Words do not express thoughts very well. They always become a little different immediately after they are expressed, a little distorted, a little foolish. And yet it also pleases me and seems right that what is of value and wisdom to one man seems nonsense to another.

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Sometimes quoted in grammatically corrected form as "They always become a little different immediately after they are expressed..." but the apparent editing error here is retained in the published versions of this translation.

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Hermann Hesse (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.