Heinrich Heine Quotes & Sayings

The artist is the child in the popular fable, every one of whose tears was a pearl. — Heinrich Heine

It is extremely difficult for a Jew to be converted, for how can he bring himself to believe in the divinity of - another Jew? — Heinrich Heine

Laughter is wholesome. God is not so dull as some people make out. Did not He make the kitten to chase its tail. — Heinrich Heine

The real madness probably is not another thing that the wisdom itself that, tired of discovering the shames of the world, has taken the intelligent resolution to become mad — Heinrich Heine

Perhaps already I am dead, And these perhaps are phantoms vain; - These motley phantasies that pass At night through my disordered brain. Perhaps with ancient heathen shapes, Old faded gods, this brain is full; Who, for their most unholy rites, Have chosen a dead poet's skull ... — Heinrich Heine

People in those old times had convictions; we moderns only have opinions. And it needs more than a mere opinion to erect a Gothic cathedral. — Heinrich Heine

Wherever people burn books, there, finally, they will also burn people. — Heinrich Heine

The spring's already at the gate With looks my care beguiling; The country round appeareth straight A flower-garden smiling. — Heinrich Heine

God will forgive me the foolish remarks I have made about Him just as I will forgive my opponents the foolish things they have written about me, even though they are spiritually as inferior to me as I to thee, O God! — Heinrich Heine

Newness hath an evanescent beauty. — Heinrich Heine

I call'd the devil, and he came, And with wonder his form did I closely scan; He is not ugly, and is not lame, But really a handsome and charming man. A man in the prime of life is the devil, Obliging, a man of the world, and civil; A diplomatist too, well skill'd in debate, He talks quite glibly of church and state. — Heinrich Heine

If one has no heart, one cannot write for the masses. — Heinrich Heine

The air grows cool and darkles, The Rhine flows calmly on; The mountain summit sparkles In the light of the setting sun. — Heinrich Heine

A pine tree standeth lonely
In the North on an upland bare;
It standeth whitely shrouded
With snow, and sleepeth there.
It dreameth of a Palm tree
Which far in the East alone,
In the mournful silence standeth
On its ridge of burning stone. — Heinrich Heine

Oh fair, oh sweet and holy as dew at morning tide,
I gaze on thee, and yearnings, sad in my bosom hide. — Heinrich Heine

Thought is invisible nature. — Heinrich Heine

He only profits from praise who values criticism. — Heinrich Heine

Our sweetest hopes rise blooming. And then again are gone, They bloom and fade alternate, And so it goes rolling on. I know it, and it troubles My life, my love, my rest, My heart is wise and witty, And it bleeds within my breast. — Heinrich Heine

Woman is at once apple and serpent. — Heinrich Heine

But a day must come when the fire of youth will be quenched in my veins, when winter will dwell in my heart, when his snow flakes will whiten my locks, and his mists will dim my eyes. Then my friends will lie in their lonely grave, and I alone will remain like a solitary stalk forgotten by the reaper. — Heinrich Heine

The nightingale appear'd the first, And as her melody she sang, The apple into blossom burst, To life the grass and violets sprang. — Heinrich Heine

We should forgive our enemies, but not before they are hanged — Heinrich Heine

The fundamental evil of the world arose from the fact that the good Lord has not created money enough. — Heinrich Heine

The more i get to know people, the more i like dogs. — Heinrich Heine

He is noble who both feels and acts nobly. — Heinrich Heine

Silence is the essential condition of happiness. — Heinrich Heine

Immortality - dazzling idea! who first imagined thee! Was it some jolly burgher of Nuremburg, who with night-cap on his head, and white clay pipe in mouth, sat on some pleasant summer evening before his door, and reflected in all his comfort, that it would be right pleasant, if, with unextinguishable pipe, and endless breath, he could thus vegetate onwards for a blessed eternity? Or was it a lover, who in the arms of his loved one, thought the immortality-thought, and that because he could think and feel naught beside! - Love! Immortality! — Heinrich Heine

Those who begin by burning books will end by burning people. — Heinrich Heine

Literary history is the great morgue where all seek the dead ones whom they love, or to whom they are related. — Heinrich Heine

I have sown Dragon's teeth and reaped only fleas. — Heinrich Heine

Music played at weddings always reminds me of the music played for soldiers before they go into battle. — Heinrich Heine

The stones here speak to me, and I know their mute language. Also, they seem deeply to feel what I think. So a broken column of the old Roman times, an old tower of Lombardy, a weather-beaten Gothic piece of a pillar understands me well. But I am a ruin myself, wandering among ruins. — Heinrich Heine

The Romans would never have found time to conquer the world if they had been obliged first to learn Latin. — Heinrich Heine

God will forgive me; that's his business. — Heinrich Heine

What Christian love cannot do is effected by a common hatred. — Heinrich Heine

This was but a prelude; where books are burnt human-beings will be burnt in the end — Heinrich Heine

Where words cease, there music begins. — Heinrich Heine

But oh! the Latin!-Madame, you can really have no idea of what a mess it is. The Romans would never have found time to conquer the world if they had been obliged first to learn Latin. Lucky dogs! they already knew in their cradles the nouns ending in im. I on the contrary had to learn it by heart, in the sweat of my brow ... — Heinrich Heine

The lotus flower is troubled
At the sun's resplendent light;
With sunken head and sadly
She dreamily waits for the night. — Heinrich Heine

Experience is a good school. But the fees are high — Heinrich Heine

He who fights with priests may make up his mind to have his poor good name torn and befouled by the most infamous lies and the most cutting slanders. — Heinrich Heine

The beauteous dragonfly's dancing By the waves of the rivulet glancing; She dances here and she dances there, The glimmering, glittering flutterer fair. Full many a beetle with loud applause Admires her dress of azure gauze, Admires her body's bright splendour, And also her figure so slender ... — Heinrich Heine

There are more fools in the world than there are people. — Heinrich Heine

The people have no ear, either for rhythm or music, and their unnatural passion for pianoforte playing and singing is thus all the more repulsive. There is nothing on earth more terrible than English music, except English painting. — Heinrich Heine

Mark this well, you proud men of action: You are nothing but the unwitting agents of the men of thought who often, in quiet self-effacement, mark out most exactly all your doings in advance. — Heinrich Heine

Whenever books are burned, men also in the end are burned. — Heinrich Heine

If the Romans had been obliged to learn Latin, they would never have found the time to conquer the world. — Heinrich Heine

The violets prattle and titter, And gaze on the stars high above. — Heinrich Heine

The gazelles so gentle and clever Skip lightly in frolicsome mood. — Heinrich Heine

While we are indifferent to our good qualities, we keep on deceiving ourselves in regard to our faults, until we come to look on them as virtues. — Heinrich Heine

The arrow belongs not to the archer when it has once left the bow; the word no longer belongs to the speaker when it has once passed his lips. — Heinrich Heine

You cannot feed the hungry on statistics. — Heinrich Heine

Nothing is more futile than theorizing about music. No doubt there are laws, mathematically strict laws, but these laws are not music; they are only its conditions? The essence of music is revelation. — Heinrich Heine

Like a great poet, Nature knows how to produce the greatest effects with the most limited means. — Heinrich Heine

I do not know if she was virtuous, but she was ugly, and with a woman that is half the battle. — Heinrich Heine

Jews who long have drifted from the faith of their fathers ... are stirred in their inmost parts when the old, familiar Passover sounds chance to fall upon their ears. — Heinrich Heine

The Portuguese, Dutch and English have been for a long time year after year, shipping home the treasures of India in their big vessels. We Germans have been all along been left to watch it. Germany would do likewise, but hers would be treasures of spiritual knowledge. — Heinrich Heine

In earlier religions the spirit of the time was expressed through the individual and confirmed by miracles. In modern religions the spirit is expressed through the many and confirmed by reason. — Heinrich Heine

What lies lurk in kisses. — Heinrich Heine

With the rose the butterfly's deep in love,
A thousand times hovering round;
But round himself, all tender like gold,
The sun's sweet ray is hovering found. — Heinrich Heine

Matrimony; the high sea for which no compass has yet been invented. — Heinrich Heine

Wherever they burn books they will also, in the end, burn human beings. — Heinrich Heine

Nothing is sillier than this charge of plagiarism. There is no sixth commandment in art. The poet dare help himself wherever he lists, wherever he finds material suited to his work. He may even appropriate entire columns with their carved capitals, if the temple he thus supports be a beautiful one. Goethe understood this very well, and so did Shakespeare before him. — Heinrich Heine

Great genius takes shape by contact with another great genius, but, less by assimilation than by friction. — Heinrich Heine

Where they have burned books, they will end in burning human beings. — Heinrich Heine

Christianity is an idea, and as such is indestructible and immortal, like every idea. — Heinrich Heine

I am no longer a divine biped. I am no longer the freest German after Goethe, as Ruge named me in healthier days. I am no longer the great hero No. 2, who was compared with the grape-crowned Dionysius, whilst my colleague No. 1 enjoyed the title of a Grand Ducal Weimarian Jupiter. I am no longer a joyous, somewhat corpulent Hellenist, laughing cheerfully down upon the melancholy Nazarenes. I am now a poor fatally-ill Jew, an emaciated picture of woe, an unhappy man. — Heinrich Heine

Iron helmets will not save/
Even heroes from the grave/
Good man's blood will drain away/
While the wickid win the day. — Heinrich Heine

I do not know the meaning of my sadness; there is an old fairy tale that I cannot get out of my mind. — Heinrich Heine

Our souls must become expanded by the contemplation of Nature's grandeur, before we can fully comprehend the greatness of man. — Heinrich Heine

The years keep coming and going, Men will arise & depart; Only one thing is immortal: The love that is in my heart. — Heinrich Heine

Seriousness shows itself more majestically when laughter leads the way. — Heinrich Heine

God will forgive me. It's his job. Heine said this on his deathbed (1856). Hilarious. He must have thought that up years before and counted the seconds to use it. — Heinrich Heine

Life is the greatest of blessings and death the worst of evils ... all great, powerful souls love life. — Heinrich Heine

God will pardon: That's His business. — Heinrich Heine

In the marvelous month of May when all the buds were bursting, then in my heart did love arise. In the marvelous month of May when all the birds were singing, then did I reveal to her my yearning and longing. — Heinrich Heine

A blaspheming Frenchman is a spectacle more pleasing to the Lord than a praying Englishman. — Heinrich Heine

There is only one writer in whom I find something that reminds me of the directness of style which is found in the Bible. It is Shakespeare. — Heinrich Heine

Reason exercises merely the function of preserving order, is, so to say, the police in the region of art. In life it is mostly a cold arithmetician summing up our follies. — Heinrich Heine

You should only attempt to borrow from those who have but few of this world's goods, as their chests are not of iron, and they are, besides, anxious to appear wealthier than they really are. — Heinrich Heine

The deepest truth blooms only from the deepest love. — Heinrich Heine

In blissful dream, in silent night, There came to me, with magic might, With magic might, my own sweet love, Into my little room above. — Heinrich Heine

No compass has ever been invented for the high seas of matrimony. — Heinrich Heine

Since the Exodus, freedom has always spoken with a Hebrew accent. — Heinrich Heine

All I really want is enough to live on, a little house in the country ... and a tree in the garden with seven of my enemies hanging in it. — Heinrich Heine

Freedom is a new religion, the religion of our time. — Heinrich Heine

The sea appears all golden. Beneath the sun-lit sky. — Heinrich Heine

There is no Sixth Commandment in art. The poet is entitled to lay his hands on whatever material he finds necessary for his work. — Heinrich Heine

Of course God will forgive me; that's His job. — Heinrich Heine

It is only kindred griefs that draw forth our tears, and each weeps really for himself. — Heinrich Heine

I consider it a degradation and a stain on my honor to submit to baptism in order to qualify myself for state employment in Prussia. — Heinrich Heine

I fell asleep reading a dull book, and I dreamed that I was reading on, so I awoke from sheer boredom. — Heinrich Heine

All special charters of freedom must be abrogated where the universal law of freedom is to flourish. — Heinrich Heine

The devil take these people and their language! They take a dozen monosyllabic words in their jaws, chew them, crunch them and spit them out again, and call that speaking. Fortunately they are by nature fairly silent, and although they gaze at us open-mouthed, they spare us long conversations. — Heinrich Heine

Lo, sleep is good, better is death
in sooth
The best of all were never to be born. — Heinrich Heine

But that age ... exerts on us
An almost terrible charm,
Like the memory of things seen
And a life lived in dreams. — Heinrich Heine

So we keep asking, over and over
Until a handful of earth
Stops our mouths-
But is that an answer? — Heinrich Heine

The music at a wedding procession always reminds me of the music of soldiers going into battle. — Heinrich Heine

The same fact that Boccaccio offers in support of religion might be adduced in behalf of a republic: It exists in spite of its ministers. — Heinrich Heine

In politics, as in life, we must above all things wish only for the attainable. — Heinrich Heine