Hermann Quotes & Sayings

We may regard the cell quite apart from its familiar morphological aspects, and contemplate its constitution from the purely chemical standpoint. We are obliged to adopt the view, that the protoplasm is equipped with certain atomic groups, whose function especially consists in fixing to themselves food-stuffs, of importance to the cell-life. Adopting the nomenclature of organic chemistry, these groups may be designated side-chains. We may assume that the protoplasm consists of a special executive centre (Leistungs-centrum) in connection with which are nutritive side-chains... The relationship of the corresponding groups, i.e., those of the food-stuff, and those of the cell, must be specific. They must be adapted to one another, as, e.g., male and female screw (Pasteur), or as lock and key (E. Fischer). — Paul R. Ehrlich

Not eternal is the world of appearances, not eternal ,anything but eternal are our garments and the style of our hair ,our bodies themselves.I am wearing a rich mans garments because i have been a rich man but i am no rich man anymore what i will be tomorrow i dont know — Hermann Hesse

The question for the ultimate foundations and the ultimate meaning of mathematics remains open; we do not know in which direction it will find its final solution nor even whether a final objective answer can be expected at all. "Mathematizing" may well be a creative activity of man, like language or music, of primary originality, whose historical decisions defy complete objective rationalization. — Hermann Weyl

Under the Nazis enormous numbers of people were compelled to spend an enormous amount of time marching in serried ranks from point A to point B and back again to point A. "This keeping of the whole population on the march seemed to be a senseless waste of time and energy. Only much later," adds Hermann Rauschning, "was there revealed in it a subtle intention based on a well-judged adjustment of ends and means. Marching diverts men's thoughts. Marching kills thought. Marching makes an end of individuality. Marching is the indispensable magic stroke performed in order to accustom the people to a mechanical, quasi-ritualistic activity until it becomes second nature. — Aldous Huxley

Those who are too lazy and comfortable to think for themselves and be their own judges obey the laws. Others sense their own laws within them. — Hermann Hesse

Sentimentality is a basking in feelings that in reality you don't take seriously enough to make the slightest sacrifice to or ever translate into action. — Hermann Hesse

Every phenomenon on earth is symbolic, and each symbol is an open gate through which the soul, if it is ready, can enter into the inner part of the world, where you and I and day and night are all one. — Hermann Hesse

He saw that the water continually flowed and flowed and yet it was always there; it was always the same and yet every moment it was new. — Hermann Hesse

I wanted only to live in accord with the promptings which came from my true self. Why was that so very difficult? — Hermann Hesse

It is good, he thought, to taste for oneself all that it is necessary to know. Already as a child I learned that worldly desires and wealth were not good things. I have known this for a long time but have only now experienced it. And now I do know it, know it not only with my memory but with my eyes, with my heart, and with my stomach. How glad I am to know it! — Hermann Hesse

Now, the external work of man is of the most varied kind as regards the force or ease, the form and rapidity, of the motions used on it, and the kind of work produced. — Hermann Von Helmholtz

The world was beautiful when looked at in this way - without any seeking, so simple, so childlike. — Hermann Hesse

The world is not imperfect or slowly evolving along a path to perfection. No, it is perfect at every moment, every sin already carries grace in it. — Hermann Hesse

But out of all secrets of the river, he today only saw one, this one touched his soul. He saw: this water ran and ran, incessantly it ran, and was nevertheless always there, was always at all times the same and yet new in every moment! Great be he who would grasp this, understand this! He understood and grasped it not, only felt some idea of it stirring, a distant memory, divine voices. — Hermann Hesse

I don't know. I really don't know. Perhaps that would be best, I thought I wanted it myself. But today I'm no longer sure what I really want and desire. Before, everything was simple, as simple as letters in my textbook. Now nothing is simple any more, not even the letters. Everything has taken on many meanings and faces. I don't know what will become of me, I can't think about that now. — Hermann Hesse

Both, the thoughts as well as the senses, were pretty things, the ultimate meaning was hidden behind both of them, — Hermann Hesse

I am in truth the Steppenwolf that I often call myself; that beast astray that finds neither home nor joy nor nourishment in a world that is strange and incomprehensible to him. — Hermann Hesse

He sat thus, lost in meditation, thinking Om, his soul as the arrow directed at Brahman. — Hermann Hesse

I like to win. If I lose, I'm not very happy. — Hermann Maier

The human body is the only machine for which there are no spare parts. — Hermann Biggs

An opportunity to allow the bees in one's bonnet to buzz even more noisily than usual. — Hermann Bondi

Hermann Goering, Joachim von Ribbentrop, Albert Speer, Walther Frank, Julius Streicher and Robert Ley did pass under my inspectionand interrogation in 1945 but they only proved that National Socialism was a gangster interlude at a rather low order of mental capacity and with a surprisingly high incidence of alcoholism. — John Kenneth Galbraith

When someone seeks," said Siddhartha, "then it easily happens that his eyes see only the thing that he seeks, and he is able to find nothing, to take in nothing because he always thinks only about the thing he is seeking, because he has one goal, because he is obsessed with his goal. Seeking means: having a goal. But finding means: being free, being open, having no goal. — Hermann Hesse

During that very first conversation, about the araucaria, he called himself the Steppenwolf, and this too estranged and disturbed me a little. What an expression! However, custom did not only reconcile me to it, but soon I never thought of him by any other name; nor could I today hit on a better description of him. A wolf of the Steppes that had lost its way and strayed into the towns and the life of the herd, a more striking image could not be found for his shy loneliness, his savagery, his restlessness, his homesickness, his homelessness. — Hermann Hesse

Love can be begged, bought, or received as a gift, one can find it in the street, but one cannot steal it. — Hermann Hesse

One of the disadwantages of school and learning, he thought dreamily, was that the mind seemed to have the tendency too see and represent all things as though they were flat and had only two dimensions. This, somehow, seemed to render all matters of intellect shallow and worthless ... — Hermann Hesse

All knowledge attains its ethical value and its human significance only by the human sense with which it is employed. Only a good man can be a great physician. — Hermann Nothnagel

I have had to experience so much stupidity, so many vices, so much error, so much nausea, disillusionment and sorrow, just in order to become a child again and begin anew. I had to experience despair, I had to sink to the greatest mental depths, to thoughts of suicide, in order to experience grace. — Hermann Hesse

And many years later, as an adult student of history, Knecht was to perceive more distinctly that history cannot come into being without the substance and the dynamism of this sinful world of egoism and instinctuality, and that even such sublime creations as the Order were born in this cloudy torrent and sooner or later will be swallowed up by it again ... Nor was this ever merely an intellectual problem for him. Rather, it engaged his innermost self more than any other problem, and he felt it as partly his responsibility. His was one of those natures which can sicken, languish, and die when they see an ideal they have believed in, or the country and community they love, afflicted with ills. — Hermann Hesse

The maker of kitsch does not create inferior art, he is not an incompetent or a bungler, he cannot be evaluated by aesthetic standards; rather, he is ethically depraved, a criminal willing radical evil. And since it is radical evil that is manifest here, evil per se, forming the absolute negative pole of every value-system, kitsch will always be evil, not just kitsch in art, but kitsch in every value-system that is not an imitation system. — Hermann Broch

The First Flowers
Beside the brook
Toward the willows,
During these days
So many yellow flowers have opened
Their eyes into gold.
I have long since lost my innocence, yet a memory
Touches my depth, the golden hours of morning, and gazes
Brilliantly upon me out of the eyes of flowers.
I was going to pick flowers;
Now I leave them all standing
And walk home, an old man. — Hermann Hesse

[Newton's calculations] entered the marrow of what we know without knowing how we know it. — Hermann Bondi

The world melted away all around him, when he stood alone like a star in the sky — Hermann Hesse

Look, my dear Govinda, this is one of my thoughts, which I have found: wisdom cannot be passed on. Wisdom which a wise man tries to pass on to someone always sounds like foolishness." "Are — Hermann Hesse

Haller belongs to those who have been caught between two ages, who are outside of all security and simple acquiescence. He belongs to those whose fate it is to live the whole riddle of human destiny heightened to the pitch of a personal torture, a personal hell. — Hermann Hesse

The rockets ... can be built so powerfully that they could be capable of carrying a man aloft. — Hermann Oberth

Faith and doubt go hand in hand, they are complementaries. One who never doubts will never truly believe. — Hermann Hesse

I have already given some account of the Steppenwolf's outward appearance. He gave at the very first glance the impression of a significant, an uncommon, and unusually gifted man. His — Hermann Hesse

When you like someone, you like them in spite of their faults. When you love someone, you love them with their faults. — Hermann Hesse

There's no reality except the one contained within us. That's why so many people live an unreal life. They take images outside them for reality and never allow the world within them to assert itself. — Hermann Hesse

With a [democratic] government anyone in principle can become a member of the ruling class or even the supreme power. The distinction between the rulers and the ruled as well as the class consciousness of the ruled become blurred. The illusion even arises that the distinction no longer exists: that with a public government no one is ruled by anyone, but everyone instead rules himself. Accordingly, public resistance against government power is systematically weakened. While exploitation and expropriation before might have appeared plainly oppressive and evil to the public, they seem much less so, mankind being what it is, once anyone may freely enter the ranks of those who are at the receiving end. Consequently, [exploitation will increase], whether openly in the form of higher taxes or discretely as increased governmental money "creation" (inflation) or legislative regulation. — Hans-Hermann Hoppe

War is not, in itself, a condition so much as the symptom of a condition - that of international anarchy. — Alfred Hermann Fried

But what a path it has been! I have had to pass through so much foolishness, so much vice, so much error, so much nausea and disillusionment and wretchedness, merely in order to become a child again and be able to start over. But all of this was just and proper. — Hermann Hesse

Among Jews, there is an absence of drunkenness, always a fruitful source of domestic strife and misconduct. — Hermann Adler

And then, for an hour, he became aware of the strange life he was leading, of him doing lots of things which were only a game, of, though being happy and feeling joy at times, real life still passing him by and not touching him — Hermann Hesse

I was initially assigned to the American Consulate in Aden, not as Principal Officer but as a supernumerary officer to handle Yemen affairs. We had no resident diplomatic mission in Yemen at the time. People from Aden went up to Yemen regularly. — Hermann Eilts

How beautiful the world was when one looked at it, without searching ... just looked, simply and innocently. — Hermann Hesse

They knew everything, the Brahmans and their holy books, they knew everything, they had taken care of everything and of more than everything, the creation of the world, the origin of speech, of food, of inhaling, of exhaling, the arrangement of the senses, the acts of the gods, they knew infinitely much - but was it valuable to know all of this, not knowing that one and only thing, the most important thing, the solely important thing? — Hermann Hesse

Nothing is harder yet nothing is more necessary, than to speak of certain things whose existence is neither demonstrable nor probable. The very fact that serious and conscientious men treat them as existing things brings them a step closer to existence and to the possibility of being born.
Spoken by Albertus Secundus in Das Glasperlenspiel — Hermann Hesse

Many verses of the holy books, above all the Upanishads of Sama-Veda spoke of this innermost thing. It is written: "Your soul is the whole world." It says that when a man is asleep, he penetrates his innermost and dwells in Atman. There was wonderful wisdom in these verses; all the knowledge of the sages was told here in enchanting language, pure as honey collected by the bees. — Hermann Hesse

Fortunately, like most children, I had learned what is most valuable, most indispensable for life before school years began, taught by apple trees, by rain and sun, river and woods ... — Hermann Hesse

If a person were to concentrate all his will power on a certain end, then he would achieve it. That's all. — Hermann Hesse

Is not every life, every work fine? — Hermann Hesse

Painting is marvelous; it makes you happier and more patient. Afterwards you do not have black fingers as with writing, but blue and red ones. — Hermann Hesse

As she wanders along the river like this, one hand on her hip and the other clutching a mark to defray her expenses, she is in well-known country. — Hermann Broch

It was necessary to organize my career to remain at the top level until Salt Lake City. — Hermann Maier

You broke through the humor of my little theater and tried to make a mess of it, stabbing with knives and spattering our pretty picture-world with the mud of reality. — Hermann Hesse

The musician writes for the orchestra what his inner voice sings to him; the painter rarely relies without disadvantage solely upon the images which his inner eye presents to him; nature gives him his forms, study governs his combinations of them. — Hermann Ebbinghaus

Liberation from ego is what we shramanas are seeking, O Exalted One. If I were your disciple, O Venerable One, I'm afraid it might befall me that my ego would be pacified and liberated only seemingly, only illusorily, that in reality it would survive and grow great, for then I would make the teaching, my discipleship, my love for you, and the community of the monks into my ego! — Hermann Hesse

Above all, I shall see to it that the enemy will not be able to drop any bombs. — Hermann Goring

How absurd these words are, such as beast and beast of prey. One should not speak of animals in that way. They may be terrible sometimes, but they're much more right than men ... They're never in any embarrassment. They always know what to do and how to behave themselves. They don't flatter and they don't intrude. They don't pretend. They are as they are, like stones or flowers or stars in the sky. — Hermann Hesse

But each person is not only himself, he is also the unique, very special point, important and noteworthy in every instance, where the phenomena of the world meet, once only and never again in the same way. And so every person's story is important, eternal, divine; and so every person, to the extent that he lives and fulfills nature's will, is wondrous and deserving of full attention. In each of us spirit has become form, in each of us the created being suffers, in each of us a redeemer is crucified. Not — Hermann Hesse

Nothing is caused by demons. There are no demons. Everyone can perform magic, everyone can reach his goal, if he can think, wait, and fast. — Hermann Hesse

It is my conclusion that UFOs do exist, are very real, and are spaceships from another or more than one solar system. They are possibly manned by intelligent observers who are members of a race carrying out long-range scientific investigations of our earth for centuries. — Hermann Oberth

And please," Ilsa Hermann advised her, "don't punish yourself, like you said you would. Don't be like me, Liesel. — Markus Zusak

The true profession of a man is to find his way to himself. — Hermann Hesse

If what matters in a person's existence is to accept the inevitable consciously, to taste the good and bad to the full and to make for oneself a more individual, unaccidental and inward
destiny alongside one's external fate, then my life has been neither empty nor worthless. — Hermann Hesse

I was not a good scholar, and during my last year at school I made little effort. This was not due to laziness ... , but to a state of youthful day-dreaming and indifference ... that was only ... pierced when creative desire enveloped me like ether. — Hermann Hesse

A thousand times I was ready to regret and take back my rash statement - yet it had been the truth. — Hermann Hesse

I was an avid reader of futurists during the 1970s and '80s. They were so wrong - about everything. — Hermann E. Ott

In his heart he heard the voice talking, which was newly awaking, and it told him: Love this water! Stay near it! Learn from it! Oh yes, he wanted to learn from it, he wanted to listen to it. He who would understand this water and its secrets, so it seemed to him, would also understand many other things, many secrets, all secrets. — Hermann Hesse

How foolish it is to wear oneself out in vain longing for warmth! Solitude is independence. — Hermann Hesse

My real self wanders elsewhere, far away, wanders on and on invisibly and has nothing to do with my life. — Hermann Hesse

Whoever, in the pursuit of science, seeks after immediate practical utility, may generally rest assured that he will seek in vain. — Hermann Von Helmholtz

seriousness, young man, is an accident of time — Hermann Hesse

I lost races because I wanted too much to win them in beating my rivals. — Hermann Maier

And they didn't like to pay with trust and love, but rather with money and goods. They betrayed each other and expected being betrayed themselves. — Hermann Hesse

In every truth, the opposite is equally true. A truth can only be expressed and enveloped in words if it is one-sided. — Hermann Hesse

My gift and uniqueness consist in this: I store images of the external world in my head, and out of them I am able to produce new images and arrangements only for myself. I can conceive the entire world in my mind. That is, I can create it anew. — Hermann Hesse

And out of the awareness of sameness grew the desire for differentiation. — Hermann Hesse

Natural selection based on the differential multiplication of variant types cannot exist before there is material capable of replicating itself and its own variations, that is, before the origination of specifically genetic material or gene-material. — Hermann Joseph Muller

What I remember most clearly was that when I put down a suggestion that seemed to me cogent and reasonable, Einstein did not in the least contest this, but he only said, 'Oh, how ugly.' As soon as an equation seemed to him to be ugly, he really rather lost interest in it and could not understand why somebody else was willing to spend much time on it. He was quite convinced that beauty was a guiding principle in the search for important results in theoretical physics. — Hermann Bondi

To nobody can you communicate in words and teachings, what happened to you in your hour of enlightenment. — Hermann Hesse

This little theater of mine has as many doors into as many boxes as you please, ten or a hundred thousand, and behind each door exactly what you seek awaits you. It is a pretty cabinet of pictures, my dear friend; but it would be quite useless to go through it as you are. You would be checked and blinded by it at every turn by what you are pleased to call your personality. You have no doubt guessed long since that the conquest of time and the escape from reality, or however else it may be that you choose to describe your longing, means simply the wish to be relieved of your so-called personality. That is the prison where you lie. — Hermann Hesse

We marked men were not at all worried about the shape the future would take. — Hermann Hesse

Out of this moment when the world melted away all around him, when he stood alone like a star in the sky, out of this moment of cold and despair, Siddhartha emerged, more himself than before, firmer in his resolve. — Hermann Hesse

But be warned, oh seeker of knowledge, of the thicket of opinions and of arguing about words. — Hermann Hesse

Possibly the apparent relapse they had suffered was not a fall and a cause for suffering, but a leap forward and a positive act. — Hermann Hesse

This one was so lively and talkative, she paid no attention to him or his shyness, so he withdrew his feelers awkwardly and a little offended crawled back into himself like a snail brushed by a cartwheel. — Hermann Hesse

Some days, I just love the physical space of the theater. I love theaters; they are heartbreakingly beautiful to me. — Peter Hermann

Doesn't your learning reveal to you that the reason why I please you and mean so much to you is because I am a kind of looking-glass for you, because there is something in me that answers you and understands you? Really, we ought all to be such looking-glasses to each other and answer and correspond to each other. — Hermann Hesse

Besides language and music, it [mathematics] is one of the primary manifestations of the free creative power of the human mind, and it is the universal organ for world understanding through theoretical construction. Mathematics must therefore remain an essential element of the knowledge and abilities which we have to teach, of the culture we have to transmit, to the next generation. — Hermann Weyl

Gratitude is not a virtue I believe in, and to me it seems hypocritical to expect it from a child. — Hermann Hesse

If I were wise, I shouldn't tell you. But I won't be wise, Harry, not for this time. I'll be just the opposite. So now mind what I say! You will hear it and forget it again. You will laugh over it, and you will weep over it. So look out! I am going to play with you for life and death, little brother, and before we begin the game I'm going to lay my cards on the table. — Hermann Hesse

Between the dark, heavily laden treetops of the spreading chestnut trees could be seen the dark blue of the sky, full of stars, all solemn and golden, which extended their radiance unconcernedly into the distance. That was the nature of the stars. and the trees bore their buds and blossoms and scars for everyone to see, and whether it signified pleasure or pain, they accepted the strong will to live. flies that lived only for a day swarmed toward their death. every life had its radiance and beauty. i had insight into it all for a moment, understood it and found it good, and also found my life and sorrows good. — Hermann Hesse

If you order, with the absolute conviction that his wish will come, it will happen that way. But you mix the desire, fear and regret, and that is a contradiction. — Hermann Hesse

Every experience has its element of magic. — Hermann Hesse

The highest art ... sets down its creations and trusts in their magic, without fear of not being understood. — Hermann Hesse

Every ego so far from being a unity is in the highest degree a manifold world, a constellated heaven, a chaos of forms, of states and stages, of inheritances and potentialities. It appears to be a necessity as imperative as eating and breathing for everyone to be forced to regard this chaos as a unity and to speak of his ego as though is was a one-fold and clearly detached and fixed phenomenon. Even the best of us shares this delusion. — Hermann Hesse

Oh, if only it were possible to find understanding," Joseph exclaimed. "If only there were a dogma to believe in. Everything is contradictory, everything tangential; there are no certainties anywhere. Everything can be interpreted one way and then again interpreted in the opposite sense. The whole of world history can be explained as development and progress and can also be seen as nothing but decadence and meaninglessness. Isn't there any truth? Is there no real and valid doctrine?"
The master had never heard him speak so fervently. He walked on in silence for a little, then said: "There is truth, my boy. But the doctrine you desire, absolute, perfect dogma that alone provides wisdom, does not exist. Nor should you long for a perfect doctrine, my friend. Rather, you should long for the perfection of yourself. The deity is within you, not in ideas and books. Truth is lived, not taught. Be prepared for conflicts, Joseph Knecht - I can see that they already have begun. — Hermann Hesse