Humboldt Quotes & Sayings

As soon as one stops searching for knowledge, or if one imagines that it need not be creatively sought in the depths of the human spirit but can be assembled extensively by collecting and classifying facts, everything is irrevocably and forever lost. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Among men who are really free, every form of industry becomes more rapidly improved - all the arts flourish more gracefully - all the sciences extend their range. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Women are in this respect more fortunate than men, that most of their employments are of such a nature that they can at the same time be thinking of quite different things. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

It is a characteristic of old age to find the progress of time accelerated. The less one accomplishes in a given time, the shorter does the retrospect appear. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Mere communion with nature, mere contact with the free air, exercise a soothing yet comforting and strengthening influence on the wearied mind, calm the storm of passion, and soften the heart when shaken by sorrow to its inmost depths. — Alexander Von Humboldt

This man [Alexander von Humboldt] is as knowledgeable as a whole academy. — Claude Louis Berthollet

The State is not in itself an end, but is only a means towards human development. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Tortoises can survive for weeks without food or water, easily long enough to float in the Humboldt Current from South America to the Galapagos Islands. — Richard Dawkins

It is continued temperance which sustains the body for the longest period of time, and which most surely preserves it free from sickness. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

People often say that I'm curious about too many things at once ... But can you really forbid a man from harbouring a desire to know and embrace everything that surrounds him? — Alexander Von Humboldt

But when on shore, & wandering in the sublime forests, surrounded by views more gorgeous than even Claude ever imagined, I enjoy a delight which none but those who have experienced it can understand - If it is to be done, it must be by studying Humboldt. — Charles Darwin

Whatever does not spring from a man's free choice, or is only the result of instruction and guidance, does not enter into his very being, but still remains alien to his true nature; he does not perform it with truly human energies, but merely with mechanical exactness. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

There are some races more cultured and advanced and ennobled by education than others; but there are no races nobler than others. All are equally destined for freedom. — Alexander Von Humboldt

If it were possible to make an accurate calculation of the evils which police regulations occasion, and of those which they prevent, the number of the former would, in all cases, exceed that of the latter. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Petroleum is the product of a distillation from great depth and issues from the primitive rocks beneath which the forces of all volcanic action lie. — Alexander Von Humboldt

However benevolent may be the intentions of Providence, they do not always advance the happiness of the individual. Providence has always higher ends in view, and works in a pre-eminent degree on the inner feelings and disposition. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

During the first half of the present century we had an Alexander von Humboldt, who was able to scan the scientific knowledge of his time in its details, and to bring it within one vast generalization. At the present juncture, it is obviously very doubtful whether this task could be accomplished in a similar way, even by a mind with gifts so peculiarly suited for the purpose as Humboldt's was, and if all his time and work were devoted to the purpose. — Hermann Von Helmholtz

Death is but a word to us. One's own experience alone can teach us the real meaning of the word. The sight of the dying does little. What one sees of them is merely what precedes death: dull unconsciousness is all we see. Whether this be so,
how and when the spirit wakes to life again,
this is what all wish to know, and what never can be known until it is experienced. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

How a person masters his fate is more important than what his fate is. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

The best and noblest parts of man depend precious little on culture, education, and whatever else it is called. One can never have enough respect for true humanity as it is visible in the persons of the totally uneducated classes, and never enough humility if one sometimes believes one is superior to them. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

in Chicago, which has installed a multimillion-dollar surveillance program with more than eight thousand cameras, the Urban Institute found that the cameras contributed to a 12 percent drop in crime in Humboldt Park but provided no statistically significant decline in crime in West Garfield Park. And — Julia Angwin

In every remodelling of the present, the existing condition of things must be supplanted by a new one. Now every variety of circumstances in which men find themselves, every object which surrounds them, communicates a definite form and impress to their internal nature. This form is not such that it can change and adapt itself to any other a man may choose to receive; and the end is foiled, while the power is destroyed, when we attempt to impose upon that which is already stamped in the soul a form which disagrees with it. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

It was a profound saying of Wilhelm Humboldt, that 'Man is man only by means of speech, but in order to invent speech he must be already man.' — Charles Lyell

Humboldt's glorious descriptions are & will for ever be unparalleled: but even he with his dark blue skies & the rare union of poetry with science which he so strongly displays when writing on tropical scenery, with all this falls far short of the truth,he averred. The delight one experiences in such times bewilders the mind; if the eye attempts to follow the flight of a gaudy butter-fly, it is arrested by some strange tree or fruit; if watching an insect one forgets it in the stranger flower it is crawling over; if turning to admire the splendor of the scenery, the individual character of the foreground fixes the attention. The mind is a chaos of delight, out of which a world of future & more quiet pleasure will arise. I am at present fit only to read Humboldt; he like another sun illuminates everything I behold. — Charles Darwin

I couldn't do my show without spending 12 years on the streets of Humboldt Park. It made me a better interrogator. Still, if they had taken me out of my squad car and gave me a show, I would've been terrible. But on 'Springer,' the spotlight was on Jerry and I got to grow up within the show. — Steve Wilkos

Nobody, said Humboldt, had a destiny. One simply decided to feign one until one came to believe in it oneself. But so many things didn't fit in with it, one had to really force oneself. — Daniel Kehlmann

It is a proverbial expression that every man is the maker of his own fortune, and we usually regard it as implying that every man by his folly or wisdom prepares good or evil for himself. But we may view it in another light, namely, that we may so accommodate ourselves to the dispositions of Providence as to be happy in our lot, whatever may be its privations. — Alexander Von Humboldt

I came to Berlin not to visit its museums and galleries, its operas, its theaters ... but for the sake of seeing and speaking with the world's greatest living man - Alexander von Humboldt. — Bayard Taylor

However great an evil immorality may be, we must not forget that it is not without its beneficial consequences. It is only through extremes that men can arrive at the middle path of wisdom and virtue. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

When we are not too anxious about happiness and unhappiness, but devote ourselves to the strict and unsparing performance of duty, then happiness comes of itself
nay, even springs from the midst of a life of troubles and anxieties and privations. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Freedom is but the possibility of a various and indefinite activity; while government, or the exercise of dominion, is a single, yet real activity. The longing for freedom, therefore, is at first only too frequently suggested by the deep-felt consciousness of its absence. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Man is naturally more disposed to beneficent than selfish actions. This we learn even from the history of savages. The domestic virtues have something in them so inviting and genial, and the public virtues of the citizen something so grand and inspiring, that even he who is barely uncorrupted, is seldom able to resist their charm. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Knowledge, Humboldt believed, had to be shared, exchanged and made available to everybody. — Andrea Wulf

[Alexander von] Humboldt showers us with true treasures. — Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

All growth toward perfection is but a returning to original existence. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

The most dangerous worldview is the worldview of those have not viewed the world. — Alexander Von Humboldt

Governmental regulations all carry coercion to some degree, and even where they don't, they habituate man to expect teaching, guidance and help outside himself, instead of formulating his own. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

At no other time has Nature concentrated such a wealth of valuable nourishment into such a small space as in the cocoa bean. — Alexander Von Humboldt

The price of apparent happiness and enjoyment is the neglect of the spontaneous active energies of the acting members. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Government, religion, property, books, are nothing but the scaffolding to build men. Earth holds up to her master no fruit like the finished man. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Human nature must be something which always remains one and the same, but which may be carried out in manifold ways. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

In the moral world there is nothing impossible if we can bring a thorough will to it. Man can do everything with himself, but he must not attempt to do too much with others. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Nature can be so soothing to the tormented mind — Alexander Von Humboldt

The inquiry into the proper aims and limits of State agency must be of the highest importance nay, that it is perhaps more vitally momentous than any other political question. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

For even if we know very little that is certain about spirit or soul, the true nature of the body, of materiality, is totally unknown and incomprehensible to us. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Even sleep is characteristic. How beautiful are children in their lovely innocence! how angel-like their blooming features! and how painful and anxious is the sleep of the guilty! — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Absolutely nothing is so important for a nation's culture as its language. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

It is an absolutely vain endeavor to attempt to reconstruct or even comprehend the nature of a human being by simply knowing the forces which have acted upon him. However deeply we should like to penetrate, however close we seem to be drawing to truth, one unknown quantity eludes us: man's primordial energy, his original self, that personality which was given him with the gift of life itself. On it rests man's true freedom; it alone determines his real character. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

I could not possibly have been placed in circumstances more highly favorable for study and exploration than those which I now enjoy. I am free from the distractions constantly arising in civilized life from social claims. Nature offers unceasingly the most novel and fascinating objects for learning. The only drawbacks to this solitude are the want of information on the progress of scientific discovery in Europe and the lack of all the advantages arising from an interchange of ideas. — Alexander Von Humboldt

I lay very little stress either upon asking or giving advice. Generally speaking, they who ask advice know what they wish to do, and remain firm to their intentions. A man may allow himself to be enlightened on various points, even upon matters of expediency and duty; but, after all, he must determine his course of action, for himself. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Work is as much a necessity to man as eating and sleeping. Even those who do nothing that can be called work still imagine they are doing something. The world has not a man who is an idler in his own eyes. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

You have a minute and a half left."
"Fine," she snapped. "Then I'll reduce this conversation to one single fact. Today I had six callers. Six! Can you recall the last time I had six callers?"
Anthony just stared at her blankly.
"I can't," Daphne continued, in fine form now. "Because it has never happened. Six men marched up our steps, knocked on our door, and gave Humboldt their cards. Six men brought me flowers, engaged me in conversation, and one even recited poetry."
Simon winced.
"And do you know why?" she demanded, her voice rising dangerously. "Do you?"
Anthony, in his somewhat belatedly arrived wisdom, held his tongue.
"It is all because he" - she jabbed her forefinger toward Simon - "was kind enough to feign interest in me last night at Lady Danbury's ball. — Julia Quinn

This view of a living nature where man is nothing is both odd and sad. Here, in a fertile land, in an eternal greenness, you search in vain for traces of man; you feel you are carried into a different world from the one you were born into. — Alexander Von Humboldt

Faith can be interested in results only, for a truth once recognized as such puts an end to the believer's thinking. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

The real discoverer of South America was [Alexander von] Humboldt, since his work was more useful for our people than the work of all conquerors. — Simon Bolivar

True resignation, which always brings with it the confidence that unchangeable goodness will make even the disappointment of our hopes, and the contradictions of life, conducive to some benefit, casts a grave but tranquil light over the prospect of even a toilsome and troubled life. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

I am more and more convinced that our happiness or unhappiness depends far more on the way we meet the events of life, than on the nature of those events themselves. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Before being free, it is necessary to be just — Alexander Von Humboldt

Life, in all ranks and situations, is an outward occupation, an actual and active work. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

The most dangerous worldviews are the worldviews of those who have never viewed the world. — Alexander Von Humboldt

So if a person produces an object on command, Humboldt wrote, we may admire what he did but we will despise what he is, not a true human being who acts in his own impulses and desires. — Noam Chomsky

True enjoyment comes from activity of the mind and exercise of the body; the two are ever united. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

What we glean from travellers' vivid descriptions has a special charm; whatever is far off and suggestive excites our imagination; such pleasures tempt us far more than anything we may daily experience in the narrow circle of sedentary life. — Alexander Von Humboldt

He [Alexander von Humboldt] was to science what Shakespeare was to the drama. — Robert G. Ingersoll

No matter how good or great a man may be, there is yet a better and a greater man within him. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

To behold, is not necessary to observe, and the power of comparing and combining is only to be obtained by education. It is much to be regretted that habits of exact observation are not cultivated in our schools; to this deficiency may be traced much of the fallacious reasoning, the false philosophy which prevails. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

The sum of the knowable, that soil which the human spirit must till, lies between all the languages and independent of them, at their center. But man cannot approach this purely objective realm other than through his own modes of cognition and feeling, in other words: subjectively. Just where study and research touch the highest and deepest point, just there does the mechanical, logical use of reason - whatever in us can most easily be separated from our uniqueness as individual human beings - find itself at the end of its rope. From here on we need a process of inner perception and creation. And all that we can plainly know about this is its result, namely, that objective truth always rises from the entire energy of subjective individuality. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

The sea has been called deceitful and treacherous, but there lies in this trait only the character of a great natural power, which, to speak according to our own feelings, renews its strength, and, without reference to joy or sorrow, follows eternal laws which are imposed by a higher Power. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

If we glance at the most important revolutions in history, we see at once that the greatest number of these originated in the periodical revolutions on the human mind. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Alexander von Humboldt, yet another friend, may have had Agassiz at least partly in mind when he observed that there are three stages in scientific discovery: first, people deny that it is true; then they deny that it is important; finally they credit the wrong person. At — Bill Bryson

Our imagination is struck only by what is great; but the lover of natural philosophy should reflect equally on little things. — Alexander Von Humboldt

Coercion may prevent many transgressions; but it robs even actions which are legal of a part of their beauty. Freedom may lead to many transgressions, but it lends even to vices a less ignoble form. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

If it were not somewhat fanciful to suppose that every human excellence is presented, as it were, in one kind of being, we might believe that the whole treasure of morality and order is enshrined in the female character. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

When we ... devote ourselves to the strict and unsparing performance of duty, ihen happiness comes of itself. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Cruelty to animals is one of the most significant vices of a low and ignoble people. Wherever one notices them, they constitute a sign of ignorance and brutality which cannot be painted over even by all the evidence of wealth and luxury. — Alexander Von Humboldt

Language is deeply entwined in the intellectual development of humanity itself, it accompanies the latter upon every step of its localized progression or regression; moreover, the pertinent cultural level in each case is recognizable in it ... Language is, as it were, the external manifestation of the minds of peoples. Their language is their soul, and their soul is their language. It is impossible to conceive them ever sufficiently identical ... The creation of language is an innate necessity of humanity. It is not a mere external vehicle, designed to sustain social intercourse, but an indispensable factor for the development of human intellectual powers, culminating in the formulation of philosophical doctrine. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Only what we have wrought into our character during life can we take with us. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

[Alexander von Humboldt was the] greatest scientific traveller who ever lived. — Charles Darwin

Time is the most important thing in human life, for what is pleasure after the departure of time? and the most consolatory, since pain, when pain has passed, is nothing. Time is the wheel-track in which we roll on towards eternity, conducting us to the Incomprehensible. In its progress there is a ripening power, and it ripens us the more, and the more powerfully, when we duly estimate it. Listen to its voice, do not waste it, but regard it as the highest finite good, in which all finite things are resolved. — Alexander Von Humboldt

Map reconciles himself to almost any event, however trying, if it happens in the ordinary course of nature. It is the extraordinary alone that he rebels against. There is a moral idea associated with this feeling; for the extraordinary appears to be something like an injustice of heaven. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Alexander von Humboldt's wide-ranging Views of Nature is a masterpiece of nineteenth-century natural history, at once science and art. Mark W. Person's stunning new translation makes the wonders of this classic accessible to the English-language world of the present. — Daniel Walker Howe

Possession, it is true, crowns exertion with rest; but it is only in the illusions of fancy that it has power to charm us. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

He considered telling her about his years as a big-time smuggler, but he doubted it would improve his odds of getting laid. Once upon a time, sure, absolutely - but hers was a generation that grew up on homegrown or Humboldt and thought Panama Red was a merlot. Gaspers suspected the young bartender would have been more impressed to meet a guy who worked for Apple, or maybe a professional skateboarder. — Carl Hiaasen

The mere reality of life would be inconceivably poor without the charm of fancy, which brings in its bosom, no doubt, as many vain fears as idle hopes, but lends much oftener to the illusions it calls up a gay flattering hue than one which inspires terror. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Every scientist is a descendant of Humboldt. We are all his family. — Emil Heinrich Du Bois-Reymond

Man is more disposed to domination than freedom; and a structure of dominion not only gladdens the eye of the master who rears and protects it, but even its servants are uplifted by the thought that they are members of a whole, which rises high above the life and strength of single generations. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Statistical projections which speak to the senses without fatiguing the mind, possess the advantage of fixing the attention on a great number of important facts. — Alexander Von Humboldt

A man must seek his happiness and inward peace from objects which cannot be taken away from him. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

How a person masters his or her fate is more important than what that fate is. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Insight into universal nature provides an intellectual delight and sense of freedom that no blows of fate and no evil can destroy. — Alexander Von Humboldt

Real inward devotion knows no prayer but that arising from the depths of its own feelings. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Even by means of our sorrows we belong to the eternal plan. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

Happiness is so nonsynonymous with joy or pleasure that it is not infrequently sought and felt in grief and deprivation. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

The sensual and spiritual are linked together by a mysterious bond, sensed by our emotions, though hidden from our eyes. To this double nature of the visible and invisible world - to the profound longing for the latter, coupled with the feeling of the sweet necessity for the former, we owe all sound and logical systems of philosophy, truly based on the immutable principles of our nature, just as from the same source arise the most senseless enthusiasms. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

The activities of La Condamine, Humboldt, Wallace, Bates, and other such explorers touched on only the tiniest fraction of the vastness of a world so expansive as to be impervious to harm. But today, the Amazon River Basin, occupying more than 2.7 million square miles is at our fingertips and is considered one of the most ecologically threatened regions of the world. — Kurt Johnson

God, I just love 'A Journey to the End of the Millennium,' by A. B. Yehoshua. My favorite novel by an American Jew is probably 'Humboldt's Gift.' — Michael Chabon

The philosophical study of nature endeavors, in the the vicissitudes of phenomena, to connect the present with the past. — Alexander Von Humboldt

Joy mingled with sadness, even with grief, is the deepest human joy. It winds itself about the soul with indescribable sweetness, with a dim but unerring sense for what will some day be born of it. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

The sorrow which calls for help and comfort is not the greatest, nor does it come from the depths of the heart. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt

The legislator should keep two things constantly before his eyes: 1. The pure theory developed to its minutest details; 2. The particular condition of actual things which he designs to reform. — Wilhelm Von Humboldt