Nicht Quotes & Sayings

Honestly, I cannot understand what people mean when they talk about the freedom of the human will. I have a feeling, for instance, that I will something or other; but what relation this has with freedom I cannot understand at all. I feel that I will to light my pipe and I do it; but how can I connect this up with the idea of freedom? What is behind the act of willing to light the pipe? Another act of willing? Schopenhauer once said: Der Mensch kann was er will; er kann aber nicht wollen was er will (Man can do what he will but he cannot will what he wills). — Albert Einstein

Gude nicht, and joy be wi' you a'. — Carolina Nairne

Yes! Very funny this terrible thing is. A man that is born falls into a dream like a man who falls into the sea. If he tries to climb out into the air as inexperienced people endeavour to do, he drowns
nicht wahr?
... No! I tell you! The way is to the destructive element submit yourself, and with the exertions of your hands and feet in the water make the deep, deep sea keep you up.
So if you ask me
how to be? — Joseph Conrad

To blow is not to play on the flute; you must move the fingers.
[Ger., Blasen ist nicht floten, ihr musst die Finger bewegen.] — Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

Not "brook" [in German: Bach], but "sea" should he [Johann Sebastian Bach] be called because of his infinite, inexhaustible richness in tone combinations and harmonies.

(Nicht Bach! Meer sollte er heissen: wegen seines unendlichen, unerschoepflichen Reichtums an Tonkombinationen und Harmonien.) — Ludwig Van Beethoven

Until you got ice cream spilled on you, you're not doing field work — Randy Pausch

America is the most compassionate country in the entire world. We do more for folks around this world. And that's the nature of the American people. — Bobby Jindal

The original fib was dreary enough, the additional biographical titbits positively inane. — Kate Morton

Who can think wise or stupid things at all that were not thought already in the past.
[Ger., Wer kann was Dummes, wer was Kluges denken,
Das nicht die Vorwelt schon gedacht.] — Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

You can, in short, lead the life of the mind, which is, despite some appalling frustrations, the happiest life on earth. And one day, in the thick of this, approaching some partial vision, you will (I swear) find yourself on the receiving end of - of all things - an "idea for a story," and you will, God save you, start thinking about writing some fiction of your own. Then you will understand, in what I fancy might be a blinding flash, that all this passionate thinking is what fiction is about, that all those other fiction writers started as you did, and are laborers in the same vineyard. — Annie Dillard

Ruhe gibt es nicht, bis zum Schluss. Und dann? Auch am Schluss steht noch ein Fragezeichen.
(There is no peace until the end and even then there would still be a question mark.) — Klaus Mann

They drove on, through pretty Schwabisch villages. Every one of them had its Christbaum, a tall evergreen in the center of town, with candles lit as darkness fell, and a star on top. There were also candles in every window, and red-berried holly weaths hung on the doors. By the side of the road, at the entry to each village, stood a sign attacking the Jews. This was, Mercier thought, a kind of competition, for none of the signs were the same. Juden dirfen nicht bleiben - 'Jews must not stay here' - was followed by Wer die Juden unterstuzt fordert den Kommunissmus, 'Who helps the Jews helps communism,' then the dramatic 'This flat-footed stranger, with kinky hair and hooked nose, he shall not our land enjoy, he must leave, he must leave. — Alan Furst

No, no! The devil is an egotist,
And is not apt, without why or wherefore,
"For God's sake," others to assist.
[Ger., Nein, nein! Der Teufel ist ein Egoist
Und thut nicht leicht um Gottes Willen,
Was einem Andern nutzlich ist.] — Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

6.4311
Der Tod ist kein Ereignis des Lebens. Den Tod erlebt man nicht.
Wenn man unter Ewigkeit nicht unendliche Zeitdauer, sondern Unzeitlichkeit versteht, dann lebt der ewig, der in der Gegenwart lebt.
Unser Leben ist ebenso endlos, wie unser Gesichtsfeld grenzenlos ist.
6.4311
Death is not an event of life. Death is not lived through.
If by eternity is understood not endless temporal duration but timelessness, then he lives eternally who lives in the present.
Our life is endless in the way that our visual field is without limit. — Ludwig Wittgenstein

Der Mensch kann tun was er will; er kann aber nicht wollen was er will.
Man can do what he wills but he cannot will what he wills. — Arthur Schopenhauer

These are modern times, nicht? Not our grandmother's days. There's more to life than finding some lord and master and being under his thumb. I swear I'll never live in such a prison! — Phyllis Edgerly Ring

We walked where the ancient pier juts into the sea.
Stood on the rim of the pool, by the circle
of black boulders. No one saw we were there
and everyone who had ever been there
stood silently in air.
Where else do we ever have to go, and why? — Naomi Shihab Nye

Neither art thou the man to catch the fiend and hold him! [Ger., Du bist noch nicht der Mann den Teufel festzuhalten. — Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

Prince Andrei recognized Wolzogen and Clausewitz, accompanied by a Cossack. They passed close by, continuing to converse, and Pierre and Andrei involuntarily heard the following phrases: "Der Krieg muss im Raum verlegt werden. Der Ansicht kann ich nicht genug Preis geben,"* said one. "O ja," said the other voice. — Leo Tolstoy

At night I sometimes see the figure of a man, on an empty road in a deserted landscape, walking behind a hearse. I am that man. It's you the hearse is taking away. I don't want to be there for your cremation; I don't want to be given an urn with your ashes in it. I hear the voice of Kathleen Ferrier singing, 'Die Welt ist leer, Ich will nicht leben mehr'* and I wake up. I check your breathing, my hand brushed over you. Neither of us wants to outlive the other. We've often said to ourselves that if, by some miracle, we were to have a second life, we'd like to spend it together.
*The world is empty. I don't want to go on living. — Andre Gorz

It was well said of a certain German book that 'er lasst sich nicht lesen" - it does not permit itself to be read. — Edgar Allan Poe

The words 'believe' and 'repent' are now largely replaced by other terms such as "Give your life to Christ', 'Open your heart to Christ', 'Do it now', 'Surrender completely', 'Decide for Christ', etc., and in similar language those who profess conversion are sometimes represented as having 'given in'. — Iain H. Murray