The Greeks possessed a knowledge of human nature we seem hardly able to attain to without passing through the strengthening hibernation of a new barbarism.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
New, Through, Strengthening, Greeks
Much can be inferred about a man from his mistress: in her one beholds his weaknesses and his dreams.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Her, Weaknesses, His, Mistress
Prejudices are so to speak the mechanical instincts of men: through their prejudices they do without any effort many things they would find too difficult to think through to the point of resolving to do them.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Think, Through, Prejudices, Resolving
Just as the performance of the vilest and most wicked deeds requires spirit and talent, so even the greatest demand a certain insensitivity which under other circumstances we would call stupidity.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Circumstances, Other, Which, Wicked
What is the good of drawing conclusions from experience? I don't deny we sometimes draw the right conclusions, but don't we just as often draw the wrong ones?
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Sometimes, Often, Deny, Conclusions
Be wary of passing the judgment: obscure. To find something obscure poses no difficult, elephants and poodles find many things obscure.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Obscure, Judgment, Wary, Elephants
With prophecies the commentator is often a more important man than the prophet.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Important, More, Than, Commentator
It is a question whether, when we break a murderer on the wheel, we do not fall into the error a child makes when it hits the chair it has bumped into.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Question, Wheel, Break, Bumped
To be content with life or to live merrily, rather all that is required is that we bestow on all things only a fleeting, superficial glance; the more thoughtful we become the more earnest we grow.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Grow, Fleeting, Rather, Glance
That man is the noblest creature may also be inferred from the fact that no other creature has yet contested this claim.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Fact, Other, May, Noblest
Delight at having understood a very abstract and obscure system leads most people to believe in the truth of what it demonstrates.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Abstract, Very, Having, Delight
Every man has his moral backside which he refrains from showing unless he has to and keeps covered as long as possible with the trousers of decorum.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Which, Backside, Trousers, Decorum
A book is a mirror: if an ape looks into it an apostle is hardly likely to look out.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Mirror, Looks, Likely, Hardly
Even truth needs to be clad in new garments if it is to appeal to a new age.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Brainy, Needs, New Age, Garments
We say that someone occupies an official position, whereas it is the official position that occupies him.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Say, Someone, Official, Whereas
To receive applause for works which do not demand all our powers hinders our advance towards a perfecting of our spirit. It usually means that thereafter we stand still.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Which, Receive, Means, Perfecting
God created man in His own image, says the Bible; philosophers reverse the process: they create God in theirs.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Bible, Process, Image, Philosophers
When an acquaintance goes by I often step back from my window, not so much to spare him the effort of acknowledging me as to spare myself the embarrassment of seeing that he has not done so.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Myself, Back, Goes, Acknowledging
Many things about our bodies would not seem to us so filthy and obscene if we did not have the idea of nobility in our heads.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Idea, Nobility, Bodies, Filthy
Perhaps in time the so-called Dark Ages will be thought of as including our own.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
History, Perhaps, Including, So-Called
One might call habit a moral friction: something that prevents the mind from gliding over things but connects it with them and makes it hard for it to free itself from them.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Mind, Over, Gliding, Friction
We cannot remember too often that when we observe nature, and especially the ordering of nature, it is always ourselves alone we are observing.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Nature, Always, We Cannot, Observing
Actual aristocracy cannot be abolished by any law: all the law can do is decree how it is to be imparted and who is to acquire it.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
How, Actual, Decree, Aristocracy
We have no words for speaking of wisdom to the stupid. He who understands the wise is wise already.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Wise, Stupid, Speaking, No Words
With most people disbelief in a thing is founded on a blind belief in some other thing.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Blind, Some, Most, Disbelief
Man is to be found in reason, God in the passions.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Man, Reason, Found, Passions
Here take back the stuff that I am, nature, knead it back into the dough of being, make of me a bush, a cloud, whatever you will, even a man, only no longer make me me.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Nature, Will, Here, Dough
It is almost everywhere the case that soon after it is begotten the greater part of human wisdom is laid to rest in repositories.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Rest, Laid, Almost, Case
The fly that doesn't want to be swatted is most secure when it lights on the fly-swatter.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Fly, Want, Most, Lights
He who is in love with himself has at least this advantage - he won't encounter many rivals.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Love, Himself, Advantage, Encounter
There exists a species of transcendental ventriloquism by means of which men can be made to believe that something said on earth comes from Heaven.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Made, Which, Means, Ventriloquism
The human tendency to regard little things as important has produced very many great things.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Little Things, Important, Produced
He who says he hates every kind of flattery, and says it in earnest, certainly does not yet know every kind of flattery.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Kind, Flattery, Certainly, Earnest
Everyone is a genius at least once a year. The real geniuses simply have their bright ideas closer together.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Intelligence, Year, Everyone, Once A Year
The most dangerous untruths are truths slightly distorted.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Most, Slightly, Truths, Distorted
The most perfect ape cannot draw an ape; only man can do that; but, likewise, only man regards the ability to do this as a sign of superiority.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Perfect, Superiority, Sign, Likewise
If all else fails, the character of a man can be recognized by nothing so surely as by a jest which he takes badly.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Which, Badly, Surely, Jest
What is called an acute knowledge of human nature is mostly nothing but the observer's own weaknesses reflected back from others.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Nature, Acute, Mostly, Human Nature
Doubt must be no more than vigilance, otherwise it can become dangerous.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
More, Than, Otherwise, Vigilance
I believe that man is in the last resort so free a being that his right to be what he believes himself to be cannot be contested.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Last, Being, I Believe That, Resort
It is in the gift for employing all the vicissitudes of life to one's own advantage and to that of one's craft that a large part of genius consists.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Gift, Large, Advantage, Employing
Man is a masterpiece of creation if for no other reason than that, all the weight of evidence for determinism notwithstanding, he believes he has free will.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Reason, Other, Evidence, Creation
To do the opposite of something is also a form of imitation, namely an imitation of its opposite.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Opposite, Form, Namely, Imitation
The pleasures of the imagination are as it were only drawings and models which are played with by poor people who cannot afford the real thing.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Poor People, Which, Models, Real Thing
Men still have to be governed by deception.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Men, Deception, Still, Governed
To err is human also in so far as animals seldom or never err, or at least only the cleverest of them do so.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
To Err Is Human, Err, Least, Cleverest
With a pen in my hand I have successfully stormed bulwarks from which others armed with sword and excommunication have been repulsed.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Been, Which, Successfully, Sword
A person reveals his character by nothing so clearly as the joke he resents.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Character, Person, His, Joke
There is no greater impediment to progress in the sciences than the desire to see it take place too quickly.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
See, Sciences, Take, Greater
Man loves company - even if it is only that of a small burning candle.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Small, Burning, Even, Candle
Erudition can produce foliage without bearing fruit.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Fruit, Produce, Bearing, Erudition
Sickness is mankind's greatest defect.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Sickness, Mankind, Greatest, Defect
Just as we outgrow a pair of trousers, we outgrow acquaintances, libraries, principles, etc., at times before they're worn out and times - and this is the worst of all - before we have new ones.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
New, Before, Worn, Outgrow
We accumulate our opinions at an age when our understanding is at its weakest.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Opinions, Weakest, Accumulate
If people should ever start to do only what is necessary millions would die of hunger.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Die, Necessary, Ever, Hunger
Never undertake anything for which you wouldn't have the courage to ask the blessings of heaven.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Never, Which, Undertake, Heaven
Nowadays three witty turns of phrase and a lie make a writer.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Lie, Phrase, Nowadays, Witty
Nothing is more conducive to peace of mind than not having any opinion at all.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Mind, Conducive, Having, Opinion
Nothing can contribute more to peace of soul than the lack of any opinion whatever.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Soul, Nothing, More, Opinion
Once we know our weaknesses they cease to do us any harm.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Cease, Harm, Once, Weaknesses
If you are going to build something in the air it is always better to build castles than houses of cards.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Cards, Always, Going, Castles
A handful of soldiers is always better than a mouthful of arguments.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Better, Always, Than, Handful
One must judge men not by their opinions, but by what their opinions have made of them.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Men, Made, Must, Opinions
I am convinced we do not only love ourselves in others but hate ourselves in others too.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Love, I Am, Convinced, Only Love
To grow wiser means to learn to know better and better the faults to which this instrument with which we feel and judge can be subject.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Grow, Which, Means, Faults
We are obliged to regard many of our original minds as crazy at least until we have become as clever as they are.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Minds, Original, Obliged, Clever
Virtue by premeditation isn't worth much.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Worth, Virtue, Much, Premeditation
The sure conviction that we could if we wanted to is the reason so many good minds are idle.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Reason, Minds, Sure, Conviction
There are people who possess not so much genius as a certain talent for perceiving the desires of the century, or even of the decade, before it has done so itself.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Decade, Desires, Before, Possess
If the little bit you have is nothing special in itself, at least find a way of saying it that is a little bit special.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Special, Find, Itself, Little Bit
The noble simplicity in the works of nature only too often originates in the noble shortsightedness of him who observes it.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Nature, Works, Too, Noble
Nothing makes one old so quickly as the ever-present thought that one is growing older.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Growing, Thought, Old, Quickly
There are very many people who read simply to prevent themselves from thinking.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Themselves, Very, Read, Prevent
The American who first discovered Columbus made a bad discovery.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Bad, Made, Discovered, Discovery
I cannot say whether things will get better if we change; what I can say is they must change if they are to get better.
- Georg C. Lichtenberg
Will, Say, I Can, Change
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