36 Quotes by E.T.A. Hoffmann

O prejudice, prejudice that cries out to Heaven, what a hold you have on humanity, and in particular on those specimens of humanity known as publishers!

I wished I could read in their shrivelled faces and watery eyes, I wished I could hear in the bad French which came half through their pinched lips and half through their pointed noses, how the old ladies had got at least on to good terms with the uncanny beings which haunted the castle.

Once upon a time—what author nowadays dare begin his tale in such a way? 'Old-fashioned! Boring!' cries the kind or rather unkind reader...

Suddenly you see a tall, thin man approaching, whose extraordinary costume immediately rivets your attention. Perched on top of a jet-black wig he wears a small grey felt hat, and everything else about him—coat, waistcoat, trousers, socks and shoes—is grey to match. Even his preternaturally long walking stick is painted grey. He comes striding towards you, with his great deep-set eyes staring straight at you, but appears to be quite unaware of your existence.

It may be, after all," said the Student Anselmus to himself, "that the superfine stomachic liqueur, which I took somewhat freely in Monsieur Conradi's, might really be the cause of all these shocking phantasms, which tortured me so at Archivarius Lindhorst's door.

Many years had passed, and the two Magi had quarrelled, for learned men are more ready to quarrel, the more learned they are.

You know, dear cousin, that there are some very strangely built people: at the first glance one recognizes them as deformed, and yet on closer inspection one cannot say where the deformity lies.

If you wonder at something because it has not yet happened to you, or because you think you cannot perceive the connection of cause and effect, that simply shows that your powers of perception are limited by the deficiencies of your vision. Whether your vision is naturally deficient, or sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought, I cannot say.

Leuwenhoek received Peregrinus with a repulsively unctuous display of friendship and with the servile compliments which convey an enforced and reluctant acknowledgement of superiority.