146 Quotes by Jean Paul

We learn our virtues from our friends who love us; our faults from the enemy who hates us. We cannot easily discover our real character from a friend. He is a mirror, on which the warmth of our breath impedes the clearness of the reflection.

Death gives us sleep, eternal youth, and immortality.

Recollection is the only paradise from which we cannot be turned out.

There are souls which fall from heaven like flowers, but ere they bloom are crushed under the foul tread of some brutal hoof.

The words that a father speaks to his children in the privacy of home are not heard by the world, but, as in whispering galleries, they are clearly heard at the end, and by posterity.

Only actions give life strength; only moderation gives it charm.

Men, like bullets, go farthest when they are smoothest.

Whenever, at a party, I have been in the mood to study fools, I have always looked for a great beauty: they always gather round her like flies around a fruit stall.

Never write on a subject until you have read yourself full of it.