Hermann Hesse Inspirational Quotations

Writing is good, thinking is better. Cleverness is good, patience is better.

Words do not express thoughts very well. They always become a little different immediately after they are expressed, a little distorted, a little foolish.

Seeking means: to have a goal; but finding means: to be free, to be receptive, to have no goal.

Knowledge can be communicated, but not wisdom. One can find it, live it, be fortified by it, do wonders through it, but one cannot communicate and teach it.

People with courage and character always seem sinister to the rest.

I have always believed, and I still believe, that whatever good or bad fortune may come our way we can always give it meaning and transform it into something of value.

Every man is more than just himself; he also represents the unique, the very special and always significant and remarkable point at which the world's phenomena intersect, only once in this way, and never again.

I have always thirsted for knowledge, I have always been full of questions.

Knowledge can communicated but not wisdom.

So she thoroughly taught him that one cannot take pleasure without giving pleasure, and that every gesture, every caress, every touch, every glance, every last bit of the body has its secret, which brings happiness to the person who knows how to wake it. She taught him that after a celebration of love the lovers should not part without admiring each other, without being conquered or having conquered, so that neither is bleak or glutted or has the bad feeling of being used or misused.

I live in my dreams — that's what you sense. Other people live in dreams, but not in their own. That's the difference.

This day will never come again and anyone who fails to eat and drink and taste and smell it will never have it offered to him again in all eternity. The sun will never shine as it does today...But you must play your part and sing a song, one of your best.

The true profession of a man is to find his way to himself.