A EUROPEAN EVENT. PART III.

...Well, here are some more of my favorite Goethe quotes:

Common sense is the genius of humanity. Yes, if there is such a thing as a ‘collective genius,’ it has to be common sense!

Daring ideas are like chessmen moved forward: they can be beaten, but they may start a winning game. In this aphorism Goethe shows both his insight into the nature of the game of chess and his understanding of how the strategy and tactics of chess are applicable to various aspects of life.

Every person above the ordinary has a mission he is called to fulfill. This is probably the best definition of an extraordinary person that can be made!

If God had wanted me other than I am, He would have created me other than I am. Deepest philosophy of human existence! It also should remind us that although we often complain to ourselves and to God about our negatives and why can’t they be separated from our positives and then erased, we need to read more of Goethe, namely the following adage of his: Our virtues and vices all spring from the same root. These two are obviously closely connected.

If you wish to know the mind of a man, listen to his words. A very good advice. I suspect that the Russians are much better at learning the minds of other men this way than most, as they are more European across the board in their culture than the modern-day Europeans, to say nothing of the other side of the ocean.

Let everyone sweep in front of his own house, and the world will be clean. In other words, if we mind our own business and do it well, the world would be a better place. This is of course my pet reading of Goethe, which does not mean that he himself had just this narrow interpretation in mind.

None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free. This sounds very close to Spinoza, but cheers to Goethe for saying this in his own words.

Superstition is the poetry of life. How deep, and how true at that depth!

The most sensible person is one who finds to his advantage everything that happens to him. I love this one in particular as it parallels one of my own historical dictums, namely that history-makers make history not so much by creating events as by appropriating whatever happens as if it were of their own doing. Today, I see the Russians in this enviable position: whatever happens in the world, they are ready to use to their own geopolitical advantage.

Whatever you cannot understand, you cannot possess. As long as we understand “possession” as a kind of reciprocal relationship, this is obviously true. Here we can see Goethe’s greatness, as he provides us with a topic for thinking, which leads us into an enquiry into the nature of ownership, which then leads us further into the depths.

We are never deceived, but we deceive ourselves. In some cases our gullibility shows our innocence, and as such it is blessed, but in most cases it shows our stupidity, like in the case of every investor into the Madoff scheme, where the exceptionally high interest rate ought to have been highly suspicious to all of his victims right from the start.

The ideal of beauty is simplicity and tranquility. Simplicity is the mark of genius, and a sign of God being there, but, of course, there is beauty and perfection both in the calm and in the storm. Beethoven, Goethe’s good friend, is a good example of the latter.

It is easier to perceive error than to find truth, for, the former lies on the surface, and is easily seen, but the latter lies in the depth where few are willing to search for it. This is in fact the finest vindication of all great philosophers that one could think of. Unlike their gloating detractors, they had the courage to search in the depths, even if all they could bring up to the surface were errors.

I could certainly go on and on with this, and, obviously, even a whole full-sized book would not be enough to exhaust the subject of Goethe. With this in mind, I now prudently bring this already oversized entry to its at any rate inevitable end.