Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach Quotes - Page 3

Distrust your judgment the moment you can discern the shadow of a personal motive in it.

There is something so beautiful in trust that even the most hardened liar need feel a certain respect for those who confide in him.

Whoever prefers the material comforts of life over intellectual wealth is like the owner of a palace who moves into the servants’ quarters and leaves the sumptuous rooms empty.

We can be wise from goodness and good from wisdom.

None are so inconsiderate as those who demand nothing of life other than their own personal comfort.

"People's minds are trained largely at the expense of their hearts." This is not so; it is only that there are more educable minds than there are educable hearts.

No one is so eager to gain new experiences as he who doesn't know how to make use of the old ones.

One remains young as long as one can still learn, can still take on new habits, can bear contradictions.

Age either transfigures or petrifies.

Pain is the great teacher of mankind. Beneath its breath souls develop.

I regret nothing, says arrogance; I will regret nothing, says inexperience.

Those whom we support hold us up in life.

The simplest and most familiar truth seems new and wonderful the instant we ourselves experience it for the first time.

The wise man is seldom prudent.

Only those few people who practice it believe in goodness.

In meeting again after a separation, acquaintances ask after our outward life, friends after our inner life.

One of the main goals of self-education is to eradicate that vanity in us without which we would never have been educated.

Without imagination, there is no goodness, no wisdom.

He who believes in freedom of the will has never loved and never hated.

We are so vain that we even care for the opinion of those we don't care for.

The understanding of some men is clear, that of others brilliant. The former illumines its surroundings; the latter obscures them.

The greatest enemy of justice is privilege.

Genius points the way, talent takes it.

One has to do good in order for it to exist in the world.

You can sink so fast that you think you are flying.