"Whatever we may say against collections, which..." - Quote by Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

Whatever we may say against collections, which present authors in a disjointed form, they nevertheless bring about many excellent results. We are not always so composed, so full of wisdom, that we are able to take in at once the whole scope of a work according to its merits. Do we not mark in a book passages which seem to have a direct reference to ourselves? Young people especially, who have failed in acquiring a complete cultivation of mind, are roused in a praiseworthy way by brilliant passages.
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More by Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

“Tolerance should, strictly speaking, be only a passing mood; it ought to lead to acknowledgment and appreciation. To tolerate a person is to affront him.”
— Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
“We must always change, renew, rejuvenate ourselves; otherwise, we harden.”
— Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
“Treat a person as they are, they will remain so. Treat a person the way that person can be and is capable of being and that person will become as he or she can be and should be.”
— Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

More on Reading

“[If a book were] very innocent, and one which might be confided to the reason of any man; not likely to be much read if let alone, but if persecuted, it will be generally read. Every man in the United States will think it a duty to buy a copy, in vindication of his right to buy and to read what he pleases.”
— Thomas Jefferson
“My father's little library consisted chiefly of books in polemic divinity, most of which I read, and have since often regretted that, at a time when I had such a thirst for knowledge, more proper books had not fallen in my way since it was now resolved I should not be a clergyman.”
— Benjamin Franklin
“Often I sit up in my room reading the greatest part of the night, when the book was borrowed in the evening and to be returned early in the morning, lest it should be missed or wanted.”
— Benjamin Franklin

More on Learning

“For imitation is natural to man from his infancy. Man differs from other animals particularly in this, that he is imitative, and acquires his rudiments of knowledge in this way; besides, the delight in it is universal.”
— Aristotle
“I absolutely cannot see how one can later make up for having failed to go to a good school at the proper time. For this is what distinguishes the hard school as a good school from all others: that much is demanded; and sternly demanded; that the good, even the exceptional, is demanded as the norm; that praise is rare, that indulgence is nonexistent; that blame is apportioned sharply, objectively, without regard for talent or antecedents. What does one learn in a hard school? Obeying and commanding.”
— Friedrich Nietzsche
“Supposing is good, but finding out is better.”
— Mark Twain