But if you were to die ten times for him, you would not alter his destiny in the slightest - Hermann Hesse
A thousand times I was ready to regret and take back my rash statement - yet it had been the truth. - Hermann Hesse
People with courage and character always seem sinister to the rest. - Hermann Hesse
You were too lazy to learn to dance until it was almost too late, and in the same way you were too lazy to learn to love. As for ideal and tragic love, that I don't doubt you can do marvellously- and all honour to you. Now you will learn to love a little in an ordinary human way. - Hermann Hesse
What we can and should change is ourselves: our impatience, our egoism (including intellectual egoism), our sense of injury, our lack of love and forbearance. I regard every other attempt to change the world, even if it springs from the best intentions, as futile. - Hermann Hesse
Within yourself is a stillness and a sanctuary to which you can retreat at any time and be yourself. - Hermann Hesse
Perhaps people like us cannot love. Ordinary people can - that is their secret. - Hermann Hesse
There's no reality except the one contained within us. That's why so many people live an unreal life. They take images outside them for reality and never allow the world within them to assert itself. - Hermann Hesse
The man of power is ruined by power, the man of money by money, the submissive man by subservience, the pleasure seeker by pleasure. - Hermann Hesse
The mind cannot live in nature, only against nature, only as its counterpart. - Hermann Hesse
You are only afraid if you are not in harmony with yourself. - Hermann Hesse
Words do not express thoughts very well. They always become a little different immediately after they are expressed, a little distorted, a little foolish. - Hermann Hesse
...your tranquil yes to the changing over into the formless void of the unlimited. - Hermann Hesse
When dealing with the insane, the best method is to pretend to be sane. - Hermann Hesse
Never again!" commanded his will. "Again! Tomorrow!" begged his heart. - Hermann Hesse
Uit deze belevenissen, die niemand ziet, bestaat de innerlijke, wezenlijke lijn van ons lot. Zulk een breuk en scheur groeit weer dicht, hij heelt en wordt vergeten, maar in de diepst verborgen hoek leeft en bloedt hij verder. - Hermann Hesse
Often it is the most deserving people who cannot help loving those who destroy them. - Hermann Hesse
Ne treba žaliti ni za čim što je prošlo. Žaliti treba za Sada i Danas, za svim onim nebrojenim danima koje sam izgubio, koji su mi protekli ne donjevši mi ni darove, ni uzbuđenja. - Hermann Hesse
I will no longer mutilate and destroy myself in order to find a secret behind the ruins. - Hermann Hesse
Without words, without writing and without books there would be no history, there could be no concept of humanity. - Hermann Hesse
The sacred sense of beyond, of timelessness, of a world which had an eternal value and the substance of which was divine had been given back to me today by this friend of mine who taught me dancing. - Hermann Hesse
Knowledge can be communicated, but wisdom cannot. A man can find it, he can live it, he can be filled and sustained by it, but he cannot utter or teach it. - Hermann Hesse
He reflected deeply, until this feeling completely overwhelmed him and he reached a point where he recognized causes; for to recognize causes, it seemed to him, is to think, and through thought along feelings become knowledge and are not lost, but become real and being to mature. - Hermann Hesse
Eternity is a mere moment, just long enough for a joke. - Hermann Hesse
At the first kiss I felt something melt inside me that hurt in an exquisite way. All my longings, all my dreams and sweet anguish, All the secrets that slept deep within me came awake, Everything was transformed and enchanted, everything made sense. - Hermann Hesse
If I know what love is, it is because of you. - Hermann Hesse
Were not the gods forms created like me and you, mortal, transient? - Hermann Hesse
Was then not all sorrow in time, all self-torment and fear in time? Were not all difficulties and evil in the world conquered as soon as one conquered time, as soon as one dispelled time? - Hermann Hesse
Las palabras son nocivas para el sentido secreto de las cosas. - Hermann Hesse
Most men will not swim before they are able to. - Hermann Hesse
Loneliness is the way by which destiny endeavors to lead man to himself. - Hermann Hesse
Our mind is capable of passing beyond the dividing line we have drawn for it. Beyond the pairs of opposites of which the world consists, other, new insights begin. - Hermann Hesse
Nothing in the world is more distasteful to a man than to follow the path that leads to himself. - Hermann Hesse
It is easier to bear the worries of wandering than to find peace in your hometown, where only the sage can live in a happy house surrounded by trite troubles and daily distractions. - Hermann Hesse
If you hate a person, you hate something in him that is part of yourself. What isn't part of ourselves doesn't disturb us. - Hermann Hesse
Once he said to her: 'You are like me; you are different from other people. You are Kamala and no one else, and within you there is a stillness and sanctuary to which you can retreat any time and be yourself, just as I can. Few people have that capacity and yet everyone could have it. - Hermann Hesse
Opinions mean nothing; they may be beautiful or ugly, clever or foolish, anyone can embrace or reject them. - Hermann Hesse
Inimene pole ju mingi kindel ega püsiv vorm, pigem on ta katse ja üleminek, ei midagi muud kui riskantne sild looduse ja vaimu vahel - Hermann Hesse
It is possible for one never to transgress a single law and still be a bastard. - Hermann Hesse
Be so true to that active seed planted inside you that, in living out its growth, you can be surprised by nothing unknown to come. - Hermann Hesse
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. - Hermann Hesse
The best weapons against the infamies of life are courage, wilfulness and patience. Courage strenthens, wilfulness is fun and patience provides tranquility. - Hermann Hesse