journal | happy birthday Ludwig

Music is a higher revelation than all wisdom and philosophy. 

Nothing is more intolerable than to have to admit to yourself your own errors. 

  

The barriers are not erected which can say to aspiring talents and industry, "Thus far and no farther." 

Tones sound, and roar and storm about me until I have set them down in notes. 

What you are, you are by accident of birth; what I am, I am by myself. There are and will be a thousand princes; there is only one Beethoven.  

To play without passion is inexcusable!

It seemed unthinkable for me to leave the world forever before I had produced all that I felt called upon to produce" 

I love a tree more than a man

Then let us all do what is right, strive with all our might toward the unattainable, develop as fully as we can the gifts God has given us, and never stop learning

My misfortune is doubly painful to me because it will result in my being misunderstood. For me there can be no recreation in the company of others, no intelligent conversation, no exchange of information with peers; only the most pressing needs can make me venture into society. I am obliged to live like an outcast.

I shall seize fate by the throat.

A great poet is the most precious jewel of a nation.