140 Germans Quotes

Following is our list of germans quotations and slogans full of insightful wisdom and perspective about germane.

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Famous Germans Quotes

Germany is an anatomical oddity: it writes with its left hand and acts with its right. — Kurt Tucholsky

The north German does not go in for extremes. He has broader horizons than the men from the mountains of Bavaria and Austria. — Karl Donitz

What, then, is this new man, the American? They are a mixture of English, Scotch, Irish, French, Dutch, Germans, and Swedes. From this promiscuous breed, that race, now called Americans, have arisen. — J. Hector St. John de Crevecoeur

In language gender is particularly confusing. Why, please, should a table be male in German, female in French, and castrated in English? — Marlene Dietrich

Dante can be understood only within the context of Italian thought, and Faust would be unthinkable if divorced from its German background; but both are part of our common cultural heritage. — Gustav Stresemann

The days of the Cross are counted. We must deliver the German nation from the pernicious influence of Christianity. — Erich Ludendorff

Languages are the pedigree of nations. — Samuel Johnson

A German singer! I should as soon expect to get pleasure from the neighing of my horse. — Frederick the Great

How do you expect the Germans to revolt when they don't even dare walk on the grass? — Joseph Stalin

Germans must fight Jews, that organized body of world criminals against whom Christ, the greatest anti-Semite of all time, had fought. — Julius Streicher

When Germany and England and America will long have lost their present identity or purpose, we shall still be strong in ours. — Maurice Samuel

It is the soldier and the army, not parliamentary majorities and decisions, that have welded the German Empire together. I put my trust in the army. — Wilhelm II

Today, Germany is on the borders of Europe everywhere. — Heinrich Himmler

They are Nietzsche's over-men, these primitive Albanians - something between kings and tigers. — Henry Noel Brailsford

We are fighting Germany, Austria and drink, and as far as I can see, the greatest of these three deadly foes is drink. — David Lloyd George

Short Germans Quotes

  • The truth is the greatest enemy of the State. — Unknown Author
  • THERE ARE TWO THINGS that don't have to mean anything, one is music and the other is laughter. — Immanuel Kant
  • We Germans fear God, but nothing else in the world. — Otto von Bismarck
  • Bees are Satan's little German Shepherds. — Theo Von
  • I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men, and German to my horse. — Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor
  • I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men, and German to my horse. — Charles V
  • Nothing is over until we decide it is! Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell, no! — John Belushi
  • Life is too short to learn German — Oscar Wilde
  • I imagine hell like this: Italian punctuality, German humour and English wine. — Peter Ustinov
  • I owe all my knowledge to the German inventor, Johannes Gutenberg! — Mehmet Murat Ildan

Goethe Quotes

German Nazism could not have succeeded in establishing itself except as a result of the theoretical contributions of Fichte, Goethe and Nietzsche, coupled with the ingenious and mighty leadership of Hitler and his comrades. — Abul A'la Maududi

Goethe has made a remark upon the perfectability of the human mind, which is full of sagacity: It is always advancing, but in a spiral line. — Madame de Stael

We know that a man can read Goethe or Rilke in the evening, that he can play Bach and Schubert, and go to his day's work at Auschwitz in the morning. — George Steiner

It is impossible to imagine Goethe or Beethoven being good at billiards or golf. — H. L. Mencken

Devotion, like fire, goeth upward. — Zoroaster

He that goeth about to persuade a multitude that they are not so well governed as they ought to be shall never want attentive and favorable hearers. — Richard Hooker

Wealth that comes quickly, goeth the same way. — George S. Clason

My understanding – of course, I’m not a philosopher or a scientist – of an aspect of Goethe’s theory of color is that he felt that color came out of tension between light and dark. I think that is very appropriate when you think about the kind of color that I shoot. — Alex Webb

The practical revolutionary will understand Goethe's 'conscience is the virtue of observers and not of agents of action'; in action, one does not always enjoy the luxury of a decision that is consistent both with one's individual conscience and the good of mankind. — Saul Alinsky

Those who are preparing for the coming of Christ should be sober, and watch unto prayer, for our adversary, the Devil, goeth about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour; whom we are to resist steadfast in the faith. — Ellen G. White

Germane Quotes

The German soldier has impressed the world, however the Italian Bersagliere soldier has impressed the German soldier. — Erwin Rommel

Our movement took a grip on cowardly Marxism and from it extracted the meaning of socialism. It also took from the cowardly middle-class parties their nationalism. Throwing both into the cauldron of our way of life there emerged, as clear as a crystal, the synthesis -- German National Socialism. — Hermann Goring

Our movement took a grip on cowardly Marxism and from it extracted the meaning of socialism. It also took from the cowardly middle-class parties their nationalism. Throwing both into the cauldron of our way of life there emerged, as clear as a crystal, the synthesis -- German National Socialism. — Hermann Goering

I met someone from the German side and we both shared the same opinion: we fought, we finished and we were friends... It wasn't worth it. — Harry Patch

My kids are around pit bulls every day. In the ’70s they blamed Dobermans, in the ’80s they blamed German Shepherds, in the ’90s they blamed the Rottweiler. Now they blame the Pit Bull. — Cesar Millan

I shot down some German planes and I got shot down myself, crashing in a burst of flames and crawling out, getting rescued by brave soldiers. — Roald Dahl

Climate policy has almost nothing to do anymore with environmental protection, says the German economist and IPCC official Ottmar Edenhofer. The next world climate summit in Cancun is actually an economy summit during which the distribution of the worlds resources will be negotiated. — Ottmar Edenhofer

The last time Boris Johnson did a deal with the Germans he came back with three nearly new water cannon. — Theresa May

Because of my flamboyant lifestyle, because of me being German, the way I am, I am the easiest person to sell as a villain. I'm the perfect target. — Kim Dotcom

When German soldiers used to come to my studio and look at my pictures of Guernica, they'd ask 'Did you do this?'. And I'd say, 'No, you did.' — Pablo Picasso

German History Quotes

All of us, who are members of the Germanic peoples, can be happy and thankful that once in thousands of years fate has given us, from among the Germanic peoples, such a genius, a leader, our Fuehrer Adolf Hitler, and you should be happy to be allowed to work with us. — Heinrich Himmler

If there had been a strong democratic sentiment in Germany, Hitler would never have come to power . [Germans] deserved what they got when they went round crying for a hero. — A. J. P. Taylor

Dachau-the significance of this name will never be erased from German history. It stands for all concentration camps which the Nazis established in their territory. — Eugen Kogon

Hitler was no inexorable product of a German 'special path', no logical culmination of long-term trends in specifically German culture and ideology. Nor was he a mere 'accident' in the course of German history. — Ian Kershaw

Cristiano reminds me of German tennis player Michael Stich. He was destined to make history, but then Boris Becker showed up. Cristiano is so fast, so strong, so incredible, but he has one problem: Leo Messi. — Jurgen Klopp

Something new has happened: For the first time in German history our fatherland is guided by a plan that considers only the needs of the people, and aims at building prosperity and reconstructing of our fatherland. — Walter Ulbricht

Occasionally I would like the German people to give us the benefit of the doubt, given our history, as opposed to assuming the worst -- assuming that we have been consistently your strong partners and that we share a common set of values. — Barack Obama

We need a war every 10 years, so we can stay match fit in case the Germans try again. — Al Murray

During the Second World War, the Germans took four years to build the Atlantic Wall. On four beaches it held up the Allies for about an hour; at Omaha it held up the U.S. for less than one day. The Atlantic Wall must therefore be regarded as one of the greatest blunders in military history. — Stephen Ambrose

The East knew and to the present day knows only that One is Free; the Greek and the Roman world, that some are free; the German World knows that All are free. The first political form therefore which we observe in History, is Despotism, the second Democracy and Aristocracy, the third, Monarchy. — G. W. F. Hegel

German Soldiers Quotes

We shall kill. If you have not killed at least one German a day, you have wasted that day... Do not count days; do not count miles. Count only the number of Germans you have killed. — Ilya Ehrenburg

I could not have the honour of being a German soldier because of my imprisonment in the First World War. And in this world war the Fuehrer refuses to allow me to serve as a soldier. — Fritz Sauckel

I believe German soldiers are good and decent, and if they did anything wrong it was because of military necessity. — Wilhelm Keitel

Every German soldier must be made to feel that he is living under the muzzle of a Russian gun. — Vasily Chuikov

Very little changed fundamentally, except that the proud German soldier had turned into a defeated bundle of misery and the great German army had disintegrated. — George Grosz

I call on God Almighty to have mercy on the German people. More than two million German soldiers went to their death for the fatherland before me. I follow now my sons - all for Germany. — Wilhelm Keitel

When Hitler declared war on the United States, he was betting that German soldiers, raised up in the Hitler Youth, would always out fight American soldiers, brought up in the Boy Scouts. He lost that bet. The Boy Scouts had been taught how to figure their way out of their own problems. — Stephen Ambrose

In the mind of all the English soldiers there is absolutely no hate for the Germans, but a kind of brotherly though slightly comtemptuous kindness - as to men who are going through a bad time as well as ourselves. — Ivor Gurney

Consideration of any kind are a crime against the German people and the soldier at the front. — Wilhelm Keitel

In the first World War British propaganda had to invent the stories of German soldiers bayoneting Belgian babies, because there were too few real atrocities to feed the hatred against the enemy. — Erich Fromm

German Language Quotes

Still, Lenin personally also forced through the deportation in fall 1922 of theologians, linguists, historians, mathematicians, and other intellectuals on two chartered German ships, dubbed the Philosophers’ Steamers. GPU notes on them recorded: “knows a foreign language,” “uses irony.” — Stephen Kotkin

You can never understand one language until you understand at least two. — Geoffrey Willans

German poetry is going in a very different direction from French poetry.... Its language has become more sober, more factual. It distrusts "beauty." It tries to be truthful. — Paul Celan

The English language was carefully, carefully cobbled together by three blind dudes and a German dictionary — Dave Kellett

Never knew before what eternity was made for. It is to give some of us a chance to learn German. — Mark Twain

I tried to learn the languages - Italian, Spanish, and German - not to successfully. Working on a European set isn't a hell of a lot different from working on an American set. — Lee Van Cleef

I don't believe there is anything in the whole earth that you can't learn in Berlin except the German language. — Mark Twain

whenever the literary german dives into a sentence, this is the last you are going to see of him till he emerges on the other side of his atlantic with his verb in his mouth. — Mark Twain

How charmed I am when I overhear a German word which I understand! — Mark Twain

In early times some sufferer had to sit up with a toothache, and he put in the time inventing the German language. — Mark Twain

German Shepherds Quotes

The most striking features of the correctly bred German Shepherds are firmness of nerves, attentiveness, unshockability, tractability, watchfulness, reliability and incorruptibility together with courage, fighting tenacity and hardness. — Max von Stephanitz

I have the brain of a German Shepherd and the body of a 16-year-old boy; they’re both in my car and I want you to see them — Bob Saget

Oh, that dog! Ever hear of a German Shepherd that bites its nails? Barks with a lisp? You say, "Attack!" And he has one. All he does is piddle. He's nothing but a fur-covered kidney that barks. — Phyllis Diller

I have German Shepherds that I train and have brought back to Germany. I love going there. — Ted Shackelford

To a space alien or a German Shepherd dog, two humans would be indistinguishable, just as attractive and unattractive space aliens and German Shepherd dogs are difficult for you to tell apart. — David Eagleman

I was named after the next-door neighbor's German shepherd. It was either that or Cadillac Smith. — Rex Smith

Jacob is a German Shepherd. (I have never understood why they aren't called German Sheepdogs. What do the Germans call shepherds?) — Alan Coren

I love dogs. I grew up with dogs in my family from the time that I was a little boy; we always had German Shepherds and Labradors. I get on very well with dogs, they trust me. — Paul Walker

I vote Democrat because I love the fact that I can now marry whatever I want. I've decided to marry my German Shepherd. — David Letterman

I grew up on a farm in Pennsylvania, where my parents raised German shepherds - we had about 30 dogs at any given time. — Tory Burch

German Quotes

It has since been agreed that speeches given in English will be translated into French and vice versa, and even into German and Italian when necessary. No doubt translations into Esperanto will also soon be in demand. — Fredrik Bajer

A German officer visited Picasso in his Paris studio during the Second World War. There he saw Guernica and, shocked at the modernist «chaos» of the painting, asked Picasso: «Did you do this?» Picasso calmly replied: «No, you did this!» — Slavoj Žižek

I paint German artists whom I admire. I paint their pictures, their work as painters, and their portraits too. But oddly enough, each of these portraits ends up as a picture of a woman with blonde hair. I myself have never been able to work out why this happens. — Georg Baselitz

The executions of agents, partisans, saboteurs, suspicious people, indulging in espionage and sabotage, and those who were of a detrimental effect to the German Army, were, in my opinion, completely in accordance with the Hague Convention. — Paul Blobel

The carrying out of the Potsdam Agreement has, however, been obstructed by the failure of the Allied Control Council to take the necessary steps to enable the German economy to function as an economic unit. — James F. Byrnes

I always thought of myself as more American than Americans when I was living in Germany, because I always had this attitude of can-do, and if you're successful, you can show it, which is a very un-German thing, you know. — Kim Dotcom

Naturally enough, I couldn't have foreseen the vast sea change which has come upon that scene as a result of German reunification and associated events. — Brian Ferneyhough

Like so many of our people, we have now had a personal experience of German barbarity which only strengthens the resolution of all of us to fight through to final victory. — George VI

I am not a man who believes that we Germans bled and conquered thirty years ago [to be] pushed aside when great international decisions are made. If that were to happen, the place of Germany as a world power would be gone for ever. I am not prepared to let that happen. — Wilhelm II

Don't let the actions of a few determine the way you feel about an entire group. Remember, not all German's were Nazis. — Erin Gruwell

People Writing About Germans

Name Quotes Likes
Read quotes by Kurt Tucholsky

Kurt Tucholsky

13 140
Read quotes by Karl Donitz

Karl Donitz
quotes on education, war and religion

13 232
Read quotes by Marlene Dietrich

Marlene Dietrich
quotes on love, education and friendship

94 2108
Read quotes by Gustav Stresemann

Gustav Stresemann
quotes on life, music and friendship

32 206
Read quotes by Samuel Johnson

Samuel Johnson
quotes on writing, life and love

1736 7561
Read quotes by Frederick the Great

Frederick the Great
quotes on religion, war

63 1784

More Germans Quotes

I worked at a factory owned by Germans, at coal pits owned by Frenchmen, and at a chemical plant owned by Belgians. There I discovered something about capitalists. They are all alike, whatever the nationality. All they wanted from me was the most work for the least money that kept me alive. So I became a communist. — Nikita Khrushchev

Our German Fatherland to which I hope will be granted... to become in the future as closely united, as powerful, and as authoritative as once the Roman world-empire was, and that, just as in the old times they said, Civis romanus sum, hereafter, at some time in the future, they will say, I am a German citizen. — Wilhelm II

The peoples of Yugoslavia do not want Fascism. They do not want a totalitarian regime, they do not want to become slaves of the German and Italian financial oligarchy as they never wanted to become reconciled to the semi-colonial dependence imposed on them by the so-called Western democracies after the first imperialist war. — Josip Broz Tito

When I came back to the United States, I decided that if you could use propaganda for war, you could certainly use it for peace. And "propaganda" got to be a bad word because of the Germans using it, so what I did was to try and find some other words so we found the word "councelor of public relations". — Edward Bernays

All dogs can become aggressive, but the difference between an aggressive Chihuahua and an aggressive pit bull is that the pit bull can do more damage. That's why it's important to make sure you are a hundred percent ready for the responsibility if you own a 'power' breed, like a pit bull, German shepherd, or Rottweiler. — Cesar Millan

After the war, he became a big proponent of the argument that chemical warfare or gas warfare was actually a more humane form of warfare than shrapnel and bombs, because he saw what all those shrapnel and bombs did to all the boys who climbed out of the trenches and tried to cross no man's land, with German machine guns and artillery on the other side, he said I'll take the gas any day. I'm not making the case for gas warfare, but the idea that getting killed by gas is more horrible than getting ripped apart by shrapnel and bullets is not one I buy. And when I see the Obama administration putting pictures of people killed by gas up on the internet, I say let's put pictures of the people who got killed by shrapnel up there, and lets have a debate about which pictures look worse. It won't even be an interesting debate, getting killed by shrapnel, in my opinion, is a lot more gruesome and a lot worse. — John Mearsheimer

If during the wild rumors of 1914–17, the imagined treason of the tsarist court to the Germans had never been real, in 1918, the abject sellout to the Germans by the Bolsheviks was all too real. The August 27 treaty was a worse capitulation than Brest-Litovsk, and one that Lenin voluntarily sought. He was bribing his way to what he hoped was safety from German overthrow as well as the right to call upon German help against attempted Entente overthrow. — Stephen Kotkin

Sometimes, however, the Gaelic blood asserts itself. The Frenchmen will then attack. But the French attacking spirit is like bottled lemonade. It lacks tenacity. The Englishmen, on the other hand, one notices that they are of Germanic blood. Sportsmen easily take to flying, and Englishmen see in flying nothing but a sport. — Manfred von Richthofen

In 2012, when the European financial bailouts, to keep Greece afloat and in the euro currency zone, began and demands for Greek austerity measures were made, the geographical divide soon became obvious. The donors and demanders were the northern countries, the recipients and supplicants mostly southern. It didn’t take long for Germans to point out that they were working until 65 but paying taxes that were going to Greece so people could retire at 55. — Tim Marshall

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