No one is willing to believe that adults too, like children, wander about this earth in… — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
No one is willing to believe that adults too, like children, wander about this earth in a daze and, like children, do not know where they come from or where they are going, act as rarely as they do according to genuine motives, and are as thoroughly governed as they are by biscuits and cake and the rod.
In the original German
Erwachsene gleich Kindern auf diesem Erdboden herumtaumeln und wie jene nicht wissen, woher sie kommen und wohin sie gehen, ebensowenig nach wahren Zwecken handeln, ebenso durch Biskuit und Kuchen und Birkenreiser regiert werden: das will niemand gern glauben.
The Sorrows of Young Werther · 1774
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Current citation
Von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang. "The Sorrows of Young Werther." The Sorrows of Young Werther and Selected Writings, translated by Catherin Hutter. Signet, 2013.
Original citation
Von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang. Die Leiden des jungen Werthers [The Sorrows of Young Werther]. Leipzig: Weygand'sche Buchhandlung, 1774.
