The Classic Pamela Positive: Divide and Rule…Unite and Lead

He was brilliant, insightful and troubled at times, too… but this is a great quote from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe:

“Divide and rule, a sound motto;

unite and lead, a better one.”

―Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

It’s sad sometimes how, per Goethe’s quote above, we at times need to separate into distinct groups in order to have harmony…but in a close future, the habit will be one of uniting…and so a better you, me, all of us.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) was a German poet, playwright, novelist, and natural philosopher, best known for his two-part poetic drama Faust, which he started around the age of twenty-three and didn’t finish until shortly before his death sixty years later. He is considered one of the greatest contributors of the German Romantic period. At the age of sixteen, in 1765, Goethe went to Leipzig University to study law as his father wished, though he also gained much recognition from the Rococo poems and lyrics he wrote during this period. In 1766 he fell in love with Anne Catharina Schoenkopf (1746-1810) and wrote his joyfully exuberant collection of poems Annette.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe formally married Christiane Vulpius in October 1806. He was opposed to the church ceremony that was, at the time, the only way of being legally married, so, although she bore Goethe a son, August, in 1789, he didn’t marry her until the Napoleonic army sacked the city in which they lived.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe now rests in the Fürstengruft or “Royal Tomb” in the “Historic Cemetery” in Weimar where his dear friend Schiller is also laid to rest. In honor of these two famous German men of letters, a statue of Goethe and Schiller now stands at the German National Theatre in Munich. UNESCO’S “Memory of the World” list includes the handwritten works of Goethe preserved by the Goethe-Schiller-Archive.

Bio Source: The Literature Network  Fig¹. Photo by Adeolu Eletu on Unsplash