A classical work doesn't ever have to be understood entirely. But those who are educated and who are still educating themselves must desire to learn more and more from it.
Interpretation
Classical works are valuable for continuous learning, even if not fully understood.
This quote emphasizes the importance of classical literature as a resource for education and self-improvement. It suggests that one does not need to grasp every detail of a classical work to benefit from it; rather, the act of engaging with such works fosters a desire for deeper knowledge and understanding, which is essential for personal growth and lifelong learning.
In practice
In a speech about the value of literature, one might quote this to emphasize the ongoing journey of learning.
Prudishness is pretense of innocence without innocence. Women have to remain prudish as long as men are sentimental, dense, and evil enough to demand of them eternal innocence and lack of education. For innocence is the only thing which can ennoble lack of education.
If you want to see mankind fully, look at a family. Within the family minds become organically one, and for this reason the family is total poetry.
He who does not become familiar with nature through love will never know her.
Religion can emerge in all forms of feeling: here wild anger, there the sweetest pain; here consuming hatred, there the childlike smile of serene humility.
A priest is he who lives solely in the realm of the invisible, for whom all that is visible has only the truth of an allegory.
Versatility of education can be found in our best poetry, but the depth of mankind should be found in the philosopher.
Some books leave us free and some books make us free.
A fondness for reading, which, properly directed, must be an education in itself.
Learn how to cook! That's the way to save money. You don't save it buying hamburger helpers, and prepared foods; you save it by buying fresh foods in season or in large supply, when they are cheapest and usually best, and you prepare them from scratch at home. Why pay for someone else's work, when if you know how to do it, you can save all that money for yourself?
I cannot imagine myself fitting into the existing curriculum. I am too self-willed for that and have had my own very definite ideas for a long time, very different from the existing ways, as to how architecture is to be taught.
Excellence is a better teacher than mediocrity. The lessons of the ordinary are everywhere. Truly profound and original insights are to be found only in studying the exemplary.
Grammar is a piano I play by ear.
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