“Why assume that to look is to see?”

“Today we haven't the heart to expel the painters and poets from society because we refuse to admit to ourselves that there is any danger in keeping them in our midst.”

“For a long time I limited myself to one colour - as a form of discipline.”

“All things considered, there is only Matisse.”

“If everybody is looking for it, then nobody is finding it. If we were cultured, we would not be conscious of lacking culture. We would regard it as something natural and would not make so much fuss about it. And if we knew the real value of this word we would be cultured enough not to give it so much importance.”

“I love a ballad but even too well if it be doleful matter merrily set down, or a very pleasant thing indeed and sung lamentably.”

“If it be true that good wine needs no bush, 'tis true that a good play needs no epilogue.”

“The object of Art is to give life a shape.”

“The object of Art is to give life a shape.”

“I have heard it saidThere is an art which in their piedness sharesWith great creating nature.”

“The astronomers said, 'Give us matter and a little motion and we will construct the universe. It is not enough that we should have matter, we must also have a single impulse, one shove to launch the mass and generate the harmony of the centrifugal and centripetal forces.' ... There is no end to the consequences of the act. That famous aboriginal push propagates itself through all the balls of the system, and through every atom of every ball.”

“Let the end try the man.”

“All is well ended, if the suit be won.”

“Where you start is not as important as where you finish.”

“Things won are done, joy's soul lies in the doing.”

“Science finds it methods.”

“Not in his goals but in his transitions, man is great.”

“I have been studying how I may compare This prison where I live unto the world; And, for because the world is populous, And here is not a creature but myself, I cannot do it. Yet I'll hammer it out.”

“Retire me to my Milan, whereEvery third thought shall be my grave.”

“I have neither the scholar's melancholy, which is emulation; nor the musician's, which is fantastical; nor the courtier's, which is proud; not the soldier's which is ambitious; nor the lawyer's, which is politic; nor the lady's, which is nice; nor the lover's, which is all these: but it is a melancholy of mine own, compounded of many simples, extracted from many objects, and indeed the sundry contemplation of my travels, which, by often rumination, wraps me in a most humorous sadness.”

“He is not worthy of the honey-comb, that shuns the hives because the bees have stings.”

“Men that hazard allDo it in hope of fair advantages:A golden mind stoops not to shows of dross.”

“Were it goodTo set the exact wealth of all our statesAll at one cast? to set so rich a mainOn the nice hazard of one doubtful hour?It were not good.”

“For in that sleep of death what dreams may come.”

“O! that a man might know The end of this day's business, ere it come; But it sufficeth that the day will end, And then the end is known.”

“My thoughts are whirled like a potter's wheel; I know not where I am nor what I do.”