Does anyone really know where they're going to?

First move me, astonish me, break my heart, let me tremble, weep, stare, be enraged-only then regale my eyes.

We swallow with one gulp the lie that flatters us, and drink drop by drop the truth which is bitter to us.

Shakespeare's fault is not the greatest into which a poet may fall. It merely indicates a deficiency of taste.

How easy it is to tell tales!

Only passions, and great passions, can raise the soul to great things. Without them there is no sublimity, either in morals or in creativity. Art returns to infancy, and virtue becomes small-minded.

In order to get as much fame as one's father one has to much more able than he.