The human understanding, when any preposition has been once laid down... forces everything else to add fresh support and confirmation; and although more cogent and abundant instances may exist to the contrary, yet it either does not observe them or it despises them, or it gets rid of and rejects them by some distinction, with violent and injurious prejudice, rather than sacrifice the authority of its first conclusions.

Before I start painting I have a slightly ambiguous feeling: happiness is a special excitement because unhappiness is always possible a moment later.

We cannot command Nature except by obeying her.

Our humanity is a poor thing, except for the divinity that stirs within us.

The breath of flowers is far sweeter in the air than in the hand.

The general root of superstition is that men observe when things hit, and not when they miss, and commit to memory the one, and pass over the other.

Wonder is the seed of knowledge