Ye are ugly? Well then, my brethren, take the sublime about you, the mantle of the ugly!

The grand style follows suit with all great passion. It disdains to please, it forgets to persuade. It commands. It wills.

There are two types of genius; one which above all begets and wants to beget, and another which prefers being fertilized and giving birth.

Let them like the Tibetans, chew the cud of their "om mane padme hum" innumerable times, or, as in Benares, count the name of the God Ram-Ram-Ram (etc. with or without charm) on their fingers; or honour Vishnu with his thousand names of invocation, Allah with his ninety-nine; or they may make use of the prayer-wheels and the rosary: the main thing is that they are settled down for a time at this work and are tolerable to look at. This kind of prayer has been invented for the benefit of the pious who have thought and elevations of their own.

In some remote corner of the universe, poured out and glittering among innumerable solar systems, there once was a star on which clever animals invented knowledge.

It is the powerful who know how to honour, it is their art, their domain for invention.

Thoughts are the shadows of our feelings - always darker, emptier and simpler.