The voice of our age seems by no means favorable to art, at all events to that kind of art to which my inquiry is directed. The course of events has given a direction to the genius of the time that threatens to remove it continually further from the ideal of art. For art has to leave reality, it has to raise itself bodily above necessity and neediness; for art is the daughter of freedom, and it requires its prescriptions and rules to be furnished by the necessity of spirits and not by that of matter.

When the wine goes in, strange things come out.

Even the weak become strong when they are united.

Did you think the lion was sleeping because he didn't roar?

I feel an army in my fist.

Ever building, building to the clouds, still building higher, and never reflecting that the poor narrow basis cannot sustain the giddy tottering column.

But how is the artist to protect himself against the corruption of the age which besets him on all sides?