The spirit's foe in man has not been simplicity, but sophistication.

It is pathetic to observe how lowly the motives are that religion, even the highest, attributes to the deity... To be given the best morsel, to be remembered, to be praised, to be obeyed blindly and punctiliously - these have been thought points of honor with the gods.

I like to walk about amidst the beautiful things that adorn the world.

I believe in general in a dualism between facts and the ideas of those facts in human heads.

why shouldnt things be largely absurd, futile, and transitory? they are so, and we are so, and they and we go together.

Beauty as we feel it is something indescribable; what it is or what it means can never be said.

In each person I catch the fleeting suggestion of something beautiful and swear eternal friendship with that.