In Bach, the vital cells of music are united as the world is in God.

If I weren't the way I am, I shouldn't write my symphonies.

The point is not to take the world's opinion as a guiding star but to go one's way in life and working unerringly, neither depressed by failure nor seduced by applause.

In the theatrical works we love and admire the most, the ending of the drama generally takes place offstage.

It's not just a question of conquering a summit previously unknown, but of tracing, step by step, a new pathway to it.

A true personality . . . is like a robust organism that, with unconscious sureness, seeks out and digests the nourishment appropriate to it and vigorously rejects that which is unsuitable.

I hope you will no longer accuse me of a lack of delicacy. as I now count on your understanding.