The basis of all true cosmic horror is violation of the order of nature, and the profoundest violations are always the least concrete and describable.

That which we call substance and reality is shadow and illusion, and that which we call shadow and illusion is substance and reality.

Blue, green, grey, white, or black; smooth, ruffled, or mountainous; that ocean is not silent.

If I am mad, it is mercy! May the gods pity the man who in his callousness can remain sane to the hideous end!

I know always that I am an outsider; a stranger in this century and among those who are still men.

I could not help feeling that they were evil things -- mountains of madness whose farther slopes looked out over some accursed ultimate abyss.

If I could create an ideal world, it would be an England with the fire of the Elizabethans, the correct taste of the Georgians, and the refinement and pure ideals of the Victorians.