Nothing great or enduring, especially in music, has ever sprung full-fledged and unprecedented from the brain of any master; the best he gives to the world he gathers from the hearts of the people, and runs it through the alembic of his genius.

When we arrived in London, my sadness at leaving Paris was turned into despair. After my long stay in the French capital, huge, ponderous, massive London seemed to me as ugly a thing as man could contrive to make.

Shortly after this I was made a member of the boys choir, it being found that I possessed a clear, strong soprano voice. I enjoyed the singing very much.

Young man, young man, your arm's too short to box with God.

I'm lonely I'll make me a world.

O Black and unknown bards of long ago, How came your lips to touch the sacred fire?

Labor is the fabled magician's wand, the philosophers stone, and the cap of good fortune.