Industry in art is a necessity - not a virtue - and any evidence of the same, in the production, is a blemish, not a quality; a proof, not of achievement, but of absolutely insufficient work, for work alone will efface the footsteps of work.

The work of a master reeks not of the sweat of the brow - suggests no effort - and is finished from its beginning.

People will forgive anything but beauty and talent. So I am doubly unpardonable.

Nature is usually wrong.

Work alone will efface the footsteps of work.

The world is divided into two classes - invalids and nurses.

To say of a picture, as is often said in its praise, that it shows great and earnest labour, is to say that it is incomplete and unfit for view.