Art is nature as seen through a temperament.

...Art itself may be defined as a single minded attempt to render the highest kind of justice to the visible universe, by bringing to light the truth, manifold and one, underlying its every aspect.

I always entreat the good Lord to give me my childhood back, that is to say, to grant that I may see nature and render it like a child, without prejudice.

Never lose the first impression which has moved you.

You know, a landscape painter's day is delightful. You get up early, at three o'clock in the morning, before sunrise; you go and sit under a tree; you watch and wait. At first there is nothing much to be seen. Nature looks like a whitish canvas with a few broad outlines faintly sketched in; all is misty, everything quivers in the cool dawn breeze. The sky lights up. The sun has not yet burst through the gauze veil that hides the meadow, the little valley, the hill on the horizon... Ah, a first ray of sunshine!

Don't imitate, don't follow the others, or else you will lag behind them.

Art is nature as seen through a temperament.