It is excruciating to be an unbeliever with a spirit that is deeply religious.
One sits down first; one thinks afterwards.
Without resistance you can do nothing
An artist cannot speak about his art any more than a plant can discuss horticulture.
The composer opens the cage door for arithmetic, the draftsman gives geometry its freedom.
Take a commonplace, clean it and polish it, light it so that it produces the same effect of youth and freshness and originality and spontaneity as it did originally, and you have done a poet's job. The rest is literature.