One cannot develop taste from what is of average quality but only from the very best.

Three things are to be looked to in a building: that it stand on the right spot; that it is securely founded; that it be successfully executed.

Must it ever be thus-that the source of our happiness must also be the fountain of our misery? The full and ardent sentiment which animated my heart with the love of nature, overwhelming me with a torrent of delight, and which brought all paradise before me, has now become an insupportable torment, a demon which perpetually pursues and harrasses me.

Whether one show one's self a man of genius in science or compose a song, the only point is, whether the thought, the discovery, the deed, is living and can live on.

No one has ever learned fully to know themselves.

Who is the wisest man? He who neither knows or wishes for anything else than what happens.

The person born with a talent they are meant to use will find their greatest happiness in using it.