The plea of ignorance will never take away our responsibilities.

The eye is continually influenced by what it cannot detect; nay, it is not going too far, to say that it is most influenced by what it detects least. Let the painter define, if he can, the variations of lines on which depend the change of expression in the human countenance.

He thinks by infection, catching an opinion like a cold.

Life being very short, and the quiet hours of it few, we ought to waste none of them in reading valueless books.

The greatest efforts of the race have always been traceable to the love of praise, as the greatest catastrophes to the love of pleasure.

No divine terror will ever be found in the work of the man who wastes a colossal strength in elaborating toys; for the first lesson that terror is sent to teach us is, the value of the human soul, and the shortness of mortal time.

In order that people may be happy in their work, these three things are needed: They must be fit for it. They must not do too much of it. And they must have a sense of success in it.