Imperfection is in some sort essential to all that we know of life. It is the sign of life in a mortal body, that is to say, of a state of progress and change. Nothing that lives is, or can be rigidly perfect; part of it is decaying, part nascent.

There is no wealth but life.

There is rough work to be done, and rough men must do it; there is gentle work to be done, and gentlemen must do it.

An infinitude of tenderness is the chief gift and inheritance of all truly great men.

Give me some mud off a city crossing, some ochre out of a gravel pit and a little whitening and some coal dust and I will paint you a luminous picture if you give me time to gradate my mud and subdue my dust.

No human being, however great, or powerful, was ever so free as a fish.

Greatness is the aggregation of minuteness; nor can its sublimity be felt truthfully by any mind unaccustomed to the affectionate watching of what is least.