Natural abilities can almost compensate for the want of every kind of cultivation, but no cultivation of the mind can make up for the want of natural abilities.

All that is good in art is the expression of one soul talking to another, and is precious according to the greatness of the soul that utters it.

A great thing can only be done by a great person; and they do it without effort.

No art can be noble which is incapable of expressing thought, and no art is capable of expressing thought which does not change.

The scholar is early acquainted with every department of the impossible.

The infinity of God is not mysterious, it is only unfathomable; not concealed, but incomprehensible; it is a clear infinity, the darkness of the pure unsearchable sea.

He who has learned what is commonly considered the whole art of painting, that is, the art of representing any natural object faithfully, has as yet only learned the language by which his thoughts are to be expressed.