All that we call ideal in Greek or any other art, because to us it is false and visionary, was, to the makers of it, true and existent.

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

Commerce is the agency by which the power of choice is obtained.

In general, pride is at the bottom of all great mistakes.

No person who is not a great sculptor or painter can be an architect. If he is not a sculptor or painter, he can only be a builder.

Such help as we can give to each other in this world is a debt to each other; and the man who perceives a superiority or a capacity in a subordinate, and neither confesses nor assists it, is not merely the withholder of kindness, but the committer of injury.

I had no companions to quarrel with, nobody to assist, and nobody to thank... the evil consequence of all this was not, however, what might perhaps have been expected, that I grew up selfish or non affectionate; but that, when affection did come, it came with a violence utterly rampant and unmanageable.