What we think or what we know or what we believe is in the end of little consequence. The only thing of consequence is what we do

Government and cooperation are in all things the laws of life. Anarchy and competition, the laws of death.

My entire delight was in observing without being myself noticed,- if I could have been invisible, all the better. . . to be in the midst of it, and rejoice and wonder at it, and help it if I could, - happier if it needed no help of mine, - this was the essential love of Nature in me, this the root of all that I have usefully become, and the light of all that I have rightly learned.

Remember always, in painting as in eloquence, the greater your strength, the quieter will be your manner, and the fewer your words; and in painting, as in all the arts and acts of life the secret of high success will be found, not in a fretful and various excellence, but in a quiet singleness of justly chosen aim.

Books are divided into two classes, the books of the hour and the books of all time.

Many thoughts are so dependent upon the language in which they are clothed that they would lose half their beauty if otherwise expressed.

You should read books like you take medicine, by advice, and not by advertisement.