Let the painter composing narrative pictures take pleasure in wealth and variety, and avoid repeating any part that occurs in it, so that the uniqueness and abundance attract people to it and delight the eye of the observer. I say that a narrative painting requires (depending on the scene), wherever the eye falls, a mixture of men of diverse appearances, of diverse ages and dress, combined together with women, children, dogs, horses, buildings, fields, and hills.

The vine that has grown old on an old tree falls with the ruin of that tree, and through that bad companionship must perish with it.

If you do not rest on the good foundation of nature, you will labour with little honor and less profit.

Shadow is the diminution alike of light and of darkness, and stands between darkness and light.

He who possesses most must be most afraid of loss.

The poet ranks far below the painter in the representation of visible things, and far below the musician in that of invisible things.

The deeper the feeling, the greater the pain