Music is like a dream. One that I cannot hear.

I liked your opera. I think I will set it to music.

I know of no more sacred duty than to rear and educate a child.

A great poet is the most precious jewel of a nation.

Rossini would have been a great composer if his teacher had spanked him enough on his backside.

Everything should be at once surprising and inevitable.

I carry my thoughts about me for a long time, often a very long time, before I write them down; meanwhile my memory is so faithful that I am sure never to forget, not even in years, a theme that has once occurred to me.