Led by long years to my last hours, too late, O world, I know your joys for what they are. You promise a peace which is not yours to give and the repose that dies before it is born. The years of fear and shame to which Heaven now set a term, renew nothing in me but the old sweet error in which, living overlong a man kills his soul with no gain to his body. I say and I know having put it to the proof, that he has the better part in Heaven whose death falls nearest his birth.

I am still learning. (at age 87)

Perchance that I might learn what pity is, That I might laugh at erring men no more.

I already have a wife who is too much for me.. she is my art, and my works are my children.

Beauty is the purgation of superfluities.

From such a gentle thing, from such a fountain of all delight, my every pain is born.

The idea is there locked inside. All you have to do is remove the excess stone.