A bishop keeps on saying at the age of eighty what he was told to say at the age of eighteen.

If it took Labouchere three columns to prove that I was forgotten, then there is no difference between fame and obscurity.

The nineteenth century is a turning point in history, simply on account of the work of two men, Darwin and Renan, the one the critic of the Book of Nature, the other the critic of the books of God. Not to recognise this is to miss the meaning of one of the most important eras in the progress of the world.

Surely Love is a wonderful thing. It is more precious than emeralds, and dearer than fine opals. Pearls and pomegranates cannot buy it, nor is it set forth in the marketplace. It may not be purchased of the merchants, for can it be weighed out in the balance for gold.

Art is the only serious thing in the world. And the artist is the only person who is never serious.

Wordsworth went to the Lakes, but he was never a lake poet. He found in stones the sermons he had already hidden there.

Yes, I am a thorough republican. No other form of government is so favorable to the growth of art.