The chief mourner does not always attend the funeral.

But there are higher secrets of culture, which are not for the apprentices, but for proficients. These are lessons only for the brave. We must know our friends under ugly masks. The calamities are our friends.

Life too near paralyses art.

Pride is handsome, economical; pride eradicates so many vices, letting none subsist but itself, that it seems as if it were a great gain to exchange vanity for pride.

Thought is the blossom; language the bud; action the fruit behind it.

Every man's task [his 'great dream' and impassioned life-goal] is his life preserver.

Men are what their mothers made them.