If the imagination is shackled, and nothing is described but what we see, seldom will anything truly great be produced either in Painting or Poetry
Thomas ColeOverall, rocks, wood and water, brooded the spirit of repose, and the silent energy of nature stirred the soul to its innermost depths.
Thomas ColeNone know how often the hand of God is seen in a wilderness but them that rove it for a man's life.
Thomas Cole. . .nature is still predominant, and there are those who regret that with the improvements of cultivation the sublimity of the wilderness should pass away: for those scenes of solitude from which the hand of nature has never been lifted, affect the mind with a more deep toned emotion than aught which the hand of man has touched. Amid them the consequent associations are of God the creator-they are his undefiled works, and the mind is cast into the contemplation of eternal things.
Thomas Cole