The world concerns me only in so far as I have a certain debt and duty to it, because I have lived in it for thirty years and owe to it to leave behind some souvenir in the shape of drawings and paintings – not done to please any particular movement, but within which a genuine human sentiment is expressed.

The only time I feel alive is when I'm painting.

What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?

Man is not on the earth solely for his own happiness. He is there to realize great things for humanity.

When I have a terrible need of - shall I say the word - religion. Then I go out and paint the stars.

That this awareness of my own fallibility will prevent me from making many mistakes doesn't alter the fact that I'm bound to make a great many mistakes anyway. But if we fall, we get up again!

That I was not suited to commerce or academic study in no way proves that I should also be unfit to be a painter.