We really learn only from those books which we cannot criticise.  The author of a book which we could criticise would have to learn from us.

That is the reason why the Bible will never lose its power; because, as long as the world lasts, no one can stand up and say:  I grasp it as a whole and understand all the parts of it.  But we say humbly:  as a whole it is worthy of respect, and in all its parts it is applicable.

There is and will be much discussions as to the use and harm of circulating the Bible.  One thing is clear to me mischief will result, as heretofore, by using it fantastically as a system of dogma; benefit, as heretofore, by a loving acceptance of its teachings.

I am convinced that the Bible will always be more beautiful the more it is understood; the more, that is, we see and observe that every word which we take in a general sense and apply specially to ourselves, had, under certain circumstances of time and place, a peculiar, special and directly individual reference.

If one has not read the newspapers for some months and then reads them altogether, one sees, as one never saw before, how much time is wasted with this kind of literature.

Shakespeare’s Henry IV.  If everything were lost that has ever been preserved to us of this kind of writing, the arts of poetry and rhetoric could be completely restored out of this one play.

Shakespeare’s finest dramas are wanting here and there in facility:  they are something more than they should be, and for that very reason indicate the great poet.

The dignity of Art appears perhaps most conspicuously in Music; for in Music there is no material to be deducted.  It is wholly form and intrinsic value, and it raises and ennobles all that it expresses.

It is only by Art, and especially by Poetry, that the imagination is regulated.  Nothing is more frightful than imagination without taste.

Art rests upon a kind of religious sense; it is deeply and ineradicably in earnest.  Thus it is that Art so willingly goes hand in hand with Religion.

A noble philosopher spoke of architecture as frozen music; and it was inevitable that many people should shake their heads over his remark.  We believe that no better repetition of this fine thought can be given than by calling architecture a speechless music.

In every artist there is a germ of daring, without which no talent is conceivable.

Higher aims are in themselves more valuable, even if unfulfilled, than lower ones quite attained.

In every Italian school the butterfly breaks loose from the chrysalis.

Let us be many-sided!  Turnips are good, but they are best mixed with chestnuts.  And these two noble products of the earth grow far apart.

In the presence of Nature even moderate talent is always possessed of insight; hence drawings from Nature that are at all carefully done always give pleasure.