“Where painting is weakest, namely, in the expression of the highest moral and spiritual ideas, there music is sublimely strong.
“It's a matter of taking the side of the weak against the strong, something the best people have always done
“The bitterest creature under heaven is the wife who discovers that her husband's bravery is only bravado, that his strength is only a uniform, that his power is but a gun in the hands of a fool.
“Our society must make it right and possible for old people not to fear the young or be deserted by them, for the test of a civilization is the way that it cares for its helpless members
“There are certain things in which mediocrity is not to be endured, such as poetry, music, painting, public speaking
“The 'morality of compromise' sounds contradictory. Compromise is usually a sign of weakness, or an admission of defeat. Strong men don't compromise, it is said, and principles should never be compromised
“People in high life are hardened to the wants and distresses of mankind as surgeons are to their bodily pains
“The more a man can forget, the greater the number of metamorphoses which his life can undergo, the more he can remember the more divine his life becomes
“This is something that I cannot get over, that a whole line could be written by half a man, that a work could be built on the quicksand of a character