A room hung with pictures is a room hung with thoughts.

There is no expedient to which a man will not resort to avoid the real labor of thinking.

The real character of a man is found out by his amusements.

Few have been taught to any purpose who have not been their own teachers.

Our Exhibitions [The Royal Academy] have... a mischievous tendency, by seducing the Painter to an ambition of pleasing indiscriminately the mixed multitude of people who resort to them.

Art in its perfection is not ostentatious; it lies hid and works its effect, itself unseen.

The great end of all arts is to make an impression on the imagination and the feeling. The imitation of nature frequently does this. Sometimes it fails and something else succeeds.

A mere copier of nature can never produce anything great.

Taste depends upon those finer emotions which make the organization of the soul.

Genius is supposed to be a power of producing excellences which are put of the reach of the rules of art: a power which no precepts can teach, and which no industry can acquire.

Invention strictly speaking, is little more than a new combination of those images which have been previously gathered and deposited in the memory; nothing can come from nothing.

To leave out beautiful sunsets is the secret of good taste.

You may shoot me with your words, You may cut me with your eyes, You may kill me with your hatefulness, But still, like air, I’ll rise.

Did you ever know that you're a jackass?

It's better to ask forgiveness than permission. - Brom

We need nearly every department, with the exception of police, fire and rescue, to look at what they can cut. Maybe there are some projects we need to put on hold.

The only person who acts sensibly is my tailor. He takes my measure anew every time he sees me. Everyone else goes by their old measurements.

News, by and large, has been the purest of all the television mediums, or at least we've tried to keep it that way, and there constantly is the argument about the separation between church and state.

Passion is too important to be without, but too fickle to be guided by. Which is why I’m more inclined to say, 'Don’t Follow Your Passion, But Always Bring it With You.'

The most interesting thing about being alive is that there is no black and white; there are many shades of gray.

Heroes don't need to talk about what they did.