At first sight experience seems to bury us under a flood of external objects, pressing upon us with a sharp and importunate reality, calling us out of ourselves in a thousand forms of action.

All art constantly aspires towards the condition of music.

Books are a refuge, a sort of cloistral refuge, from the vulgarities of the actual world.

To burn always with this hard, gem-like flame, to maintain this ecstasy, is success in life.

Art comes to you proposing frankly to give nothing but the highest quality to your moments as they pass.

Not the fruit of experience, but experience itself, is the end.

Philosophical theories or ideas, as points of view, instruments of criticism, may help us to gather up what might otherwise pass unregarded by us.

Great passions may give us a quickened sense of life, ecstasy and sorrow of love, the various forms of enthusiastic activity, disinterested or otherwise, which comes naturally to many of us.

The way to perfection is through a series of disgusts

To know when one's self is interested, is the first condition of interesting other people.

Many attempts have been made by writers on art and poetry to define beauty in the abstract, to express it in the most general terms, to find some universal formula for it.

Learning and skill are things to be proud of

Knowledge, learning, is an eternal thing.

When you're working a three-hour gig, how do you know when to climax? You just watch the crowd and ride the wave. If they're not feeling a song, you move on.

It took us 2,000 years to find Noah’s Ark. Do we ever find Flight 370?

What appeals to you the most is the very thing that will drive you crazy

What can i tell you about the choices we make? Fate reads like the polar opposite of decision, and so much of life reads like fate.

My only sanction is the love and affection in which you hold me. But it has its weaknesses, as it has its strengths.

The Ultimate expression of Humility comes when we control our senses.

So are we going to continue glaring angrily at each other while we pose in our tough stances? Or use our time to work out a plan that hopefully doesn’t end with our mutual deaths? (Acheron)

I wanted to know what it means to know something, whether we can know at all, and, if so, how.