“Talent is something rare and beautiful and precious, and it must not be allowed to go to waste.”

“Artistic talent is a gift from God and whoever discovers it in himself has a certain obligation: to know that he cannot waste this talent, but must develop it.”

“Beauty is precious, you see, and the more beautiful something is, the more precious it is; and the more precious it is the more it hurts us that it will fade away; and the more we are hurt by beauty, the more we love the world.”

“Thy glass will show thee how thy beauties wear, thy dial how thy precious minutes waste”

“Love is always love, come whence it may. A heart that beats at your approach, an eye that weeps when you go away are things so rare, so sweet, so precious that they must never be despised.”

“Genius is a word that is very loosely used nowadays. It is ascribed to persons to whom a more sober judgement would be satisfied to allow talent. Genius and talent are very different things. Many people have talent; it is not rare: genius is. Talent is adroit and dexterous; it can be cultivated; genius is innate, and too often strangely allied to grave defects. But what is genius?”