“Every increased possession loads us with new weariness.”

“You can only possess beauty through understanding it.”

“Let every dawn of morning be to you as the beginning of life, and every setting sun be to you as its close.”

“Nature is painting for us, day after day, pictures of infinite beauty if only we have the eyes to see them.”

“All that we call ideal in Greek or any other art, because to us it is false and visionary, was, to the makers of it, true and existent.”

“If only the Geologists would let me alone, I could do very well, but those dreadful Hammers! I hear the clink of them at the end of every cadence of the Bible verses”

“But if you can fix some conception of a true human state of life to be striven for — life, good for all men, as for yourselves; if you can determine some honest and simple order of existence; following those trodden ways of wisdom, which are pleasantness, and seeking her quiet and withdrawn paths, which are peace; — then, and so sanctifying wealth into 'commonwealth,' all your art, your literature, your daily labours, your domestic affection, and citizen's duty, will join and increase into one magnificent harmony. You will know then how to build, well enough; you will build with stone well, but with flesh better; temples not made with hands, but riveted of hearts; and that kind of marble, crimson-veined, is indeed eternal. ”