A man cannot speak to his son, but as a father; to his wife, but as a husband; to his enemy, but upon terms: whereas a friend may speak, as the case requires, and not as it sorteth with the person.
The inquiry of truth, which is the love-making, or the wooing of it, the knowledge of truth, which is the presence of it, and the belief of truth, which is the enjoying of it, is the sovereign good of human nature.
The zeal which begins with hypocrisy must conclude in treachery at first it deceives, at last it betrays.
We think according to nature. We speak according to rules. We act according to custom.
To seek to extinguish anger utterly is but a bravery of the Stoics. We have better oracles: ‘Be angry, but sin not.’ ‘Let not the sun go down upon your wrath.’
There is little friendship in the world, and least of all between equals.
The world’s a bubble, and the life of man, Less than a span.
Time is the greatest innovator.
Much bending breaks the bow; much unbending the mind.
All painting is an accident. But it’s also not an accident, because one must select what part of the accident one chooses to preserve.
It’s such an extraordinary supple medium that you never do quite know what paint will do.
If you can talk about it, why paint it?
I think I tend to destroy the better paintings, or those that have been better to a certain extent. I try and take them further, and they lose all their qualities, and they lose everything. I think I would say that I destroy all the better paintings.
I like, you may say, the glitter and colour that comes from the mouth, and I’ve always hoped in a sense to be able to paint the mouth like Monet painted a sunset.
Of all things known to mortals wine is the most powerful and effectual for exciting and inflaming the passions of mankind, being common fuel to them all.
Painting today is pure intuition and luck and taking advantage of what happens when you splash the stuff down.
I believe in deeply ordered chaos.
Habit, if wisely and skillfully formed, becomes truly a second nature; but unskillfully and unmethodically depicted, it will be as it were an ape of nature, which imitates nothing to the life, but only clumsily and awkwardly.
Boldness is a child of ignorance.
The wonder of a single snowflake outweighs the wisdom of a million meteorologists.