Imagination is the living power and prime agent of all human perception.

Exclusively of the abstract sciences, the largest and worthiest portion of our knowledge consists of aphorisms: and the greatest and best of men is but an aphorism.

Common sense in an uncommon degree is what the world calls wisdom.

There is one art of which people should be masters - the art of reflection.

Humor is consistent with pathos, whilst wit is not.

A great mind must be androgynous.

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree: Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea.

That gracious thing, made up of tears and light.

The love of a mother is the veil of a softer light between the heart and the heavenly Father.

Religion is the most gentlemanly thing in the world. It alone will gentilize, if unmixed with cant.

Poor little Foal of an oppressed race! I love the languid patience of thy face.

I will overcome every obstruction.

A decision clouded with doubt is never a good decision

You can make any human activity into meditation simply by being completely with it and doing it just to do it.

Culture is not a surface phenomenon, it is our very care

It's very hard to find artists in the history of western art who don't make portraiture ideological in some way.

It's natural for a child to assume that his or her own childhood is unremarkable.

I think any reasonable person knows which reporters to eliminate.

We go forward with our heads held high, but look back and remember where we come from.

Some gems for the greatest of them all

A hermit is simply a person to whom civilization has failed to adjust itself.