Just as courage imperils life, fear protects it. Anyone who in discussion relies upon authority uses, not his understanding, but rather his memory. A good painter is to paint two main things, men and the working of man's mind. The truth of things is the chief nutriment of superior intellects. The men of experiment are like the ant; they only collect and use. But the bee . . . gathers its materials from the flowers of the garden and of the field, but transforms and digests it by a power of its own. The eye sees a thing more clearly in dreams than the imagination awake. As a well spent day brings happy sleep, so a life well spent brings happy death. The smallest feline is a masterpiece. The desire to know is natural to good men. The depth and strength of a human character are defined by its moral reserves. People reveal themselves completely only when they are thrown out of the customary conditions of their life, for only then do they have to fall back on their reserves. |