“In our variable climate where [all] the seasons are recognizable in one day, where all the vapoury turbulence involves the face of things, where nature seems to sport in all: her dignity and dispensing incidents for the artist’s study.... how happily is the landscape painter situated, how roused by every change in nature in every moment, that allows no languor even in her effects which she places before him, and demands most peremptorily every moment his admiration and investigation, to store his mind with every change of time and place.”

“A painter should begin every canvas with a wash of black, because all things in nature are dark except where exposed by the light.”

“The sky is a blanket that hovers over our heads all the time. Preserves our environment, which plays with us every season. The sky changes its form every season and every moment, making us feel surprised.”

“All places where women are excluded tend downward to barbarism; but the moment she is introduced, there come in with her courtesy, cleanliness, sobriety, and order.”

“To me the prevailing tone of Rembrandt's mind, as shown in his art, is serenity. Where the subject allows him, his natural disposition seems always tranquil. He is the painter of repos”

“Most of all she loved that when she hugged him her head would rest neatly just below his chin, where she could feel his breath lightly blowing her hair and tickling her head.”

“It is the very joy of man's heart to admire, where he can; nothing so lifts him from all his mean imprisonments, were it but for moments, as true admiration.”

“She can find in her bewilderment no words wherewith to begin, how to order or where to end her speech; fain would she pour out all in her first utterance, but not even the first words doth fear-stricken shame allow her.”
Nec quibus incipiat demens videt ordine nec quo quove tenus, prima cupiens effundere voce omnia, sed nec prima pudor dat verba timenti.

“We don't admit it to ourselves, not until the very moment of death, but in that moment, we see all life before us and we understand how we chose, every day of our lives, the manner of our death.”

“Fortunately however, is that [painting] school where Mother Nature is placed in the foreground, and where only she is consulted to representate 'truth' on the canvas or panel. Only he knows the secrets of the manifold diversity of nature. His painting is a faithful copy of nature - which is the highest praise for a painter..”