“Better is art, than evil strength; for with art men may hold what strength may not obtain.”

Source: Earthsea Books, The Farthest Shore (1972), Chapter 3, "Hort Town" (Ged)

Vague Thoughts On Art (1911)
Context: Art is the great and universal refreshment. For Art is never dogmatic; holds no brief for itself; you may take it, or you may leave it. It does not force itself rudely where it is not wanted. It is reverent to all tempers, to all points of view. But it is wilful — the very wind in the comings and goings of its influence, an uncapturable fugitive, visiting our hearts at vagrant, sweet moments; since we often stand even before the greatest works of Art without being able quite to lose ourselves! That restful oblivion comes, we never quite know when — and it is gone! But when it comes, it is a spirit hovering with cool wings, blessing us from least to greatest, according to our powers; a spirit deathless and varied as human life itself.

Source: Eldest

Source: The Commercial Power of Great Britain, 1925, p. xxxi ; Highlighted section cited in: Joel Mokyr. The Enlightened Economy: Britain and the Industrial Revolution, 1700-1850. 2011. p. 237
Context: The successes obtained in the government of the arts, are similar to the successes obtained in the government of men. We may succeed for a time, by fraud, by surprise, by violence: we can succeed permanently only by means directly opposite. It is not alone the courage, the intelligence, the activity of the manufacturer and the merchant which maintain the superiority of the productions and the commerce of their country; it is far more their wisdom, their economy, above all their probity.

The Open Universe : An Argument for Indeterminism (1992), p. 44

"Into the Fire"
Song lyrics, The Rising (2002)

Something About a Soldier (1940)
Context: Wars, for us, are either inevitable, or created. Whatever they are, they should not wholly vitiate art. What art needs is greater men, and what politics needs is better men.

Peace and the Public Mind (1935)
Context: The force which makes for war does not derive its strength from the interested motives of evil men; it derives its strength from the disinterested motives of good men. Pacifists have sometimes evaded that truth as making too great a concession to Mars, as seeming to imply (which it does not in fact) that in order to abolish war, men must cease to be noble.
Base motives are, of course, among those which make up the forces that produce war. Base motives are among those which get great cathedrals built and hospitals constructed-contractors' profit-seeking, the vested interests of doctors and clergy. But Europe has not been covered by cathedrals because contractors wanted to make money, or priests wanted jobs.