A primer for children may fairly pass over in silence this or that important piece of knowledge or art which it expounds, respecting which the teacher judged, that it is not yet fitted for the capacities of the children for whom he was writing. But it must contain absolutely nothing which blocks up the way towards the knowledge which is held back, or misleads the children from it.
When the Child by dint of blows and caresses had grown and was now come to years of understanding, the Father sent it at once into foreign countries: and here it recognised at once the Good which in its Father's house it had possessed, and had not been conscious of.
Ah! Prince, we painters expect that a portrait when finished will find the lover as warm as when he ordered it. We paint with eyes of love, and the eyes of love alone must judge our works.
The man who can wholly resign himself to the impressions which innocence and beauty make upon him is, in my opinion, rather to be envied than derided.
Thou art mine, too cheap at any price. Oh, thou enchanting work of art! Do I then possess thee? But who shall possess thyself, thou still more beautiful masterpiece of nature?
The child, sent abroad, saw other children who knew more, who lived more becomingly, and asked itself, in confusion, "Why do I not know that too? Why do I not live so too? Ought I not to have been taught and admonished of all this in my father's house?"
Education gives to man nothing which he might no educe out of himself; it gives him that which he might educe out of himself, only quicker and more easily.
For if the pious were absolutely happy, and it also of course was a necessary part of his happiness that his satisfaction should be broken by no uneasy thoughts of death, and that he should die old, and satisfied with life to the full: how could he yearn after another life? And how could he reflect upon a thing after which he did not yearn?
One incautious step often leads to mischief.
An evil woman? There is but one evil woman in the world: a pity everyone believes their own to be such.