Henry James

"A man's destiny is his character."

"Singleness of purpose is one of the chief essentials for success in life, no matter what may be one's aim."

"The difference between a natural and an artificial wig is vast indeed."

"A writer who won't invest himself personally in his work is merely a secretary."

"One cannot always be sure of one's deepest motives."

"The effort really to see and really to represent is no idle business in face of the constant force that makes for muddlement."

"To do something noble and beautiful and to leave the world a bit better, whether by an improved poppy, a perfect poem, or a rescued soul."

"Verily, the writer is the nearest thing to a god."

"The beautiful gain nothing by compliments; they are sufficiently aware of their charms already."

"There's no greater bliss than mutuality."

"One might enumerate the items of high civilization, as it exists in other countries, as fine art, for instance, lovely literature, museums of ancient sculpture. To these things we are still rather crude."

"The capacity to be alone is the capacity to love."

"Taste is the most passionate and, so to speak, the grossest of the senses."

"Success, which is the only earthly judge of rightness."

"Curiosity, I take it, is the bent of the mind that keeps the world going."

"There is in fact nothing more beautiful than the expression of a perfectly adjusted state of mind."

"The very principle of life is commitment."

"To life, to letters, to the world one belongs; but to one's self one belongs less."

"It takes an extraordinary amount of poetry to fill an ordinary life."

"Do something which will cost you something."

"Memory is the strongest thing we have in our arsenal."

"The liar's punishment is not in the least that he is not believed, but that he cannot believe anyone else."

"What befits us, well begun and well continued, is to recognize our duty to the beautiful."

"The heart of a child contains many a secret."

"Ideas are, in truth, forces."

"What is art but life upon the larger scale."

"The very essence of the beautiful is that it should be capable of being otherwise."

"To speak immoderately of any one is to speak of oneself."

"When you judge another, you do not define them, you define yourself."

"The greatest intensity is always the quietest."