Voices of the Muses

The world's great painters, poets, composers and thinkers wrote constantly about how to live — in letters, journals and the works themselves. This is that wisdom, gathered and verified: a companion for your day, and a doorway into the arts they made.

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Today's voice
“Let us rather submit with firmness to His almighty will, in the full conviction that it will prove for our good, as he does nothing without a cause.”
— Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Vol. 1 (trans. Lady Grace Wallace, 1865) (1778)
Composer, 1756–1791
What this is, and how to use it

Not a quote site. A daily practice, and a door.

1

Find a voice for your day

Filter by what you're living through — courage, solace, gratitude, stillness — and hear how someone who lived by their art faced the same thing. Every quote is real: traced to the letter, page or verse it was actually written in, never internet folklore.

2

Don't just read — sit with it

Take one voice, not twenty. Read it slowly, twice. Ask what it would change about your afternoon if it were true. That single unhurried minute is the smallest version of every practice ImagineArts teaches.

3

Follow the voice to its art

Each voice is a door: Van Gogh's letters lead to really looking, Seneca leads to the examined life, the Psalms lead to awe. When a voice grabs you, start free and learn the practice behind it.

11 verified voices in Literature & poetry · 11 shown here, a fresh sample each day

“I am larger, better than I thought, / I did not know I held so much goodness.”
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (1892 edition) (1892)
Literature & poetry Joy & delight Hope
“That you are here—that life exists and identity, / That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.”
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (1892 edition) (1892)
Literature & poetry Meaning & purpose Courage Hope
“Art is a spiritual organ of human life which cannot be destroyed”
— Leo Tolstoy, What is Art? (trans. Aylmer Maude) (1897)
Literature & poetry Hope Transcendence
“Hope is the thing with feathers / That perches in the soul, / And sings the tune without the words, / And never stops at all”
— Emily Dickinson, Poems by Emily Dickinson (ed. Todd & Higginson) (1891)
Literature & poetry Solace & consolation Hope
“Afoot and light-hearted I take to the open road, / Healthy, free, the world before me, / The long brown path before me leading wherever I choose. / Henceforth I ask not good-fortune, I myself am good-fortune, / Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing”
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (1892 edition) (1892)
Literature & poetry Joy & delight Courage Hope
“the experience of each new age requires a new confession, and the world seems always waiting for its poet”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Poet (Essays: Second Series) (1844)
Literature & poetry Creativity Hope
“I think I shall be among the English Poets after my death.”
— John Keats, Letters of John Keats to His Family and Friends (ed. Sidney Colvin) (1818)
Literature & poetry Courage Hope
“It is the powerful language of resistance—it is the dialect of common sense. It is the speech of the proud and melancholy races, and of all who aspire. It is the chosen tongue to express growth, faith, self-esteem, freedom, justice, equality, friendliness, amplitude, prudence, decision, and courage. It is the medium that shall wellnigh express the inexpressible.”
— Walt Whitman, Complete Prose Works (1855)
Literature & poetry Craft & discipline Hope
“Are you too deeply occupied to say if my verse is alive? The mind is so near itself it cannot see distinctly, and I have none to ask. Should you think it breathed, and had you the leisure to tell me, I should feel quick gratitude.”
— Emily Dickinson, Letters to T. W. Higginson (in 'Emily Dickinson's Letters', The Atlantic Monthly) (1862)
Literature & poetry Craft & discipline Courage Hope
“The destiny of art in our time is to transmit from the realm of reason to the realm of feeling the truth that well-being for men consists in being united together”
— Leo Tolstoy, What is Art? (trans. Aylmer Maude) (1897)
Literature & poetry Meaning & purpose Hope Community
“The task of art is enormous. Through the influence of real art, aided by science guided by religion, that peaceful co-operation of man which is now obtained by external means—by our law-courts, police, charitable institutions, factory inspection, etc.—should be obtained by man's free and joyous activity. Art should cause violence to be set aside.”
— Leo Tolstoy, What is Art? (trans. Aylmer Maude) (1897)
Literature & poetry Hope Community
The Salon library

This is today’s sample of twelve. The whole collection is in the Salon.

Salon members read all 746 English quotes and the Afrikaans collection too, with every filter, the plain-words notes from A Year with the Muses, the quotes they save, and a private journal for the lines that stay with them.

Join the SalonAlready a member? Open the library →

Every quote in this collection was verified against its original public-domain source — the letter, journal, poem or treatise it truly comes from. No internet folklore, no misattributions. Start free to bring these voices into your daily practice.