“[I]mperfection is in some sort essential to all that we know of life. It is the sign of life in a mortal body, that is to say, of a state of progress and change. Nothing that lives is, or can be, rigidly perfect; part of it is decaying, part nascent.”
— John Ruskin, The Stones of Venice, Volume 2 (1853)
“the will of God is always best, and God certainly knows better than we do whether it is most for our good to be in this world or in the next.”
— Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Vol. 1 (trans. Lady Grace Wallace, 1865) (1770)
“[T]he sky is for all; bright as it is, it is not 'too bright, nor good, for human nature's daily food;' it is fitted in all its functions for the perpetual comfort and exalting of the heart, for the soothing it and purifying it from its dross and dust.”
— John Ruskin, Modern Painters, Volume 1 (1843)
“There is a land of pure delight Where saints immortal reign, Infinite day excludes the night, And pleasures banish pain.”
— Isaac Watts, Hymns and Spiritual Songs (1707)
“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)
“When the heart is hard and parched up, come upon me with a shower of mercy. When grace is lost from life, come with a burst of song. When tumultuous work raises its din on all sides shutting me out from beyond, come to me, my lord of silence, with thy peace and rest.”
— Rabindranath Tagore, Gitanjali (Song Offerings) (1912)
“Remember too on every occasion which leads thee to vexation to apply this principle; not that this is a misfortune, but that to bear it nobly is good fortune.”
— Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
“So instead of giving way to despair, I took the way of active melancholy as long as I had strength for activity, or in other words, I preferred the melancholy that hopes and aspires and searches to the one that despairs, mournful and stagnant.”
— Vincent van Gogh, Letters of Vincent van Gogh (1880)
“it is to the Greeks that we turn when we are sick of the vagueness, of the confusion, of the Christianity and its consolations, of our own age”
— Virginia Woolf, The Common Reader (1925) (1925)
“Heaps of people don’t copy. Heaps of others do copy — for me, I set myself to it by chance, and I find that it teaches and above all sometimes consoles.”
— Vincent van Gogh, Letters of Vincent van Gogh (1889)
“Wherefore, O judges, be of good cheer about death, and know of a certainty, that no evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death.”
— Plato, Apology
“Praised be my Lord for those who for Thy love forgive And weakness bear and tribulation. Blessed those who shall in peace endure, For by Thee, most High, shall they be crowned.”
— Francis of Assisi, The Canticle of the Sun (trans. Paschal Robinson) (1225)
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.