The main object of the novel is to represent life. . .The success of a work of art, to my mind, may be measured by the degree to which it produces a ….

A swift carriage, of a dark night, rattling with four horses over roads that one can’t see--that’s my idea of happiness..

She feels in italics and thinks in CAPITALS..

London is on the whole the most possible form of life..

We work in the dark - we do what we can - we give what we have. Our doubt is our passion, and our passion is our task. The rest is the madness of art..

It is, I think, an indisputable fact that Americans are, as Americans, the most self-conscious people in the world, and the most addicted to the beli….

Things are always different from what they might be..

I intend to judge things for myself; to judge wrongly, I think, is more honorable than not to judge at all..

One of my latest sensations was going to Lady Airlie's to hear Browning read his own poems - with the comport of finding that, at least, if you don't….

Art does not lie in copying nature.- Nature furnishes the material by means of which is to express a beauty still unexpressed in nature.-The artist b….

Until you try, you don't know what you can't do..

The critical sense is so far from frequent that it is absolutely rare, and the possession of the cluster of qualities that minister to it is one of t….

An Englishman's never so natural as when he's holding his tongue..

Make him [the reader] think the evil, make him think it for himself, and you are released from weak specifications..

Don't try so much to form your character - it's like trying to pull open a tight, tender young rose. Live as you like best and your character will ta….

Love has nothing to do with good reasons..

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

Deep experience is never peaceful..

Excellence does not require perfection..

Cats and monkeys; monkeys and cats; all human life is there..

The artist beholds in nature more than she herself Nature is conscious of..