A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.

All frescoes are as high finished as miniatures or enamels, and they are known to be unchangeable; but oil, being a body itself, will drink or absorb very little colour, and changing yellow, and at length brown, destroys every colour it is mixed with, especially every delicate colour. It turns every permanent white to a yellow and brown putty, and has compelled the use of that destroyer of colour, white lead, which, when its protecting oil is evaporated, will become lead again. This is an awful thing to say to oil painters ; they may call it madness, but it is true. All the genuine old little pictures, called cabinet pictures, are in fresco and not in oil. Oil was not used except by blundering ignorance till after Vandyke’s time ; but the art of fresco painting being lost, oil became a fetter to genius and a dungeon to art.

Art is the Tree of Life. Science is the Tree of Death.

As the air to a bird, or the sea to a fish, so is contempt to the contemptible.

Bring out number, weight, and measure in a year of dearth.

Energy is Eternal Delight.

Energy is the only life ... as Reason is the bound or outward circumference of Energy.

Execution is the chariot of genius.

God forbid that Truth should be confined to Mathematical Demonstration! He who does not know truth at sight is unworthy of Her Notice.

He who would do good to another must do it in Minute Particulars: General Good is the plea of the scoundrel, hypocrite, and flatterer, For Art and Science cannot exist but in minutely organized particulars.

He who would do good to another must do it in Minute Particulars: General Good is the plea of the scoundrel, hypocrite, and flatterer, For Art and Science cannot exist but in minutely organized particulars.

I turn my eyes to the schools & universities of Europe
And there behold the loom of Locke whose woof rages dire,
Washed by the water-wheels of Newton. Black the cloth
In heavy wreaths folds over every nation; cruel works
Of many wheels I view, wheel without wheel, with cogs tyrannic
Moving by compulsion each other: not as those in Eden, which
Wheel within wheel in freedom revolve, in harmony & peace.

I was angry with my friend:
I told my wrath, my wrath did end.
I was angry with my foe:
I told it not, my wrath did grow.

I was in a Printing-house in Hell, and saw the method in which knowledge is transmitted from generation to generation.

If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear as it is, infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro’ narrow chinks of his cavern.

Improvement makes straight road, but the crooked roads without improvement are roads of genius.

In seed time learn, in harvest teach, in winter enjoy.

Invention depends altogether upon Execution or Organisation, as that is right or wrong, so is the Invention perfect or imperfect.

It is the greatest of crimes to depress true art and science.

May God us keep
From Single vision & Newton’s sleep!

Mock on, mock on, Voltaire, Rousseau!
Mock on, mock on: 'Tis all in vain!
You throw the sand against the wind,
And the wind blows it back again.
And every sand becomes a gem
Reflected in the beams divine;
Blown back they blind the mocking eye,
But still in Israel's paths they shine.
The atoms of Democritus
And Newton's particles of light
Are sands upon the Red Sea shore,
Where Israel's tents do shine so bright.

The Arts & Sciences are the Destruction of Tyrannies or Bad Governments. Why should a good government endeavour to depress what is its chief and only support.

The best wine is the oldest, the best water the newest.

The cistern contains, the fountain overflows.

The Foundation of Empire is Art & Science. Remove them, or Degrade them, & the Empire is No More. Empire follows Art, & not Vice Versa as Englishmen suppose.

The hours of Folly are measured by the clock, but of Wisdom no clock can measure.

The rat, the mouse, the fox, the rabbit, watch the roots; the lion, the tiger, the horse, the elephant the fruits.

To create a little flower is the labour of ages.

To generalize is to be an idiot. To particularize is the alone distinction of merit. General knowledges are those knowledges that idiots possess.

To learn the language of art, copy for ever is my rule.

To see a World in a grain of Sand,
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand,
And Eternity in an hour.

To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour.

To teach doubt and Experiment Certainly was not what Christ meant.

To the eyes of the man of imagination, Nature is Imagination itself.

What is now proved was once only imagin’d.

Where man is not, Nature is barren.

William Blake called division the sin of man; Faraday was a great man because he was utterly undivided. His whole, very harmonious, very well balanced, … and used the brain in the limited way in which it is useful…. [H]e built up his few but precious speculations. Their simplicity rivals with their forcefulness.

William Blake said that “to be an Error & to be Cast out is a part of God’s design.” It is certainly part of the design of science.