For beauty being the best of all we know Robert Bridges
For beauty being the best of all we know Sums up the unsearchable and secret aims Of nature, and on joys whose earthly names Were never told can form and sense bestow; And man has sped his instinct to outgo The step of science; and against her shames Imagination stakes out heavenly claims, Building a tower above the head of woe.
Nor is there fairer work for beauty found Than that she win in nature her release From all the woes that in the world abound; Nay with his sorrow may his love increase, If from man’s greater need beauty redound, And claim his tears for homage of his peace.
Art and Heart by Ella Wheeler Wilcox From Poems of Passion (1883)
Though critics may bow to art, and I am its own true lover, It is not art, but heart, which wins the wide world over.
Though smooth be the heartless prayer, no ear in Heaven will mind it, And the finest phrase falls dead if there is no feeling behind it.
Though perfect the player’s touch, little, if any, he sways us, Unless we feel his heart throb through the music he plays us.
Though the poet may spend his life in skilfully rounding a measure, Unless he writes from a full, warm heart he gives us little pleasure. So it is not the speech which tells, but the impulse which goes with the saying; And it is not the words of the prayer, but the yearning back of the praying.
It is not the artist’s skill which into our soul comes stealing With a joy that is almost pain, but it is the player’s feeling. And it is not the poet’s song, though sweeter than sweet bells chiming, Which thrills us through and through, but the heart which beats under the rhyming.
And therefore I say again, though I am art’s own true lover, That it is not art, but heart, which wins the wide world over. Pino Daeni Art
The truly creative mind in any field is no more than this: A human creature born abnormally, inhumanely sensitive. To them… a touch is a blow, a sound is a noise, a misfortune is a tragedy, a joy is an ecstasy, a friend is a lover, a lover is a god, and failure is death. Add to this cruelly delicate organism the overpowering necessity to create, create, create — so that without the creating of music or poetry or books or buildings or something of meaning, their very breath is cut off… They must create, must pour out creation. By some strange, unknown, inward urgency they are not really alive unless they are creating. Pearl Buck Vincent Van Gogh Painting
What am I in the eyes of most people — a nonentity, an eccentric, or an unpleasant person — somebody who has no position in society and will never have; in short, the lowest of the low. All right, then — even if that were absolutely true, then I should one day like to show by my work what such an eccentric, such a nobody, has in his heart. That is my ambition, based less on resentment than on love in spite of everything, based more on a feeling of serenity than on passion. Though I am often in the depths of misery, there is still calmness, pure harmony and music inside me. I see paintings or drawings in the poorest cottages, in the dirtiest corners. And my mind is driven towards these things with an irresistible momentum. Vincent van Gogh Vladimir Volegov Art
Whether it is the beautiful that brings to our hearts the love of truth and justice, or whether it is truth that teaches us how to find the beautiful in nature and how to love it, in eather case art does a noble work. It drags out the soul from its everyday shell, and brings it under the spell of its own mysterious and wonderful power, so that a memory of this experience stays with the people, sustains them in their daily labors, and refines their minds. Helena Modjeska Vladimir Volegov Art
Art BY Herman Melville
In placid hours well-pleased we dream Of many a brave unbodied scheme. But form to lend, pulsed life create, What unlike things must meet and mate: A flame to melt—a wind to freeze; Sad patience—joyous energies; Humility—yet pride and scorn; Instinct and study; love and hate; Audacity—reverence. These must mate, And fuse with Jacob’s mystic heart, To wrestle with the angel—Art.
Get Off The Scale! Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free
You are beautiful. Your beauty, just like your capacity for life, happiness, and success, is immeasurable. Day after day, countless people across the globe get on a scale in search of validation of beauty and social acceptance. Get off the scale! I have yet to see a scale that can tell you how enchanting your eyes are. I have yet to see a scale that can show you how wonderful your hair looks when the sun shines its glorious rays on it. I have yet to see a scale that can thank you for your compassion, sense of humor, and contagious smile. Get off the scale because I have yet to see one that can admire you for your perseverance when challenged in life. It’s true, the scale can only give you a numerical reflection of your relationship with gravity. That’s it. It cannot measure beauty, talent, purpose, life force, possibility, strength, or love. Don’t give the scale more power than it has earned. Take note of the number, then get off the scale and live your life. You are beautiful!
Withdraw into yourself and look. And if you do not find yourself beautiful yet, act as does the creators of statues that are to be made beautiful; they cut away here, they smooth there, they make this line lighter, this other purer, until a lovely face has grown upon their work. So do you also; cut away all that is excessive, straighten all that is crooked, bring light to all that is in shadow; labor to make all one glow of beauty and never cease chiseling your statue until there shall shine out on you from it the godlike splendor of virtue, until you shall see the perfect Goodness established in the stainless shrine. Plotinus
The recipe for beauty is to have less illusion and more Soul, to retreat from the belief of pain or pleasure in the body into the unchanging calm and glorious freedom of spiritual harmony. Mary Baker Eddy
Cherish your visions; cherish your ideals; cherish the music that stirs in your heart, the beauty that forms in your mind, the loveliness that drapes you purest thoughts, for out of them will grow delightful conditions, all heavenly environment; of these if you but remain true to them, your world will at last be built. James Allen
Awakening to Beauty John O’Donohue
We live between the act of awakening and the act of surrender. Each morning we awaken to the light and the invitation to a new day in the world of time; each night we surrender to the dark to be taken to play in the world of dreams where time is no more. At birth we were awakened and emerged to become visible in the world. At death we will surrender again to the dark to become invisible. Awakening and surrender: They frame each day and each life; between them is the journey where anything can happen, the beauty and the frailty. The human soul is hungry for beauty; we seek it everywhere — in landscape, music, art, clothes, furniture, gardening, companionship, love, religion, and in ourselves. No one would desire not to be beautiful. When we experience the Beautiful, there is a sense of homecoming. We feel most alive in the presence of the Beautiful, for it meets the needs of our soul. For a while the strain of struggle and endurance are relieved and our frailty becomes illuminated by a different light in which we come to glimpse behind the shutter of appearances the sure form of things. In the experience of beauty we awaken and surrender in the same act. We find that we slip into the Beautiful with the same ease as we slip into the seamless embrace of water; something ancient within us already trusts that this embrace will hold us.
The search for beauty is the search for God Who is All Beauty. He who seeks shall find. And all along the paths my feet have trod, I have sought hungrily with heart and mind, And open eyes for beauty, everywhere. Lo! I have found the world is very fair. The search for beauty is the search for God.
Beauty was first revealed to me by stars, Before I saw it in my mother’s eyes, Or, seeing, sensed it beauty, I was stirred To awe and wonder by those orbs of light All palpitant against empurpled skies. They spoke a language to my childish heart Of mystery and splendour, and of space, Friendly with gracious, unseen presences. Beauty was first revealed to me by stars.
Sunsets enlarged the meaning of the word. There was a window looking to the west: Beyond it, wide Wisconsin fields of grain, And then a hill, whereon white flocks of clouds Would gather in the afternoon to rest. And when the sun went down behind that hill, What scenes of glory spread before my sight– What beauty–beauty, absolute, supreme! Sunsets enlarged the meaning of that word.
Clover in blossom, red and honey-sweet, In summer billowed like a crimson sea Across the meadow lands. One day, I stood Breast-high amidst its waves, and heard the hum Of myriad bees, that had gone mad like me With fragrance and with beauty. Over us, A loving sun smiled from a cloudless sky, While a bold breeze kissed lightly as it passed, Clover in blossom, red and honey-sweet.
Autumn spoke loudly of the beautiful. And in the gallery of Nature hung Colossal pictures hard against the sky, Set forests gorgeous with a hundred hues; And with each morning, some new wonder flung Before the startled world; some daring shade, Some strange, new scheme of colour and of form. Autumn spoke loudly of the beautiful.
Winter, though rude, is delicate in art More delicate than Summer or than fall Winter’s touch On Nature seemed most beautiful of all That evanescent beauty of the frost On window panes; of clean, fresh, fallen snow; Of white, white sunlight on the ice-draped trees. Winter, though rude, is delicate in art.
Morning! The word itself is beautiful, And the young hours have many gifts to give That feed the soul with beauty. He who keeps His days for labour and his nights for sleep Wakes conscious of the joy it is to live, And brings from that mysterious Land of Dreams A sense of beauty that illumines earth. Morning! The word itself is beautiful. The search for beauty is the search for God. Daniel Gerhartz Art
BEAUTY MAKING Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Methinks there is no greater work in life Than making beauty. Can the mind conceive One little corner in celestial realms Unbeautiful, or dull or commonplace? Or picture ugly angels, illy clad? Beauty and splendour, opulence and joy, Are attributes of God and His domain, And so are worth and virtue. But why preach Of virtue only to the sons of men, Ignoring beauty, till they think it sin? Why, if each dweller on this little globe Could know the sacred meaning of that word And understand its deep significance, Men’s thoughts would form in beauty, till their dreams Of heaven would find expression in their lives, However humble; they themselves would grow Godlike, befitting such a fair estate. Let us be done with what is only good, Demanding here and now the beautiful; Lest, with the mind and eye on earth untrained, We shall be ill at ease when heaven is gained. Vicente Romero Redondo Art
The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross Michael & Inessa Garmash
A man should hear a little music, read a little poetry, and see a fine picture every day of his life, in order that worldly cares may not obliterate the sense of the beautiful which God has implanted in the human soul. The soul that sees beauty may sometimes walk alone. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched they must be felt with the heart. Hellen Keller
Never lose an opportunity of seeing anything beautiful, for beauty is God’s handwriting.
We ascribe beauty to that which is simple; which has no superfluous parts; which exactly answers its end; which stands related to all things; which is the mean of many extremes. Ralph Waldo Emerson
I need to be held and told I am lovely- To hear magical, wild, magnificent things, Which will surge through my senses with the good pain Of new blood pumping its way into numbed extremities.
The rose is fairest when ’tis budding new, And hope is brightest when it dawns from fears; The rose is sweetest wash’d with morning dew, And love is loveliest when embalm’d in tears. Sir Walter Scott, The Lady of the Lake
Where fall the tears of love the rose appears, And where the ground is bright with friendship’s tears, Forget-me-not, and violets, heavenly blue, Spring glittering with the cheerful drops like dew. William Cullen Bryant, translation of N. Miller’s Paradise of Tears.
If I could bribe them by a Rose I’d bring them every flower that grows From Amherst to Cashmere! I would not stop for night, or storm Or frost, or death, or anyone My business were so dear! by Emily Dickinson
How fair is the Rose! what a beautiful flower. The glory of April and May! But the leaves are beginning to fade in an hour, And they wither and die in a day. Yet the Rose has one powerful virtue to boast, Above all the flowers of the field; When its leaves are all dead, and fine colours are lost, Still how sweet a perfume it will yield! saac Watts, The Rose
In my garden there is a large place for sentiment. My garden of flowers is also my garden of thoughts and dreams. The thoughts grow as freely as the flowers, and the dreams are as beautiful. Abram L. Urban
Sweet letters of the angel tongue, I’ve loved ye long and well, And never have failed in your fragrance sweet To find some secret spell, A charm that has bound me with witching power, For mine is the old belief, That midst your sweets and midst your bloom, There’s a soul in every leaf! M. M. Ballou, Flowers.
This old world that we’re livin’ in Is might hard to beat. You get a thorn with every Rose But – ain’t the roses sweet?” Frank Stanton
Let me show you Sweet smell of a delicate whisper Behind the vision of gardens Go and read of your life Tiny ripping at the heart Drunk from a rose. Erica Caitlin Lee
Long, long be my heart with such memories fill’d! Like the vase, in which roses have once been distill’d— You may break, you may shatter the vase if you will, But the scent of the roses will hang round it still. Thomas Moore
Loveliest of lovely things are they On earth that soonest pass away. The rose that lives its little hour Is prized beyond the sculptured flower. William Cullen Bryant
I saw the sweetest flower wild nature yields, A fresh-blown musk-rose; ’twas the first that threw Its sweets upon the summer: graceful it grew As is the wand that Queen Titania wields. And, as I feasted on its fragrancy, I thought the garden-rose it far excelled; But when, O Wells! thy roses came to me, My sense with their deliciousness was spelled: Soft voices had they, that with tender plea Whispered of peace, and truth, and friendliness unquelled. by John Keats,To A Friend Who Sent Me Some Roses
Eyes of some men travel far For the finding of a star; Up and down the heavens they go, Men that keep a mighty rout! I’m as great as they, I trow, Since the day I found thee out, Little Flower!—I’ll make a stir, Like a sage astronomer. William Wordsworth, To the Small Celandine
I kept looking at the flowers in a vase near me: lavender sweet peas, fragile winged and yet so still, so perfectly poised, apart, and complete. They are self-sufficient, a world in themselves, a whole — perfect. Is that then, perfection? Is what those sweet peas had what I have, occasionally in moments like that? But flowers always have it — poise, completion, fulfillment, perfection; I only occasionally, like that moment. For that moment I and the sweet peas had an understanding. Anne Morrow Lindbergh
Most people tend to think the best of those who are blessed with beauty; we have difficulty imagining that physical perfection can conceal twisted emotions or a damaged mind. DEAN KOONTZ, Odd Thomas
There are various orders of beauty, causing men to make fools of themselves in various styles. GEORGE ELIOT, Adam Bede
Beauty can be consoling, disturbing, sacred, profane; it can be exhilarating, appealing, inspiring, chilling. It can affect us in an unlimited variety of ways. Yet it is never viewed with indifference: beauty demands to be noticed; it speaks to us directly like the voice of an intimate friend. If there are people who are indifferent to beauty, then it is surely because they do not perceive it. ROGER SCRUTON, Beauty
To speak of beauty is to enter another and more exalted realm– a realm sufficiently apart from our everyday concerns as to be mentioned only with a certain hesitation. People who are always in praise and pursuit of the beautiful are an embarrassment, like people who make a constant display of their religious faith. Somehow, we feel such things should be kept for our exalted moments, and not paraded in company, or allowed to spill out over dinner. ROGER SCRUTON, Beauty
Beauty had this penalty — it came too readily, came too completely. It stilled life — froze it. One forgot the little agitations; the flush, the pallor, some queer distortion, some light or shadow, which made the face unrecognisable for a moment and yet added a quality one saw for ever after. It was simpler to smooth that all out under the cover of beauty. VIRGINIA WOOLF, To the Lighthouse
Poets make pets of pretty, docile words: I love smooth words, like gold-enamelled fish Which circle slowly with a silken swish, And tender ones, like downy-feathered birds: Words shy and dappled, deep-eyed deer in herds, Come to my hand, and playful if I wish, Or purring softly at a silver dish, Blue Persian kittens fed on cream and curds.
I love bright words, words up and singing early; Words that are luminous in the dark, and sing; Warm lazy words, white cattle under trees; I love words opalescent, cool, and pearly, Like midsummer moths, and honied words like bees, Gilded and sticky, with a little sting.
Find something beautiful From a story The Teacher Anon
With a gentle look of reflection on her face, she paused and said, “Before class is over, I would like to share with all of you a thought that is unrelated to class, but which I feel is very important.
“Each of us is put here on earth to learn, share, love, appreciate and give of ourselves. None of us knows when this fantastic experience will end. It can be taken away at any moment. Perhaps this is God’s way of telling us that we must make the most out of every single day.”
Her eyes beginning to water, she went on, So I would like you all to make me a promise. From now on, on your way to school, or on your way home, find something beautiful to notice. It doesn’t have to be something you see it could be a scent – perhaps of freshly baked bread wafting out of someone’s house, or it could be the sound of the breeze slightly rustling the leaves in the trees, or the way the morning light catches the autumn leaf as it falls gently to the ground.
Please look for these things, and cherish them. For, although it may sound trite to some, these things are the stuff of life. The little things we are put here on earth to enjoy. The things we often take for granted. We must make it important to notice them, for at any time…it can all be taken away.
The class was completely quiet. We all picked up our books and filed out of the room silently. That afternoon, I noticed more things on my way home from school than I had that whole semester.
Every once in a while, I think of that teacher and remember what an impression she made on all of us, and I try to appreciate all of those things that sometimes we all overlook. Take notice of something special you see on your lunch hour today. Go barefoot. Or walk on the beach at sunset. Stop off on the way home tonight to get a double-dip ice cream cone.
For as we get older, it is not the things we did that we often regret, but the things we didn’t do. Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.
symphonylove 