Endeavoring to purchase something we think beautiful may in fact be the most unimaginative way of dealing with the longing it excites in us, just as trying to sleep with someone may be the bluntest response to a feeling of love.

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Anxiety is the handmaiden of contemporary ambition.

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Because the rhythm of conversation makes no allowance for dead periods, because the presence of others calls for continuous responses, we are left to regret the inanity of what we say, and the missed opportunity of what we do not.

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The longing for destiny is nowhere stronger than in our romantic life.

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A dominant impulse on encountering beauty is to wish to hold on to it, to possess it and give it weight in one's life. There is an urge to say, "I was here, I saw this and it mattered to me".

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There is a longing for a return to a time without the need for choices, free of the regret at the inevitable loss that all choice (however wonderful) has entailed.

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We each appear to hold within ourselves a range of divergent views as to our native qualities... and amid such uncertainty, we typically turn to the wider world to settle the question of our significance... we seem beholden to affections of others to endure ourselves.

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We don't really learn anything properly until there is a problem, until we are in pain, until something fails to go as we had hoped... we suffer, therefore we think.

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To be shown love is to feel ourselves the object of concern: our presence is noted, our name is registered, our views are listened to, our failings are treated with indulgence and our needs are ministered to. And under such care, we flourish.

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It is perhaps when our lives are at their most problematic that we are likely to be most receptive to beautiful things.

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