#beauty

I tell you Schoonmaker she doesn't know what she has. That's the heart of it. She's like some wild creature who hasn't a clue the worth of its coat. ↗

— Anna Godbersen

#unaware #beauty

The beauty of artifacts is in how they reassure us we’re not the first to die. ↗

— Simon Van Booy

#die #beauty

Is a PLONGEUR'S work really necessary to civilization? We have a feeling that it must be 'honest' work, because it is hard and disagreeable, and we have made a sort of fetish of manual work. We see a man cutting down a tree, and we make sure that he is filling a social need, just because he uses his muscles; it does not occur to us that he may only be cutting down a beautiful tree to make room for a hideous statue. I believe it is the same with a PLONGEUR. He earns his bread in the sweat of his brow, but it does not follow that he is doing anything useful; he may be only supplying a luxury which, very often, is no luxury at all. ↗

— George Orwell

#beauty

He was so handsome, so beautiful. Inside and out. ↗

— Jay Bell

#beauty

The ugliness at the heart of beauty. Is there always ugliness, do you suppose? Even when the object is very, very beautiful? ↗

— Mary Balogh

#ugly #beauty

Why did people assume that the beautiful among them needed nothing but their beauty to bring them happiness? That behind the beauty there was nothing but an empty shell, insensitive shell? ↗

— Mary Balogh

#shell #beauty

Though beauty is autonomous, there seem to be occasions when human presence can become congruent with her will. In creative work no amount of force or mechanical management can guarantee beauty. Suddenly, without expecting it, beauty is there. Yet ultimately beauty is a profound illumination of presence, a stirring of the invisible in visible form and in order to receive this we need to cultivate a new style of approaching the world. ↗

— John O'Donohue

#beauty

The blue, mosquitoey night pushes in from the hotel windows. ↗

— Jennifer Egan

#beauty

O, lack and doubt and fear can only come Because of plenty, confidence, and love! They are the shadow-forms about their feet, Because they are not perfect crystal-clear To the all-searching sun in which they live. Dread of its loss is Beauty’s certain seal! ↗

— George MacDonald

#virtue #weakness #beauty

The time of the autumn floods came and the hundred streams poured into the Yellow River. … Then the Lord of the River was beside himself with Joy, believing that all the beauty in the world belonged to him alone. ↗

— Zhuangzi

#beauty