William Blake

The true method of knowledge is experiment.

Imagination is the real and eternal world of which this vegetable universe is but a faint shadow.

The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing that stands in the way. Some see nature all ridicule and deformity... and some scarce see nature at all. But to the eyes of the man of imagination, nature is imagination itself.

Fun I love, but too much fun is of all things the most loathsome. Mirth is better than fun, and happiness is better than mirth.

The difference between a bad artist and a good one is: the bad artist seems to copy a great deal the good one really does.

Great things are done when men and mountains meet.

Active Evil is better than Passive Good.

It is not because angels are holier than men or devils that makes them angels, but because they do not expect holiness from one another, but from God only.

Where mercy, love, and pity dwell, there God is dwelling too.

That the Jews assumed a right exclusively to the benefits of God will be a lasting witness against them and the same will it be against Christians.

Opposition is true friendship.

The bird a nest, the spider a web, man friendship.

The glory of Christianity is to conquer by forgiveness.

It is easier to forgive an enemy than to forgive a friend.

What is the price of experience? Do men buy it for a song? Or wisdom for a dance in the street? No, it is bought with the price of all the man hath, his house, his wife, his children.

The weak in courage is strong in cunning.

I must create a system or be enslaved by another mans I will not reason and compare: my business is to create.

Exuberance is beauty.

The foundation of empire is art and science. Remove them or degrade them, and the empire is no more. Empire follows art and not vice versa as Englishmen suppose.

Art is the tree of life. Science is the tree of death.