Forests, lakes, and rivers, clouds and winds, stars and flowers, stupendous glaciers and crystal snowflakes – every form of animate or inanimate existence, leaves its impress upon the soul of man. – Orison Swett Marden

I think most artists create out of despair. The very nature of creation is not a performing glory on the outside, its a painful, difficult search within. – Louise Berliawsky Nevelson

Good heavens, of what uncostly material is our earthly happiness composed… if we only knew it. What incomes have we not had from a flower, and how unfailing are the dividends of the seasons. – James Russell Lowell