Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes

The beauty of art is that it allows you to slow down, and for a moment, things that once seemed unfamiliar become precious to you.

But when I was twelve years old I caught my first strong glimpse of one of the fundamental forces of existence, whose votary I was destined to be for life - namely, Beauty.

Art attracts us only by what it reveals of our most secret self.

There are worlds of experience beyond the world of the aggressive man, beyond history, and beyond science. The moods and qualities of nature and the revelations of great art are equally difficult to define; we can grasp them only in the depths of our perceptive spirit.

Jazz will endure just as long people hear it through their feet instead of their brains.

The love of beauty in its multiple forms is the noblest gift of the human cerebrum.

When everything else physical and mental seems to diminish, the appreciation of beauty is on the increase.

The nature of music is mysterious and so much so that it generates strong emotions within us. It moves along passages that reach the most intimate areas of our psyche without being tried by prejudices or influences of any kind.

To so enter into it in nature and art that the enjoyed meanings of life may become a part of living is the attitude of aesthetic appreciation.

Whatever makes an impression on the heart seems lovely in the eye.

Beauty must appeal to the senses, must provide us with immediate enjoyment, must impress us or insinuate itself into us without any effort on our part.

Poetry should... should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance.

Vivid images are like a beautiful melody that speaks to you on an emotional level. It bypasses your logic centers and even your intellect and goes to a different part of the brain.

It is not sufficient to see and to know the beauty of a work. We must feel and be affected by it.

Sympathy relies on a common experience. If you're clumsy, you might have sympathy for others who tend to bump into things. Empathy, on the other hand, is the ability to understand another person's feelings even if you've never experienced them yourself.

She was hearing everything that went on in his heart, like a person who can trace a map with his fingertip and conjure up vivid, living scenery.

I do not have much patience with a thing of beauty that must be explained to be understood.

As we have no immediate experience of what other men feel, we can form no idea of the manner in which they are affected, but by conceiving what we ourselves should feel in the like situation.

No one can explain how the notes of a Mozart melody, or the folds of a piece of Titian's drapery, produce their essential effects. If you do not feel it, no one can by reasoning make you feel it.

It is a test (a positive test, I do not assert that it is always valid negatively), that genuine poetry can communicate before it is understood.

Your own pain is involuntary; you feel overwhelmed and have no control. When feeling the pain of others, there is an element of discomfort, but there also is a level of stability because you are voluntarily accepting pain. It gives you a sense of confidence.

I'm not trying to spell out a story. I still think you feel the painting, and the reason you read the mark is because you also feel the mark.

If you connect emotionally with the plight of those characters, ou feel what they feel and you walk away with a sense of understanding and empathy, and hopefully, something has been illuminated for you. And I tink that's what happendd for a lot of readers with my novels.

The artist appeals to that part of our being which is not dependent on wisdom; to that in us which is a gift and not an acquisition-and therefore, more permanently enduring. He speaks to our capacity for delight and wonder, to the sense of mystery surrounding our lives; to our sense of pity, and beauty and pain.

I'm romantic. I fall in love every day. Not with people but with situations. The other day, I saw a tramp polishing his shoes. That just gripped my heart.