The artist, depicting man disdainful of the storm and stress of life, is no less reconciling and healing than the poet who, while endowing Nature and Humanity, rejoices in its measureless superiority to human passions and human sorrows.
BERNARD BERENSONNo artifact is a work of art if it does not help to humanize us. Without art…our world would have remained a jungle.
More Bernard Berenson Quotes
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Boast is always a cry of despair, except in the young it is a cry of hope.
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A complete life may be one ending in so full an identification with the oneself that there is no self left to die.
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We usually meet all of our relatives only at funerals where somebody always observes: “Too bad we can’t get together more often”.
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You can parody and make fun of almost anything, but that does not turn the universe into a caricature.
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How can I regain even for a minute the feeling of ample leisure I had during my early, my creative years? Then I seldom felt fussed, or hurried.
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Consistency requires you to be as ignorant today as you were a year ago.
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Who will free me from hurry, flurry, the feeling of a crowd pushing behind me, of being hustled and crushed?
BERNARD BERENSON -
There was time for work, for play, for love, the confidence that if a task was not done at the appointed time, I easily could fit it into another hour. I used to take leisure for granted, as I did time itself.
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International affairs will be placed on a better footing when it is understood that there is no way of punishing a people for the crimes of its rulers.
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Government lasts as long as the under-taxed can defend themselves against the over-taxed.
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I am only a picture-taster, the way others are wine-or tea-tasters.
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One can repent even of having repented.
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Miracles happen to those who believe in them. Otherwise why does not the Virgin Mary appear to Lamaists, Mohammedans, or Hindus who have never heard of her.
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I would I could stand on a busy corner, hat in hand, and beg people to throw me all their wasted hours.
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[Describing his house:] It is a library with living rooms attached.
BERNARD BERENSON







