Margaret Haerens

“A room without books is like a body without a soul.”
― Marcus Tullius Cicero

“because yes – he likes to 'write' – but to 'do' – to do a particular thing – perhaps on paper (perhaps on canvas – perhaps in stone – perhaps, perhaps in a musical score) – a thing that will stand, a thing that will bear (that will sustain) repeated contemplation: a thing that will sustain long contemplation, and that will (in a 'deep' enough way) reward the beholder.”
― Robert Lax, Love Had a Compass: Journals and Poetry

“If, then, I were asked for the most important advice I could give, that which I considered to be the most useful to the men of our century, I should simply say: in the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you.”
― Leo Tolstoy, Essays, Letters and Miscellanies

“People forced to live by conventions are always the first to enforce them.”
― George Hodgman, Bettyville: A Memoir