"No one feels another's grief, no one understands another's joy. People imagine they can reach one another. In reality they only pass each other by."

"Why does God endow us with compassion?"

"I never force myself to be devout except when I feel so inspired, and never compose hymns of prayers unless I feel within me real and true devotion."

"There are two contrary impulses which govern this man's brain-the one sane, and the other eccentric. They alternate at regular intervals."

"There are eight girls in the house in which I am living, and practically all of them are good looking. You can realize that I am kept busy."

"I am composing like a god, as if it simply had to be done as it has been done."

"If only your pure and clean mind could touch me, dear Haydn, nobody has a greater reverence for you than I have."

"The world resembles a stage on which every man is playing a part."

"Approval or blame will follow in the world to come."

"Every night when I go to bed, I hope that I may never wake again, and every morning renews my grief."

"Happy is the man who finds a true friend, and far happier is he who finds that true friend in his wife."

"When I wished to sing of love, it turned to sorrow. And when I wished to sing of sorrow, it was transformed for me into love."

"You believe happiness to be derived from the place in which once you have been happy, but in truth it is centered in ourselves."

"Nobody understands another's sorrow, and nobody another's joy."

"I try to decorate my imagination as much as I can."

"Above all things, I must not get angry. If I do get angry I knock all the teeth out of the mouth of the poor wretch who has angered me."

"A man endures misfortune without complaint."

"The greatest misfortune of the wise man and the greatest unhappiness of the fool are based upon convention."

"One bites into the brass mouthpiece of his wooden cudgel, and the other blows his cheeks out on a French horn. Do you call that Art?"

"Our castle is not imposing, but is well built, and surrounded by a very fine garden. I live in the bailiff's house."

"Easy mind, light heart. A mind that is too easy hides a heart that is too heavy."

"Why should the composer be more guilty than the poet who warms to fantasy by a strange flame, making an idea that inspires him the subject of his own very different treatment?"

"The manager is to be blamed who distributes parts to his players which they are unable to act."