Music is essentially useless, as life is.
I daresay one profits more by the mistakes one makes off one's own bat than by doing the right thing on somebody's else advice.
My theology, briefly, is that the universe was dictated but not signed.
My pessimism extends to the point of even suspecting the sincerity of the pessimists.
Good company and good discourse are the very sinews of virtue.
Your world is made of your memories, and your memories are given to you by your world. The whispering voice of happenstance is always in our ears. 'This is the world. This is the way things are. Look. Pay attention. Remember.'
The more things a man is ashamed of, the more respectable he is.