23 Quotes by Thomas Cole

It was not that the jagged precipices were lofty, that the encircling woods were the dimmest shade, or that the waters were profoundly deep; but that over all, rocks, wood, and water, brooded the spirit of repose, and the silent energy of nature stirred the soul to its inmost depths.

If the imagination is shackled, and nothing is described but what we see, seldom will anything truly great be produced either in Painting or Poetry.

None know how often the hand of God is seen in a wilderness but them that rove it for a man’s life.

Though American scenery is destitute of many of those circumstances that give value to the European, still it has features, and glorious ones, unknown to Europe... the most distinctive, and perhaps the most impressive, characteristic of American scenery is its wildness.

The ills of discrimination are still with us. We have to continue the tenacity and vigilance of the 1960s. Racial understanding is not something we find; it’s something we create.