Tulip Fever Quotes

Your faith is like putty. How easily you mold it to your own desires.

The world is chaotic. All artists know this, but they try to make sense of it. Sophia has made sense of it for him. She has stitched it together like the most beautiful cloak. Her love has sewn it together and they can wrap it around themselves and be safe from the world. Nobody can reach them.

Sophia will not come. How mad he is to imagine, for a moment, that she might. Why should she risk everything for him? He can offer her nothing, only love.

And then, after the first blush of the admiration which he could not help feeling, he began to be tortured by the pangs of envy, by that slow fever which creeps over the heart and changes it into a nest of vipers, each devouring the other and ever born anew.

Art lies, to tell the truth. Flowers from different seasons bloom impossibly together. Trees are shifted around in the landscape to frame the composition. Rooms are created like stage sets, furnished with the artist’s own possessions, where models are arranged in a speechless moment of drama.

I’m like a mussel, closed in my shell. It’s only you who can open me.

Next to me she seems like a clean blackboard, whereas I am full of crossed-out scribbles that I can no longer decipher.

We use God to justify our actions when in fact it is our own instinct for survival that pushes us on.

After the storm the city lies becalmed. It is a sunny morning, still and cold. Branches litter the streets like broken limbs. People clear away the wreckage. They swarm around like ants whose anthill has been scuffed; how doggedly they rebuild their lives.

Thou hast begot children not only for thy selfe, but also for thy countrie, which should not only bee to thy self a joy and pleasure,but also profitable and commodius afterwardes unto the common wealth. —BARTHOLOMEW BATTY, The Christian Man’s Closet, 1581

It is a nice sunny day; his bunions have stopped hurting. There is always something to celebrate, in Gerrit’s view.

But you have to be courageous, my friend, and unafraid of pain. For only through pain will the beauty of the world be revealed.’’ He

There's no such thing as an ugly woman, just not enough brandy. - Jan Van Loos

Even when I succeed in getting there we only have an hour. At ten o’clock the night-watch trumpet sounds and those who are out return to bed. What a blameless, hardworking nation we are. In bed by ten, faithful husbands and faithful wives. It is no city for lovers, for those out late on the street are viewed with suspicion.

If the poet says that he can inflame men with love, which is the central aim in all animal species, the painter has the power to do the same, and to an even greater degree, in that he can place in front of the lover the true likeness of that which is beloved, often making him kiss and speak to it. —LEONARDO DA VINCI, Notebooks

Conduct thyself always with the same prudence as though thou went observed by ten eyes and pointed at by ten fingers. —CONFUCIUS

Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret places is pleasant. —JACOB CATS, Moral Emblems, 1632

Our task is not to solve enigmas, but to be aware of them, to bow our heads before them and also to prepare the eyes for never-ending delight and wonder.

It is this sexual excess, no doubt, that has caused Jan to neglect his work. Lots of spermatozoa enfeebles a man and thins his blood. - Jacob

She is color, waiting to be mixed; a painting, ready to be brushed into life. She is a moment, waiting to be fixed forever under a shiny varnish.

If the does not come today he exists, he breathes this air and walks these streets.

How easily I can be betrayed by those who mean me no harm.

For a man’s greatest joy and comfort is a happy home, where he can close the door after his day’s labours and find peace and solace beside the fireplace, enjoying the loving attentions of a blessed wife.

The Dutch are a hardworking, resourceful people; when their land is flooded they pump out the water and drain it again. They are used to repairing the ravages caused by the wrath of God, for He has sent these tempests to test them.

All life is a risk—I’m a physician, I’m only too well aware of that. But some people sail closer to the wind and they are the ones after my own heart. I admire them for that, you see, because I have been incapable of doing it myself.

I sit there. My breasts press against the cotton of my chemise; my thighs burn under my petticoat. I am conscious of my throat, my earlobes, my pulsing blood. My body is throbbing but this is because I have a fever. This is why I am aching, why I am both heavy and featherlight. The painter works. His eyes flick to me and back to his canvas. As he paints I feel his brush stroking my skin.... I am in bed with my sisters. I keep my eyes squeezed shut because I know he's sitting there, watching me. His red tongue flicks over his teeth. If I open my eyes the wolf will be there, sitting on his haunches beside my bed. My heart squeezes. I mutter my rosary... Holy Mary, Mother of God... I can feel his hot, meaty breath on my face. My hands cupping my budded breasts. I mutter faster, willing him to move closer.