„Wherever I am, I am Love, no less
among these shepherds than with nobility.
And inequalities of subjects to my rule
I balance as I please.“

Statement written weeks before his death in 1994, as quoted in "Unseen Bill Hicks Clip" in Esquire (3 February 2014) https://www.esquire.com/uk/culture/film/news/a5661/unseen-bill-hicks-clip/

Catherine in Ch. 1
Quelle: The Garden of Eden (1986)

1880s, 1880, Letter to Theo (Cuesmes, July 1880)
Quelle: The Letters of Vincent van Gogh
Kontext: So please don't think that I am renouncing anything, I am reasonably faithful in my unfaithfulness and though I have changed, I am the same, and what preys on my mind is simply this one question: what am I good for, could I not be of service or use in some way, how can I become more knowledgeable and study some subject or other in depth? That is what keeps preying on my mind, you see, and then one feels imprisoned by poverty, barred from taking part in this or that project and all sorts of necessities are out of one's reach. As a result one cannot rid oneself of melancholy, one feels emptiness where there might have been friendship and sublime and genuine affection, and one feels dreadful disappointment gnawing at one's spiritual energy, fate seems to stand in the way of affection or one feels a wave of disgust welling up inside. And then one says “How long, my God!”

Jane Sinnett, trans 1846 p. 50
The Vocation of Man (1800), Knowledge

Quelle: The Great Gatsby

Letter to the Soldiers of Coroticus (c.450?)
Kontext: I am Patrick, yes a sinner and indeed untaught; yet I am established here in Ireland where I profess myself bishop. I am certain in my heart that "all that I am," I have received from God. So I live among barbarous tribes, a stranger and exile for the love of God. He himself testifies that this is so. I never would have wanted these harsh words to spill from my mouth; I am not in the habit of speaking so sharply. Yet now I am driven by the zeal of God, Christ's truth has aroused me. I speak out too for love of my neighbors who are my only sons; for them I gave up my home country, my parents and even pushing my own life to the brink of death. If I have any worth, it is to live my life for God so as to teach these peoples; even though some of them still look down on me.

"Queen of the Black Coast" (1934)
Quelle: Conan the Barbarian Omnibus -The Original Stories
Kontext: He shrugged his shoulders. "I have known many gods. He who denies them is as blind as he who trusts them too deeply. I seek not beyond death. It may be the blackness averred by the Nemedian skeptics, or Crom's realm of ice and cloud, or the snowy plains and vaulted halls of the Nordheimer's Valhalla. I know not, nor do I care. Let me live deep while I live; let me know the rich juices of red meat and stinging wine on my palate, the hot embrace of white arms, the mad exultation of battle when the blue blades flame and crimson, and I am content. Let teachers and priests and philosophers brood over questions of reality and illusion. I know this: if life is illusion, then I am no less an illusion, and being thus, the illusion is real to me. I live, I burn with life, I love, I slay, and am content."

Quelle: The Fiery Cross

Quelle: Letter to the Earl of Bute (November 1760), quoted in Letters from George III to Lord Bute, 1756–1766, ed. Romney Sedgwick (1939), p. 50

As quoted in "Maia Mitchell: My Audition For ‘The Fosters’ Was ‘Crap’" by Sean Daly at The TV Page (20 January 2014) I'm sexy.

Civil Disobedience (1849)

In the House of Commons (18 April 1947), cited in The Oxford Dictionary of Political Quotations (1996), Jay, Oxford University Press, p. 93.
Post-war years (1945–1955)

ChimpReports http://chimpreports.com/index.php/news-in-pictures/sports-in-pictures/18122-fnl4-golola-tries-zig-zag-skills-at-basketball.html

Last words; Burr was an atheist. His last words were a response to the efforts of his friend, Reverend P.J. Van Pelt, to get Burr to state that there was a God. Reported in Holmes Moss Alexander, Aaron Burr: The Proud Pretender‎ (1937), p. 356.

Book of Taliesin (c. 1275?), The Fold of the Bards
Kontext: I am a harmonious one; I am a clear singer.
I am steel; I am a druid.
I am an artificer; I am a scientific one.
I am a serpent; I am love; I will indulge in feasting.
I am not a confused bard drivelling,
When songsters sing a song by memory,
They will not make wonderful cries;
May I be receiving them.
Like receiving clothes without a hand,
Like sinking in a lake without swimming
The stream boldly rises tumultuously in degree.

Quote in his letter to brother Theo, from Drenthe, The Netherlands, Autumn 1883; as quoted in Vincent van Gogh, edited by Alfred H. Barr; Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1935 https://www.moma.org/documents/moma_catalogue_1996_300061887.pdf, (letter 338) p. 21
1880s, 1883

Quoted from: Antonio Rodríguez, "Una pintora extraordinaria," Así (17 March 1945)
1925 - 1945
Variante: I paint self-portraits because I am so often alone, because I am the person I know best.