"There is no excellent beauty ...."

There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in proportion.

Francis Bacon

"Life's splendor forever lies in wait ...."

“Life’s splendor forever lies in wait about each one of us in all its fullness, but veiled from view,  deep down, invisible, far off.  It is there, though, not hostile, not reluctant, not deaf.  If you summon it by the right word, by its right name, it will come.”  

Franz Kafka