"This morning I received a letter from. He writes that he does not believe scientific research into the nature of color and light can help the artist, neither can anatomy nor the laws of optics. He wants to discuss these questions with me and find out my views. Now everything depends on how this knowledge is to be used. But surely it is clear that we could not pursue our studies of light with much assurance if we did not have as a guide the discoveries of Chevreul and other scientists. I would not have distinguished between local color and light if science had not given us the hint; the same holds true for complementary colors, contrasting colors, etc. 'Yes', he will tell me: 'but these have always been taken into account, look at Monet' It is at this point that the question becomes serious!"

“Each one of us has several facets. The surface often appears more important than what is inside, hence the errors of those who judge carelessly. How many times has that not happened to me! The surface is often complete in some people from the very beginning, but not the possession of their own sensations. From this come errors. Some natures achieve the surface very slowly j this is the least danger an artist runs. So one should not think of the surface or the appearance, but concentrate on what is inner!”

“The next day he took me to hear the 'Concert Colonne' at the Chatelet. First we lunched and then went to the hall. There was a fine program! Schumann, Bizet , Berlioz . - I can scarcely express how I marveled at the Hamlet and Romeo et Juliette of Berlioz. - He belongs with Delacroix, with Shakespeare, he is of the same family, he has the mark of these men of genius. He is prodigious in movement, imagination, strangeness, vigor, delicacy, sense of contrast, he is terrible and suave.”

“I began to understand my sensations, to know what I wanted, at around the age of forty.. ..but only vaguely. At fifty, that is in 1880, I formulated the idea of unity, without being able to render it. At sixty, I am beginning to see the possibility of rendering it.”

“Yesterday I had a violent run-in with M. Eugene Manet on the subject of Seurat and Paul Signac. The latter was present, as was Guillaumin. You may be sure I rated Manet roundly. - Which will not please Renoir. - But anyhow, this is the point, I explained to M. Manet, who probably didn't understand anything I said, that Seurat has something new to contribute which these gentlemen, despite their talent, are unable to appreciate, that I am personally convinced of the progressive character of his art and certain that in time it will yield extraordinary results. Besides I am not concerned with the appreciation of artists, no matter whom. I do not accept the snobbish judgments of "romantic impressionists" to whose interest it is to combat new tendencies. I accept the challenge, that's all..”

“I well remember that around 1874, Duret, who is above reproach, Duret himself said to me with all sorts of circumlocutions that I was on the wrong track, that everyone thought so, including my best friends.. .I admit that when alone, with nobody to prompt me, I reproached myself similarly, - I plumbed myself, - decision was terribly hard. - Should I, yes or no, persevere another way? I concluded in the affirmative, I took into account the risks of the unknown, and I was right to stick.”

“collected letters to his son Lucien, pdf on Archive”