He has danced in every palace of every capital, played in every club. He has hunted elephants through the jungles of India, boar through the forest of Austria, pigs over the plains of Massachusetts … He has ridden through Moscow, in strange apparel, to kiss the catafalque of more than one Tzar … Be he gallant, the ladies are at his feet.

Max Beerbohm, of (I think) King Edward VII

What audacious criminal, what mystifier, what maniac collector, what insane lover, has committed this abduction?

L’Illustration upon the theft of the Mona Lisa

The theft of the Mona Lisa

The theft of the Mona Lisa

My great idea is that one must forgive the pope. To begin with, he needs it more than anyone else. Secondly, that’s the only way to set oneself above him.

Camus, The Fall

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Morton Lauridsen – “O Magnum Mysterium”
Lux Aeterna

Choral music gets better the louder you play it. My neighbors probably think I’m a very religious man. Performed by the Los Angeles Master Chorale.