169. "I spend all my mornings with the muses;--and they bless me
also in my walks."

(October 12, 1835, to his nephew Karl.)

170. "Concerning myself nothing,--that is, from nothing nothing."

(October 19, 1815, to Countess Erdody.)

[A possible allusion to the line, "Nothing can come of nothing."
from Shakespeare's "King Lear," Act 1, scene 1]

171. "Beethoven can write, thank God; but do nothing else on
earth."

(December 22, 1822, to Ferdinand Ries, in London.)

172. "Mentally I often frame an answer, but when I come to write
it down I generally throw the pen aside, since I am not able to
write what I feel."

(October 7, 1826, to his friend Wegeler, in Coblenz. "The better
sort of people, I think, know me anyhow." He is excusing his
laziness in letter-writing.)

173. "I have the gift to conceal my sensitiveness touching a
multitude of things; but when I am provoked at a moment when I am
more sensitive than usual to anger, I burst out more violently
than anybody else."