Letter to Gustave Flaubert from George Sand

To Gustave Flaubert, at Croisset Nohant June 21, 1868

Why am I not the ... river which cradles you with its sweet murmuring and which brings you freshness in your den! I would chat discreetly with you between pages of your novel, and I would make that fantastic grating of the chain* which you detest, but whose oddity does not displease me, keep still. I love everything that makes up a milieu, the rolling of the carriages and the noise of the workmen in Paris, the cries of a thousand birds in the country, the movement of the ships on the waters; I love also absolute, profound silence, and in short, I love everything that is around me, no matter where I am; it is auditory idiocy, a new variety. It is true that I choose my milieu and don't go to the Senate nor to other disagreeable places. 

*The chain of the tug-boat going up or going down the Seine.

George Sand Gustave Faubert Letters translated by A.L. McKenzie (p171) 

Nobody can advise and help you, nobody. There is only one single means. Go inside yourself. Discover the motive that bids you write; examine whether it sends its roots down to the deepest places of your heart, confess to yourself whether you would have to die if writing were denied you. This before all: ask yourself in the quietest hour of your night: must I write?

RAINER MARIA RILKE

You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.

Marcus Aurelius