Description of Apollo demands the highest style-
an exaltation above everything human.

Winckelmann

Erotes playing with Apollo's belongings
Roman Fresco found in Herculaneum, Pompeii

Strength of mind rests in sobriety; for this keeps your reason unclouded by passion.

Pythagoras

Apollo
By Giovanni Baglione (1620)

Apollo, Hermes and Heracles

Fresco depicting Apollo with his cithara

Apollo Sauroktonos, the python slayer (Detail)

How Apollo's laurel sapling shakes!
How the whole temple shakes! Away, away with the wicked!
It must be Phoebus kicking at the door with his fair foot.
Do you not see? The Delian palm nods gently,
All of a sudden; the swan sings beautifully in the air.
Bolts of the doors, thrust yourselves back.
Keys--open the doors! For the god is no longer far away.

So, young men, prepare yourselves for singing and dancing.
Apollo appears not to all, only to the good.
He who sees him is great; who does not is lowly.
We will see you, Worker from Afar, and we will never be lowly.
Let the cithara not be silent.
Nor your step noiseless with Apollo approaching, you children,
If you intend to complete the marriage vows and to cut your hair,
And if the wall is to stand on its aging foundations.
Well done the youths; the strings are no longer at rest.

Be silent and hear the song of Apollo's glory.
Even the sea is silent, for bards celebrate
The cithara or bow, weapons of Lycoreian Phoebus.
Neither does mother Thetis mournfully lament for her Achilles
If she hears, "Hie Paian, Hie Paian."
Even the weeping rock forgets its griefs--
The sobbing stone forever fixed in Phrygia,
Marble where once a woman gaped sorrowfully.
Cry, "Hie, Hie"; it is a poor thing to contest the blessed.
May he who fights with the blessed fight my king,
And may he who fights my king also fight with Apollo.
The chorus which sings to Apollo with his heart
He will honor. He has the power; he sits on the right hand of Zeus.
Neither will the chorus sing of Apollo for only one day;
He is worthy of many hymns. Who would not readily sing of Apollo?

Golden is Apollo's mantle and golden its clasp,
As are his lyre and Lyctian bow and quiver;
Golden are his sandals, for Apollo is rich in gold.
Rich in possessions; you might have proof of this at Delphi.
Always fair, always young! Never do
Traces of down touch his blooming cheeks.
His hair drips fragrant oils to the ground,
But streaming from the locks of Apollo is not fat.
But Panacaea. In the city where these dew drops
Fall to earth all things are secure.
None is so versatile in skill as Apollo.
He watches over the archer; he watches over the bard;
Phoebus's are both the bow and song.
His are the prophets and prophetesses; from Phoebus
Physicians learn the skill of postponing death.

-Callimachus, "Hymn to Apollo".

The circumstance of Apollo being the destroyer of the wicked was believed by some of the ancients to have given rise to his name Apollo, which they connected with apollumi, “to destroy.” (Aeschyl. Agam. 1081.) Some modern writers, on the other hand, who consider the power of averting evil to have been the original and principal feature in his character, say that Apollôn, i. e. Apellôn, (from the root pello), signifies the god who drives away evil, and is synonymous with alexikakas, Acesius, Acestor, sôtêr, and other names and epithets applied to Apollo.

Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology

Apollo, with cithara, holds out a phiale (libation dish) to Nike; between them is the omphalos-stone (”navel of the world,” located at Delphi). Marble relief, artist unknown; ca. 100-75 BCE.  

The Apollo Necklace
By Henry Wilson

Those who are in the wrong in matters of supreme importance are objects of pity rather than of hate ...

Julian the Philosopher

Apollo Attended by Nymphs
by François Girardon

Pastoral Apollo
By John Flaxman

At dawn, when you have trouble getting out of bed, tell yourself: “I have to go to work — as a human being. What do I have to complain of, if I’m going to do what I was born for — the things I was brought into the world to do? Or is this what I was created for? To huddle under the blankets and stay warm?”

So you were born to feel “nice”? Instead of doing things and experiencing them? Don’t you see the plants, the birds, the ants and spiders and bees going about their individual tasks, putting the world in order, as best they can? And you’re not willing to do your job as a human being? Why aren’t you running to do what your nature demands?

You don’t love yourself enough. Or you’d love your nature too, and what it demands of you.

Marcus Aurelius