Leonardo da Vinci
A well-spent day brings happy sleep.
Leonardo da VinciAll our knowledge has its origins in our perceptions.
Leonardo da VinciAlthough nature commences with reason and ends in experience it is necessary for us to do the opposite, that is to commence with experience and from this to proceed to investigate the reason.
Leonardo da VinciAnyone who conducts an argument by appealing to authority is not using his intelligence; he is just using his memory.
Leonardo da VinciArt is never finished, only abandoned.
Leonardo da VinciAs a well-spent day brings happy sleep, so a life well spent brings happy death.
Leonardo da VinciAs every divided kingdom falls, so every mind divided between many studies confounds and saps itself.
Leonardo da VinciBeyond a doubt truth bears the same relation to falsehood as light to darkness.
Leonardo da VinciBlinding ignorance does mislead us. O! Wretched mortals, open your eyes!
Leonardo da VinciCommon Sense is that which judges the things given to it by other senses.
Leonardo da VinciExperience does not err. Only your judgments err by expecting from her what is not in her power.
Leonardo da VinciFor once you have tasted flight you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skywards, for there you have been and there you will long to return.
Leonardo da VinciHe who is fixed to a star does not change his mind.
Leonardo da VinciHe who loves practice without theory is like the sailor who boards ship without a rudder and compass and never knows where he may cast.
Leonardo da VinciHe who wishes to be rich in a day will be hanged in a year.
Leonardo da VinciHuman subtlety will never devise an invention more beautiful, more simple or more direct than does nature because in her inventions nothing is lacking, and nothing is superfluous.
Leonardo da VinciI have been impressed with the urgency of doing. Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do.
Leonardo da VinciI have offended God and mankind because my work didn't reach the quality it should have.
Leonardo da VinciI have wasted my hours.
Leonardo da VinciI love those who can smile in trouble, who can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection. ‘Tis the business of little minds to shrink, but they whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves their conduct, will pursue their principles unto death.
Leonardo da VinciIn rivers, the water that you touch is the last of what has passed and the first of that which comes; so with present time.
Leonardo da VinciIron rusts from disuse; water loses its purity from stagnation… even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind.
Leonardo da VinciIt had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.
Leonardo da VinciIt's easier to resist at the beginning than at the end.
Leonardo da VinciJust as courage imperils life, fear protects it.
Leonardo da VinciLearning never exhausts the mind.
Leonardo da VinciLife is pretty simple: You do some stuff. Most fails. Some works. You do more of what works. If it works big, others quickly copy it. Then you do something else. The trick is the doing something else.
Leonardo da VinciLife well spent is long.
Leonardo da VinciMarriage is like putting your hand into a bag of snakes in the hope of pulling out an eel.
Leonardo da VinciMen of lofty genius when they are doing the least work are most active.
Leonardo da VinciNature never breaks her own laws.
Leonardo da VinciNothing strengthens authority so much as silence.
Leonardo da VinciOur life is made by the death of others.
Leonardo da VinciSimplicity is the ultimate sophistication.
Leonardo da VinciThe function of muscle is to pull and not to push, except in the case of the genitals and the tongue.
Leonardo da VinciThe greatest deception men suffer is from their own opinions.
Leonardo da VinciThe human foot is a masterpiece of engineering and a work of art.
Leonardo da VinciThe noblest pleasure is the joy of understanding.
Leonardo da VinciThe poet ranks far below the painter in the representation of visible things, and far below the musician in that of invisible things.
Leonardo da VinciThe smallest feline is a masterpiece.
Leonardo da VinciThe truth of things is the chief nutriment of superior intellects.
Leonardo da VinciThere are three classes of people: those who see, those who see when they are shown, those who do not see.
Leonardo da VinciTime stays long enough for anyone who will use it.
Leonardo da VinciWater is the driving force of all nature.
Leonardo da VinciWhere the spirit does not work with the hand, there is no art.
Leonardo da VinciWhere there is shouting, there is no true knowledge.
Leonardo da VinciWhile I thought that I was learning how to live, I have been learning how to die.
Leonardo da VinciWho sows virtue reaps honor.
Leonardo da VinciWhy does the eye see a thing more clearly in dreams than the imagination when awake?
Leonardo da VinciYou can have no dominion greater or less than that over yourself.
Leonardo da VinciYou do ill if you praise, but worse if you censure, what you do not understand.
Leonardo da Vinci