Alexander von Humboldt Quotes

47 Sourced Quotes

The most powerful influence exercised by the Arabs on general natural physics was that directed to the advances of chemistry; a science for which this race created a new era.(...) Besides making laudatory mention of that which we owe to the natural science of the Arabs in both the terrestrial and celestial spheres, we must likewise allude to their contributions in separate paths of intellectual development to the general mass of mathematical science.

Alexander von Humboldt
I shall collect plants and fossils, and with the best of instruments make astronomic observations. Yet this is not the main purpose of my journey. I shall endeavor to find out how nature's forces act upon one another, and in what manner the geographic environment exerts its influence on animals and plants. In short, I must find out about the harmony in nature.

Alexander von Humboldt
The principal impulse by which I was directed was the earnest endeavor to comprehend the phenomena of physical objects in their general connection, and to represent nature as one great whole, moved and animated by internal forces. My intercourse with highly-gifted men early led me to discover that, without an earnest striving to attain to a knowledge of special branches of study, all attempts to give a grand and general view of the universe would be nothing more than a vain illusion. These special departments in the great domain of natural science are, moreover, capable of being reciprocally fructified by means of the appropriative forces by which they are endowed.

Alexander von Humboldt
That which we call the Atlantic Ocean is only a valley excavated by the force of the waters; the form of the seacoast, the salient and re-entrant angles of America, of Africa, and of Europe proclaim this catastrophe.

Alexander von Humboldt
That which, in the vagueness of our impressions, loses all distinctness of form, like some distant mountain shrouded from view by a veil of mist, is clearly revealed by the light of mind, which, by its scrutiny into the causes of phenomena, learns to resolve and analyze their different elements, assigning to each its individual character.

Alexander von Humboldt
This active striving, which has existed in all ages, must frequently, and under various forms, have deluded men into the idea that they had reached the goal, and discovered the principle which could explain all that is variable in the organic world, and all the phenomena revealed to us by sensuous perception.

Alexander von Humboldt
One of the noblest characteristics which distinguish modern civilization from that of remoter times is, that it has enlarged the mass of our conceptions, rendered us more capable of perceiving the connection between the physical and intellectual world, and thrown a more general interest over objects which heretofore occupied only a few scientific men, because those objects were contemplated separately, and from a narrower point of view.

Alexander von Humboldt
An equal appreciation of all branches of the mathematical, physical, and natural sciences is a special requirement of the present age, in which the material wealth and the growing prosperity of nations are principally based upon a more enlightened employment of the products and forces of Nature.

Alexander von Humboldt
That which for a long time remains merely an object of vague intuition, by degrees acquires the certainty of positive truth; and man, as an I immortal poet has said, in our own tongue - Amid ceaseless change seeks the unchanging pole.

Alexander von Humboldt
Whatever must be characterized as mere probability lies beyond the domain of physical description of the universe; science must not wander into the cloudland of cosmological dreams.

Alexander von Humboldt
Since scientific knowledge, although frequently blended with vague and superficial views, has been more extensively diffused through wider circles of social life, apprehensions of the possible evils threatened by comets have acquired more weight, as their direction has become more definite.

Alexander von Humboldt
This assemblage of imperfect dogmas bequeathed by one age to another - this physical philosophy, which is composed of popular prejudices - is not only injurious because it perpetuates error with the obstinacy engendered by the evidence of ill observed facts, but also because it hinders the mind from attaining to higher views of nature.

Alexander von Humboldt
Man cannot act upon Nature, or appropriate her forces to his own use, without comprehending their full extent and having an intimate acquaintance with the laws of the physical world.

Alexander von Humboldt
In infinity of space as well as in eternity of time, all things are shrouded in an uncertain and frequently deceptive twilight.

Alexander von Humboldt
Statistical projections which speak to the senses without fatiguing the mind, possess the advantage of fixing the attention on a great number of important facts.

Alexander von Humboldt
Science is the labor of mind applied to nature...

Alexander von Humboldt
Nature considered rationally, that is to say, submitted to the process of thought, is a unity in diversity of phenomena; a harmony, blending together all created things, however dissimilar in form and attributes; one great whole animated by the breath of life.

Alexander von Humboldt