Leonardo da Vinci Quotes

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No small hole can so modify the convergence of rays of light as to prevent, at a long distance, the transmission of the true form of the luminous body causing them.

Leonardo da Vinci
Obstacles cannot crush me. Every obstacle yields to stern resolve. He who is fixed to a star does not change his mind.

Leonardo da Vinci
All objects project their whole image and likeness, diffused and mingled in the whole of the atmosphere, opposite to themselves. The image of every point of the bodily surface, exists in every part of the atmosphere. All the images of the objects are in every part of the atmosphere

Leonardo da Vinci
The body of the atmosphere is full of infinite radiating pyramids produced by the objects existing in it. These intersect and cross each other with independent convergence without interfering with each other and pass through all the surrounding atmosphere; and are of equal force and value — all being equal to each, each to all. And by means of these, images of the body are transmitted everywhere and on all sides, and each receives in itself every minutest portion of the object that produces it.

Leonardo da Vinci
The water you touch in a river is the last of that which has passed, and the first of that which is coming. Thus it is with time present.

Leonardo da Vinci
That man is of supreme folly who always wants for fear of wanting; and his life flies away while he is still hoping to enjoy the good things which he has with extreme labour acquired.

Leonardo da Vinci
The mind passes in an instant from east to west; and all the great incorporeal things resemble these very closely in speed.

Leonardo da Vinci
I ask at what part of its curved motion the moving cause will leave the thing moved and moveable.

Leonardo da Vinci
Men will deal rude blows to that which is the cause of their life:—They will thrash the grain.

Leonardo da Vinci
It reflects no great honour on a painter to be able to execute one thing well.

Leonardo da Vinci
You can have no dominion greater or less than that over yourself.

Leonardo da Vinci
I find that any luminous body when seen through a dense and thick mist diminishes in proportion to its distance from the eye. Thus it is with the sun by day, as well as the moon and the other eternal lights by night. And when the air is clear, these luminaries appear larger in proportion as they are farther from the eye.

Leonardo da Vinci
The East will be seen to rush to the West and the South to the North in confusion round and about the universe, with great noise and trembling or fury.

Leonardo da Vinci
There is nothing which deceives us as much as our own judgement.

Leonardo da Vinci
Here forms, here colours, here the character of every part of the universe are concentrated to a point; and that point is so marvellous a thing … Oh! marvellous, O stupendous Necessity — by thy laws thou dost compel every effect to be the direct result of its cause, by the shortest path. These are miracles...

Leonardo da Vinci
Those who are in love with practice without knowledge are like the sailor who gets into a ship without rudder or compass and who never can be certain whether he is going. Practice must always be founded on sound theory, and to this Perspective is the guide and the gateway; and without this nothing can be done well in the matter of drawing.

Leonardo da Vinci
The city will gain beauty worthy of its name and to you it will be useful by its revenues, and the eternal fame of its aggrandizement.

Leonardo da Vinci
The body which is nearest to the light casts the largest shadow, and why? If an object placed in front of a single light is very close to it you will see that it casts a very large shadow on the opposite wall, and the farther you remove the object from the light the smaller will the image of the shadow become.

Leonardo da Vinci
He who has access to the fountain does not go to the water-pot.

Leonardo da Vinci
Experience never errs; it is only your judgments that err by promising themselves effects such as are not caused by your experiments.

Leonardo da Vinci
What is called Nothingness is to be found only in time and in speech. In time it stands between the past and future and has no existence in the present; and thus in speech it is one of the things of which we say: They are not, or they are impossible.

Leonardo da Vinci
Experience, the interpreter between formative nature and the human race, teaches how that nature acts among mortals; and being constrained by necessity cannot act otherwise than as reason, which is its helm, requires her to act.

Leonardo da Vinci
To speak well of a base man is much the same as speaking ill of a good man.

Leonardo da Vinci
The wind which passes through the skins of animals will make men leap up:—That is the bagpipes, which cause men to dance.

Leonardo da Vinci
If any man could have discovered the utmost powers of the cannon, in all its various forms and have given such a secret to the Romans, with what rapidity would they have conquered every country and have vanquished every army, and what reward could have been great enough for such a service! Archimedes indeed, although he had greatly damaged the Romans in the siege of Syracuse, nevertheless did not fail of being offered great rewards from these very Romans; and when Syracuse was taken, diligent search was made for Archimedes; and he being found dead greater lamentation was made for him by the Senate and people of Rome than if they had lost all their army; and they did not fail to honour him with burial and with a statue.

Leonardo da Vinci