Leonardo da Vinci Quotes
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He who wishes to be rich in a day will be hanged in a year.
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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.
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I ask how far away the eye can discern a non-luminous body, as, for instance, a mountain. It will be very plainly visible if the sun is behind it; and could be seen at a greater or less distance according to the sun's place in the sky.
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Swimming upon water teaches men how birds do upon the air.
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Tell me if anything was ever done.
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The cock does not crow till it has thrice flapped its wings; the parrot in moving among boughs never puts its feet excepting where it has first put its beak. Vows are not made till Hope is dead.
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Reserve the great matters till the end, and the small matters give at the beginning.
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Wine is good, but water is preferable at table.
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If you transmit the rays of the sun through a hole in the shape of a star you will see a beautiful effect of perspective in the spot where the sun's rays fall.
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The eye can best distinguish the forms of objects when it is placed between the shaded and the illuminated parts.
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Iron rusts from disuse; stagnant water loses its purity and in cold weather becomes frozen; even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind.
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The sun gives spirit and life to plants and the earth nourishes them with moisture.
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Shun those studies in which the work that results dies with the worker.
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A bird makes the same use of wings and tail in the air as a swimmer does of his arms and legs in the water.
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Ask counsel of him who rules himself well.
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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.
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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.
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Truth here makes Falsehood torment lying tongues.
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To speak well of a base man is much the same as speaking ill of a good man.
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He who does not punish evil commands that it be done.
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Fear arises sooner than anything else.
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Of the horse I will say nothing because I know the times.
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The greatest deception men suffer is from their own opinions.
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The image of the sun where it falls appears as a thing which covers the person who attempts to cover it.