Inspirational Quotes
Words to motivate, inspire, and guide you.
Leonardo da Vinci Quotes
IgnoranceAwarenessSufferingDeceptionTruth & Wisdom Blinding ignorance does mislead us. O! Wretched mortals, open your eyes!
DestinyInventionFlightAmbition I have always felt it is my destiny to build a machine that would allow man to fly.
KnowledgeExperienceReasoning Although 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.
KnowledgeWritten WordPreservation All knowledge which ends in words will die as quickly as it came to life, with the exception of the written word: which is its mechanical part.
DualityTransformationPresence The beginnings and ends of shadow lie between the light and darkness and may be infinitely diminished and infinitely increased. Shadow is the means by which bodies display their form. The forms of bodies could not be understood in detail but for shadow.
PerceptionLogicJudgmentSensesReasoning Common Sense is that which judges the things given to it by other senses.
TheoryPracticeGuidancePurpose He who loves practice without theory is like the sailor who boards ship without a rudder and compass and never knows where he may cast.
TalentDiligencePerseveranceDisciplineDevelopment Many are they who have a taste and love for drawing, but no talent; and this will be discernible in boys who are not diligent and never finish their drawings with shading.
Art FormsArtistic ExpressionRepresentation The poet ranks far below the painter in the representation of visible things, and far below the musician in that of invisible things.
InactionStagnationMental VigorActivity Iron rusts from disuse; water loses its purity from stagnation... even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind.
SpiritBodyInterdependence The spirit desires to remain with its body, because, without the organic instruments of that body, it can neither act, nor feel anything.
PerceptionReasonContemplation The senses are of the earth, the reason stands apart from them in contemplation.
DebutGreatnessFameGlory The human bird shall take his first flight, filling the world with amazement, all writings with his fame, and bringing eternal glory to the nest whence he sprang.
PowerTransient SuccessFameMaterialism How many emperors and how many princes have lived and died and no record of them remains, and they only sought to gain dominions and riches in order that their fame might be ever-lasting.
Knowledge Acquisition In order to arrive at knowledge of the motions of birds in the air, it is first necessary to acquire knowledge of the winds, which we will prove by the motions of water in itself, and this knowledge will be a step enabling us to arrive at the knowledge of beings that fly between the air and the wind.
DivisionConfusionDistractionDepletionUnity As every divided kingdom falls, so every mind divided between many studies confounds and saps itself.
AnatomyKnowledgeArtMovementUnderstanding The painter who is familiar with the nature of the sinews, muscles, and tendons, will know very well, in giving movement to a limb, how many and which sinews cause it; and which muscle, by swelling, causes the contraction of that sinew; and which sinews, expanded into the thinnest cartilage, surround and support the said muscle.
LoveKnowledgeUnderstandingExperience For, verily, great love springs from great knowledge of the beloved object, and if you little know it, you will be able to love it only little or not at all.
PerceptionProportionScale There is no object so large but that at a great distance from the eye it does not appear smaller than a smaller object near.
InfluencePowerSpontaneityOpposition Weight, force and casual impulse, together with resistance, are the four external powers in which all the visible actions of mortals have their being and their end.
StrengthPerseveranceResilienceCourageIntegrity I 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.
PerceptionOptical IllusionsDistanceColor TheoryDrawing Techniques The divisions of Perspective are 3, as used in drawing; of these, the first includes the diminution in size of opaque objects; the second treats of the diminution and loss of outline in such opaque objects; the third, of the diminution and loss of colour at long distances.
NatureKnowledgeLogicPrinciple Nature is the source of all true knowledge. She has her own logic, her own laws, she has no effect without cause nor invention without necessity.
GeniusIntellectThoughtActivity Men of lofty genius when they are doing the least work are most active.
UnderstandingJudgmentDiscernment You do ill if you praise, but worse if you censure, what you do not understand.
BalanceInfluencePerspectiveUnity Each man is always in the middle of the surface of the earth and under the zenith of his own hemisphere, and over the centre of the earth.
PaintingVisual PerceptionElements of Art Painting is concerned with all the 10 attributes of sight; which are: Darkness, Light, Solidity and Colour, Form and Position, Distance and Propinquity, Motion and Rest.
ArtPracticeConsciousnessPerceptionCreativity The painter who draws merely by practice and by eye, without any reason, is like a mirror which copies every thing placed in front of it without being conscious of their existence.
LogicCritical Thinking Anyone who conducts an argument by appealing to authority is not using his intelligence; he is just using his memory.
MedicineSicknessHarmonyHealingBalance Medicine is the restoration of discordant elements; sickness is the discord of the elements infused into the living body.
MarriageRiskHopeUncertainty Marriage is like putting your hand into a bag of snakes in the hope of pulling out an eel.
DestinyMemoryEarly LifeEncounter It seems that it had been destined before that I should occupy myself so thoroughly with the vulture, for it comes to my mind as a very early memory, when I was still in the cradle, a vulture came down to me, he opened my mouth with his tail and struck me a few times with his tail against my lips.
PerfectionSimplicityEfficiency Human 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.
Nature's VarietyUniquenessIndividualityDiversity To such an extent does nature delight and abound in variety that among her trees there is not one plant to be found which is exactly like another; and not only among the plants, but among the boughs, the leaves and the fruits, you will not find one which is exactly similar to another.