Leonardo da Vinci was an Italian Renaissance polymath, a famous artist, engineer, inventor, and mathematician. Although he is most famously known for his paintings and designs, he also made contributions in various fields, including pyrotechnics, music, astronomy, and civil engineering.
The genius of Leonardo da Vinci can be explained by one thing: his intuition. Leonardo never cared about what other people thought or expected from him. He was free to explore his thoughts without being confined by the rules of society or tradition. As a result of this freedom to explore ideas freely without restriction, Leonardo da Vinci’s genius soared into something infinite that our world has not seen yet.
Here are his most famous and inspirational quotes that will inspire you to follow your passions and achieve your goals.
79 Most Inspirational Leonardo Di Vinci Quotes
“The truth of things is the chief nutriment of superior intellects.”
“As every divided kingdom falls, so every mind divided between many studies confounds and saps itself.”
“Beyond a doubt truth bears the same relation to falsehood as light to darkness.”
“Nothing can be love or hated unless it is first known.”
“Once you tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return.”
“Men of lofty genius when they are doing the least work are most active.”
“A wave is never found alone, but is mingled with the other waves.”
“Life well spent is long.”
“One has no right to love or hate anything if one has not acquired a thorough knowledge of its nature.”
“The acquisition of knowledge is always of use to the intellect because it may thus drive out useless things and retain the good. For nothing can be loved or hated unless it is first known.”
“Learning never exhausts the mind.”
“Study without desire spoils the memory, and it retains nothing that it takes in.”
“The greatest deception men suffer is from their own opinions.”
“It is easier to resist at the beginning than at the end.”
“Just as food eaten without appetite is a tedious nourishment, so does study without zeal damage the memory by not assimilating what it absorbs.”
“Once you have tasted the taste of sky, you will forever look up.”
“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.”
“Though I may not, like them, be able to quote other authors, I shall rely on that which is much greater and more worthy — on experience.”
“I love those who can smile in trouble, who can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection. It’s 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.”
“There are three classes of people: those who see, those who see when they are shown, those who do not see.”
“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.”
“Every action needs to be prompted by a motive.”
“Where the spirit does not work with the hand there is no art.”
“Nothing can be loved or hated unless it is first understood.”
“One can have no smaller or greater mastery than mastery of oneself.”
“Knowledge of the past and of the places of the earth is the ornament and food of the mind of man.”
“Anyone who conducts an argument by appealing to authority is not using his intelligence; he is just using his memory.”
“You do ill to praise, but worse to censure, what you do not understand“
“Time abides long enough for those who make use of it.”
“Experience never errs; it is only your judgments that err by promising themselves effects such as are not caused by your experiments.”
“Make your work to be in keeping with your purpose.”
“Life 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.”
“As a well spent day brings happy sleep, so life well used brings happy death.”
“He who wishes to be rich in a day will be hanged in a year.”
“It 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.”
“Time stays long enough for anyone who will use it.”
“As you cannot do what you want, want what you can do.”
“Poor is the pupil that does not surpass his master.”
“It’s easier to resist at the beginning than at the end.”
“I love those who can smile in trouble.”
“When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return.”
“He who is fixed to a star does not change his mind.”
“He who thinks little errs much.”
“All our knowledge has its origins in our perceptions.”
“The knowledge of all things is possible.”
“Iron rusts from disuse, stagnant water loses its purity, and in cold weather becomes frozen; even so does inaction sap the vigors of the mind.”
“Learn how to see. Realize that everything connects to everything else.”
“Why does the eye see more clearly when asleep than the imagination when awake?”
“The noblest pleasure is the joy of understanding.”
“I have always felt it is my destiny to build a machine that would allow man to fly.”
“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.”
“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.”
“The deeper the feeling, the greater the pain.”
“I awoke, only to find that the rest of the world is still asleep.”
“Obstacles cannot crush me. Every obstacle yields to stern resolve. He who is fixed to a star does not change his mind.”
“He who does not oppose evil, commands it to be done.”
“As a well-spent day brings happy sleep, so a life well spent brings happy death.”
“The human foot is a masterpiece of engineering and a work of art.”
“Life without love, is no life at all.”
“Experience does not err. Only your judgments err by expecting from her what is not in her power.”
“Realize that everything connects to everything else.”
“Why does the eye see a thing more clearly in dreams than the imagination when awake?”
“In time and with water, everything changes.”
“Learning is the only thing the mind never exhausts, never fears, and never regrets.”
“Small rooms or dwellings discipline the mind; large ones weaken it.”
“Learning acquired in youth arrests the evil of old age; and if you understand that old age has wisdom for its food, you will so conduct yourself in youth that your old age will not lack for nourishment.”
“I have been impressed with the urgency of doing. Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do.”
“Wisdom is the daughter of experience.”
“Just as a well-filled day brings blessed sleep, so a well-employed life brings a blessed death.”
“You can have no dominion greater or less than that over yourself.”
“Tears come from the heart and not from the brain.”
“All our knowledge has its origin in our perceptions.”
“You do ill if you praise, but worse if you censure, what you do not understand.”
“There are four powers: memory and intellect, desire and covetousness. The two first are mental and the others sensual. The three senses sight, hearing, and smell cannot well be prevented; touch and taste not at all.”
“Experience is a truer guide than the words of others.”
“In rivers, the water that you touch is the last of what has passed and the first of that which comes; so with present time.”
“Poor is the pupil who does not surpass his master.”
“The painter has the universe in his mind and hands.”
“Why does the eye see a thing more clearly in dreams than with the imagination being awake?”
