Society and the World

Even the richest soil, if left uncultivated will produce the rankest weeds.

Even the richest soil, if left uncultivated will produce the rankest weeds.

I have always felt it is my destiny to build a machine that would allow man to fly.

Inaction saps the vigor of the mind.

You should prefer a good scientist without literary abilities than a literate one without scientific skills.

You should prefer a good scientist without literary abilities than a literate one without scientific skills.

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.

Anyone who conducts an argument by appealing to authority is not using his intelligence; he is just using his memory.

Anyone who conducts an argument by appealing to authority is not using his intelligence; he is just using his memory.

The mole has very small eyes and it always lives under ground; and it lives as long as it is in the dark but when it comes into the light it dies immediately, because it becomes known; and so it is with lies.

The merit of painting lies in the exactness of reproduction. Painting is a science and all sciences are based on mathematics. No human inquiry can be a science unless it pursues its path through m a t h e m a t i c a l e x p o s i t i o n a n d demonstration.

Not to punish evil is equivalent to authorizing it.

Not to punish evil is equivalent to authorizing it.

What induces you, oh man, to depart from your home in town, to leave parents and friends, and go to the countryside 72 over mountains and valleys, if it is not for the beauty of the world of nature?

To me it seems that those sciences are vain and full of error which are not born of experience, mother of all certainty, first-hand experience which in its origins, or means, or end has passed through one of the five senses.

Test knowledge through experience, be prepared to make mistakes, and be persistent about it.

Test knowledge through experience, be prepared to make mistakes, and be persistent about it.

I say that the power of vision extends through the visual rays to the surface of non-transparent bodies, while the power possessed by these bodies extends to the power of vision.

Fire destroys all sophistry, that is deceit; and maintains truth alone, that is gold.

Common Sense is that which judges the things given to it by other senses.

A bird is an instrument working according to mathematical law, which instrument it is within the capacity of man to reproduce with all its movements.

I roamed the countryside searching for answers to things I did not understand. Why shells existed on the tops of mountains. How the various circles of water form around the spot which has been struck by a stone, and why a bird sustains itself in the air.

Motion is created by the destruction of balance.

Experience does not err. Only your judgments err by expecting from her what is not in her power.