Leonardo da Vinci Quotes - Page 2

A painter should begin every canvas with a wash of black, because all things in nature are dark except where exposed by the light.

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.

Not to punish evil is equivalent to authorizing it.

To become an artist you have to be curious.

One can have no smaller or greater mastery than mastery of oneself.

If you are alone you belong entirely to yourself. If you are accompanied by even one companion you belong only half to yourself or even less in proportion to the thoughtlessness of his conduct and if you have more than one companion you will fall more deeply into the same plight.

A good painter is to paint two main things namely men and the working of man's mind.

If the painter wishes to see beauties that charm him, it lies in his power to create them, and if he wishes to see monstrosities that are frightful, ridiculous, or truly pitiable, he is lord and God thereof.

All sciences are vain and full of errors that are not born of Experience, the mother of all Knowledge.

No counsel is more sincere than that given on ships which are in danger.

Reprove your friend in secret and praise him in public.

The eye which turns from a white object in the light of the sun and goes into a less fully lighted place will see everything as dark.