1168

How to spend life.

To lie is so vile, that even if it were in speaking well of godly things it would take off something from God’s grace; and Truth is so excellent, that if it praises but small things they become noble.

Beyond a doubt truth bears the same relation to falsehood as light to darkness; and this truth is in itself so excellent that, even when it dwells on humble and lowly matters, it is still infinitely above uncertainty and lies, disguised in high and lofty discourses; because in our minds, even if lying should be their fifth element, this does not prevent that the truth of things is the chief nutriment of superior intellects, though not of wandering wits.

But you who live in dreams are better pleased by the sophistical reasons and frauds of wits in great and uncertain things, than by those reasons which are certain and natural and not so far above us.

Taken from The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci edited by Jean Paul Richter, 1880.

Notebooks of Leonoardo da Vinci
XIX: Philosophical Maxims. Morals. Polemics and Speculations.
. . .
Science, its principles and rules.
1148,
1149,
1150,
1151,
1152,
1153,
1154,
1155,
1156,
1157,
1158,
1159,
1160,
1161
What is life?.
1162,
1163
Death.
1164
How to spend life.
1165,
1166,
1167,
1168,
1169,
1170,
1171,
1172,
1173,
1174,
1175,
1176,
1177,
1178,
1179
On foolishness and ignorance.
1180,
1181,
1182
On riches.
1183,
1184,
1185,
1186,
1187
Rules of Life.
1188
. . .