Leonardo da Vinci on Science

"Su per lago di Como di ver Lamagnia (Alemagna, cioè Germania) è valle di Ciavenna dove la Mera fiume mette in esso lago. Qui si truova montagni sterili e altissime chon grandi scogli ... In queste montagnie li uccielli d’acqua dette maragoni. Qui nasscie abeti, larici eppini, daini, stambuche, chamoze e teribili orsi. Non ci si pò montare se none a 4 piedi. Vannoci i villani a tempi delle nevi chon grande ingiegni per fare trabochare gli orsi giù per esse ripe. Queste montagni strette metano i(n) mezo il fiume. Sono a destra e assinistra per isspatio di miglia 20 tutti a detto modo."

"3 miglia più in là si trova li edifici della vena del rame e dello argento, presso una terra detta Pra Santo Petro e vene di ferro e cose fantastiche. ( Ancient Italian)"

"Oysters open completely when the moon is full; and when the crab sees one it throws a piece of stone or seaweed into it and the oyster cannot close again so that it serves the crab for meat. Such is the fate of him who opens his mouth too much and thereby puts himself at the mercy of the listener."

"truovasi di miglio i(n) miglio bone osteriee. ( Ancient Italian)"

"3 miles further on are the buildings of the vein of copper and silver, near a land called Prato San Pietro and veins of iron and fantastic things. (paper F.573)"

"Fa vini potenti e assai, … e ‘l vino vale el più uno soldo il boccale e la libbra della vitella un soldo e ‘l sale 10 dinari, e ‘l simile il burro, ed è la loro libbra 30 once, e l’ova un soldo la soldata. ( Modern Italian)"

"Look at the grace and sweetness of men and women in the street..."

"He makes powerful and very strong wines, … and the wine is worth more than a penny per jug and the pound of veal a penny and the salt 10 denarii, and so is the butter, and their pound is 30 ounces, and the eggs a penny. (referring to the food products of Valtellina)"

"I am not to blame for putting forward, in the course of my work on science, any general rule derived from a previous conclusion."

"Mechanics is the paradise of the mathematical sciences because by means of it one comes to the fruits of mathematics."

"Experience never errs; it is only your judgments that err by promising themselves effects such as are not caused by your experiments."

"There is no certainty in sciences where one of the mathematical sciences cannot be applied, or which are not in relation with these mathematics."

"Leonardo and the Renaissance engineers from Institute and Museum of the History of Science"

"The man who blames the supreme certainty of mathematics feeds on confusion, and can never silence the contradictions of sophistical sciences which lead to an eternal quackery."

"It is the infinite alone that cannot be attained, for if it could it would become finite."