Observation Quotes

My observation is that whenever one person is found adequate to the discharge of a duty . . . it is worse executed by two persons, and scarcely done at all if three or more are employed therein.

Darkness is absence of light. Shadow is diminution of light.

The eye, the window of the soul, is the chief means whereby the understanding can most fully and abundantly appreciate the infinite works of Nature; and the ear is second.

The beginnings and ends of shadow lie between the light and darkness and may be infinitely diminished and infinitely increased. Shadow is the means by which bodies display their form. The forms of bodies could not be understood in detail but for shadow.

My works are the issue of simple and plain experience which is the true mistress.

Although human ingenuity may devise various inventions which, by the help of various instruments, answer to one and the same purpose, yet will it never discover any inventions more beautiful, more simple or more practical than those of nature, because in her inventions there is nothing lacking and nothing superfluous; and she makes use of no counterpoise when she constructs the limbs of animals in such a way as to correspond to the motion of their bodies, but she puts into them the soul of the body.

If you cause your ship to stop and place the head of a long tube in the water and place the outer extremity to your ear, you will hear ships at a great distance from you.

Many will think they may reasonably blame me by alleging that my proofs are opposed to the authority of certain men held in the highest reverence by their inexperienced judgments; not considering that my works are the issue of pure and simple experience.

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.

A single and distinct luminous body causes stronger relief in the objects than a diffused light; as may be seen by comparing one side of a landscape illuminated by the sun, and one overshadowed by clouds, and illuminated only by the diffused light of the atmosphere.

To any white body receiving the light from the sun, or the air, the shadows will be of a bluish cast.

A luminous body will appear more brilliant in proportion as it is surrounded by deeper shadow.

The boundaries of bodies are the least of all things. The proposition is proved to be true, because the boundary of a thing is a surface, which is not part of the body contained within that surface; nor is it part of the air surrounding that body, but is the medium interposted between the air and the body, as is proved in its place.

Thus it is with a deaf and dumb person who, when he sees two men in conversation - although he is deprived of hearing - can nevertheless understand, from the attitudes and gestures of the speakers, the nature of their discussion.

Light is the chaser away of darkness. Shade is the obstruction of light. Primary light is that which falls on objects and causes light and shade. And derived lights are those portions of a body which are illuminated by the primary light. A primary shadow is that side of a body on which the light cannot fall.

Observe the light and consider its beauty. Blink your eye and look at it. That which you see was not there at first, and that which was there is there no more.

Describe the tongue of the woodpecker and the jaw of the crocodile.

The frog instantly dies when the spinal cord is pierced; and previous to this it lived without head without heart or any bowels or intestines orskin; and here therefore it would seem lies the foundation of move- ment and life.

A bird as it rises always sets its wings above the wind and without beating them, and it always moves in a circular movement.

The air moves like a river and carries the clouds with it; just as running water carries all the things that float upon it.