Natura Quotes
More Natura Quotes
Tutte le opera, che si veggono fatte dallo Iddio della Natura in cielo ed in terra, sono tutte di Scultura.
Benvenuto Cellini— All works of nature created by God in heaven and on earth are works of sculpture.
— Treatise on Sculpture (1564), opening words, cited from G. P. Carpani (ed.) Vita di Benvenuto Cellini (Milano: Nicolo Bettoni, 1821) vol. 3, p. 199; translation from Jean Paul Richter (ed.) The Literary Works of Leonardo da Vinci (London: Phaidon, 1970) vol. 1, p. 90.
Natura beatis,omnibus esse dedit, si quis cognoverit uti.
claudian— Nature has given the opportunity of happiness to all, knew they but how to use it.
— In Rufinum, Bk. I, lines 215-216.
Divina Natura dedit agros, ars humana ædificavit urbes.
marcus terentius varro— It was divine nature which gave us the country, and man's skill that built the cities.
— Marcus Porcius Cato on Agriculture : Marcus Terentius Varro on Agriculture. W.D. Hooper & H.B. Ash. (translation). Harvard University Press, 1993. Bk. 3, ch. 1
Natura è gran maestra, e mai non erra.
niccolò forteguerri— VIII, 20.Translation: Nature’s a mighty teacher, and ne’er errs.Translation reported in Harbottle’s Dictionary of quotations French and Italian (1904), p. 363.
Format enim Natura prius nos intus ad omnem Fortunarum habitum, juvat, aut impellit ad iram, Aut ad humum moerore gravi deducit, et angit.
horace— For nature forms our spirits to receive
Each bent that outward circumstance can give:
She kindles pleasure, bids resentment glow,
Or bows the soul to earth in hopeless woe.Line 108 (translated by John Conington).
Natura abhorret vacuum.
françois rabelais— Translation: Nature abhors a vacuum.Chapter 5.
Divina Natura dedit agros, ars humana ædificavit urbes.
— It was divine nature which gave us the country, and man's skill that built the cities.
— Marcus Porcius Cato on Agriculture : Marcus Terentius Varro on Agriculture. W.D. Hooper & H.B. Ash. (translation). Harvard University Press, 1993. Bk. 3, ch. 1
Natura è gran maestra, e mai non erra.
— VIII, 20.
— Translation: Nature’s a mighty teacher, and ne’er errs.
— Translation reported in Harbottle’s Dictionary of quotations French and Italian (1904), p. 363.
Natura beatis, omnibus esse dedit, si quis cognoverit uti.
— Nature has given the opportunity of happiness to all, knew they but how to use it.
— In Rufinum, Bk. I, lines 215-216.
Format enim Natura prius nos intus ad omnem Fortunarum habitum, juvat, aut impellit ad iram, Aut ad humum moerore gravi deducit, et angit.
— For nature forms our spirits to receive
Each bent that outward circumstance can give:
She kindles pleasure, bids resentment glow,
Or bows the soul to earth in hopeless woe.
— Line 108 (translated by John Conington).
In rerum Natura nullum datur contingens; sed omnia ex necessitate divinae naturae determinata sunt ad certo modo existandum et operandum. In the nature of things nothing contingent isgranted, but all things are determined by the necessity of divine nature for existing and working in a certain way.
Baruch also known as Benedict de Spinoza Spinoza— 1677 Ethics, bk.1, prop.29.
De Natura Rationis est, res sub quadam aeternitatis specie percipere. It is the nature of reason to perceive things under a certain species of eternity.
Baruch also known as Benedict de Spinoza Spinoza— 1677 Ethics, bk.2, prop.44, corollary 2.
Se l'arte dell'eloquenza è l'arte di persuadere, non vi è altra eloquenza che quella di dire sempre il vero, il solo vero, il nudo vero. Le parole, onde è necessità di nostra inferma Natura di rivestire il pensiero, saranno tanto più potenti, quanto più atte al fine, cioè più nudo lasceranno il vero, che è nel pensiero.
vincenzo cuoco— Translation: If the art of eloquence is the art of persuading, there is no other eloquence but that of saying the truth, only the truth, the naked truth. Words, since it is a necessity of our infirm nature to clothe thought, will be the more powerful the more they are suited to their aim, that is the more naked they will leave the truth, which resides in thought.
— Platone in Italia
Consuetudo Natura potentior est.
quintus curtius rufus— Habit is stronger than nature.
— V, 5, 21.
Aetolos Acarnanas Macedonas, eiusdem linguae homines, leues ad tempus ortae causae diiungunt coniunguntque: cum alienigenis, cum barbaris aeternum omnibus Graecis bellum est eritque; Natura enim, quae perpetua est, non mutabilibus in diem causis hostes sunt...
livy— Translation: The Aitolians, the Akarnanians, the Macedonians, men of the same speech, are united or disunited by trivial causes that arise from time to time; with aliens, with barbarians, all Greeks wage and will wage eternal war; for they are enemies by the will of nature, which is eternal, and not from reasons that change from day to day...
— Liber XXXI, 29, 15
L’arte che imita la Natura, opera per gradi, e non a salti.
raimondo montecuccoli— P. 344.
— Translation: Art, which imitates nature, works by steps, and not by leaps.
— Translation reported in Harbottle's Dictionary of quotations French and Italian (1904), p. 333.
Fervent bella horrida, ferventossibus inclusa fremit et discordibus armisnon simplex Natura hominis.
prudentius— War rages, horrid warEven in our bones; our double nature soundsWith armèd discord.
— Psychomachia, line 902; translation from C. S. Lewis The Allegory of Love (London: Oxford University Press, [1936] 1975) p. 72.
(Che) la Natura umana è fatta in guisa Che si mantien di lagrime e di risa.
niccolò forteguerri— XXVI, 80.Translation: For human nature so is fashioned,
That upon teais and laughter it is fed.Translation reported in Harbottle’s Dictionary of quotations French and Italian (1904), p. 345.
Nil igitur mors est ad nos neque pertinet hilum, quandoquidem Natura animi mortalis habetur.
lucretius— Therefore death is nothing to us, it matters not one jot, since the nature of the mind is understood to be mortal.Variant translation: Death therefore is nothing to us nor does it concern us a scrap, seeing that the nature of the spirit we possess is something mortal.Book III, line 830-31.
Consuetudo est secunda Natura.
— Custom is second nature.
— St. Augustine.
Consuetude quasi altera Natura effici.
— Habit is, as it were, a second nature.
— Cicero, De Finibus Bonorum et Malorum, V, 25, Tusculanarum Disputationum, II, 17.
Consuetudo Natura potentior est.
quintus curtius rufus— Habit is stronger than nature.
— Quintus Curtius Rufus, De Rebus Gestis Alexandri Magni, V, 5, 21.
Ignoratur enim, quæ sit Natura animai; Nata sit, an contra nascentibus insinuetur; Et simul intereat nobiscum, morte diremta, An tenebras Orci visat, vastasque lacunas: An pecudes alias divinitus insinuet se.
— For it is unknown what is the real nature of the soul, whether it be born with the bodily frame or be infused at the moment of birth, whether it perishes along with us, when death separates the soul and body, or whether it visits the shades of Pluto and bottomless pits, or enters by divine appointment into other animals.
— Lucretius, De Rerum Natura, I. 113.
Consuetudo Natura potentior est.
— Habit is stronger than nature.
— V, 5, 21.
Divina Natura dedit agros, ars humana ædificavit urbes.
marcus terentius varro— Divine Nature gave the fields, human art built the cities.
— Marcus Terentius Varro, De Re Rustica, III. 1.
Atqui si vitiis mediocribus ac mea paucis mendosa est Natura, alioqui recta, velut si egregio inspersos reprehendas corpore naevos, si neque avaritiam neque sordes nec mala lustra obiciet vere quisquam mihi, purus et insons, ut me collaudem, si et vivo carus amicis... at hoc nunc laus illi debetur et a me gratia maior. nil me paeniteat sanum patris huius, eoque non, ut magna dolo factum negat esse suo pars, quod non ingenuos habeat clarosque parentis, sic me defendam.
— If my character is flawed by a few minor faults, but is otherwise decent and moral, if you can point out only a few scattered blemishes on an otherwise immaculate surface, if no one can accuse me of greed, or of prurience, or of profligacy, if I live a virtuous life, free of defilement (pardon, for a moment, my self-praise), and if I am to my friends a good friend, my father deserves all the credit... As it is now, he deserves from me unstinting gratitude and praise. I could never be ashamed of such a father, nor do I feel any need, as many people do, to apologize for being a freedman's son.
— Book I, satire vi, lines 65-92.
Nil igitur mors est ad nos neque pertinet hilum, quandoquidem Natura animi mortalis habetur.
— Book III, line 830-31.
Nec species sua cuique manet, rerumque novatrix Ex aliis alias reddit Natura figuras. Nec perit in toto quidquam, mihi credite, mundo, Sed variat faciemque novat: nascique vocatur Incipere esse aliud, quàm quod fuit antè; morique Desinere illud idem; quum sint huc forsitan illa, Haec translata illuc; summâ tamen omnia constant.
— No species remains constant: that great renovator of matter
Nature, endlessly fashions new forms from old: there’s nothing
in the whole universe that perishes, believe me; rather
it renews and varies its substance. What we describe as birth
is no more than incipient change from a prior state, while dying
is merely to quit it. Though the parts may be transported
hither and thither, the sum of all matter is constant.
— XV, 252-8 (translated by Peter Green).
Fervent bella horrida, fervent ossibus inclusa fremit et discordibus armis non simplex Natura hominis.
— War rages, horrid war
Even in our bones; our double nature sounds
With armèd discord.
— Psychomachia, line 902; translation from C. S. Lewis The Allegory of Love (London: Oxford University Press, [1936] 1975) p. 72.
