Thoughts on Art and Life Part 9

The shuttle says: I will continue to move until the cloth is woven.

Everything that is crooked is straightened.

Great ruin proceeds from a slight cause.

Fine gold is recognized when it is tested.

The image will correspond to the die.

The wall will fall on him who sc.r.a.pes it.

Ivy lives long.

To the traitor, death is life, because if he makes use of others he is no longer believed.

When fortune comes seize her in front firmly, because behind she is bald.

Constancy means, not he who begins, but he who perseveres.

I do not yield to obstacles.

Every obstacle is overcome by resolve.

He who is chained to a star does not change.

[Sidenote: Truth]

112.

Fire destroys falsehood,--that is to say, sophistry,--and rehabilitates truth, scattering the darkness.

Fire must be represented as the consumer of all sophistry and the revealer of truth, because it is light and scatters darkness which conceals all essences.

Fire destroys all sophistry,--that is to say, deceit,--and preserves truth alone, which is gold. {45} Truth cannot be concealed in the end, dissimulation is of no avail. Dissimulation is frustrated before so great a judge. Falsehood puts on a mask.

There is nothing hidden under the sun. Fire must represent truth because it destroys all sophistry and lies, and the mask is for sophistry and lies, which conceal truth.

113.

Rather privation of limbs than weariness of doing good. The power of using my limbs shall fail me before the power of being useful. Rather death than weariness. I cannot be satiated with serving. I do not weary of giving help. No amount of work is sufficient to weary me.

This is a carnival motto: "Sine la.s.situdine." Hands in which ducats and precious stones abound like snow never grow weary of serving, but such a service is for its utility only and not for our profit. Nature has formed me thus.

[Sidenote: Ingrat.i.tude]

114.

This shall be placed in the hand of ingrat.i.tude: The wood nourishes the fire that consumes it. When the sun, the scatterer of darkness, shines, you put out the light which for you in particular, and for your need and convenience, expelled the darkness.

[Sidenote: Physiological Inferiority of Man]

115.

I have found that in the composition of the human body as compared with the bodies of {46} animals the senses are less subtle and coa.r.s.er; it is thus composed of less ingenious machinery and of cells less capable of receiving the power of senses. I have seen that in the lion the sense of smell is connected with the substance of the brain and descends through the nostrils which form an ample receptacle for it; and it enters into a great number of cartilaginous cells which are provided with many pa.s.sages in order to receive the brain. A large part of the head of the lion is given up to the sockets of the eyes, and the optic nerves are in immediate contact with the brain; the contrary occurs in man, because the sockets of the eyes occupy a small portion of the head, and the optic nerves are subtle and long and weak, and owing to the weakness of their action we see little by day and less at night; and the animals above mentioned see better at night than in the daytime; and the proof of this is that they seek their prey at night and sleep during the daytime, as do also the nocturnal birds.

[Sidenote: Man's Ethical Inferiority]

116.

Thou hast described him king of animals, but I would rather say, king of beasts, thou being the greatest--for hast thou not slain them in order that they may give thee their children to glut thy greed with which thou hast striven to make a sepulchre for all animals? And I would say still more if I might speak the whole truth. But let us {47} confine ourselves to human matters, relating one supreme infamy, which is not to be found among the animals of the earth; because among these you will not find animals who eat their young, except when they are utterly foolish (and there are few indeed of such among them), and this occurs only among the beasts of prey, such as the lions, and leopards, panthers, lynxes, cats and the like, which sometimes feed on their young; but thou, besides thy children, dost devour thy father, thy mother, thy brother and thy friends; and not satisfied with this, thou goest forth to hunt on the islands of others, seizing other men and these half naked ... thou fattenest and chasest them down thy own throat. Now does not nature produce enough vegetables for thee to satisfy thyself? And if thou art not content with vegetables, canst thou not by a mixture of them make infinite compounds as Platina wrote, and other writers on food?

[Sidenote: Man in the Animal World]

117.

The description of man, including that of such creatures belonging almost to the same species, such as apes, monkeys and the like, of which there are many.

118.

The way of walking in man is similar in all cases to the universal way of walking in four-footed animals, because, just as they move their feet {48} crosswise, like a trotting horse, so man moves his four limbs crosswise, that is to say, in walking he puts forward his right foot simultaneously with his left arm, and so on vice versa.

119.

Write a special treatise to describe the movements of four-footed animals, among which is man, who in his childhood also walks on four feet.

[Sidenote: Fragment of a Letter]

120.

There is one who having promised me much less than his due, and being disappointed of his presumptuous desire, has tried to deprive me of all my friends; and finding them wise and not pliable to his will, he has threatened me that he would bring accusations against me and alienate my benefactors from me: hence I have informed Your Lordship of this, so that this man, who wishes to sow the usual scandals, may not find a soil fit for sowing the thoughts and deeds of his evil nature; and that when he tries to make Your Lordship the tool of his infamous and malicious nature he may be disappointed of his desire.

[Sidenote: Giacomo of Pupil of Leonardo]

121.

On the 23d of April, 1490, I began this book; and started again on the horse. Giacomo came to live with me on Saint Mary Magdalen's day in 1490; {49} he was ten years old. He was a thief, a liar, obstinate, and a glutton. On the second day I had two shirts made for him, a pair of socks and a jerkin, and when I placed the money aside to pay for these things, he stole it out of the purse and I could never force him to confess the fact, though I was quite certain of it--4 lire. On the following day I went to sup with Giacomo Andrea, and this same Giacomo supped for two and did mischief for four, since he broke three bottles, spilled the wine, and after this came to sup where I... Item: on the 7th of September he stole a silver point, worth twelve soldi, from Marco, who was living with me, and took it from his studio; and when Marco had looked for it for some time he found it hidden in Giacomo's box--lire 1, soldi 2. Item: on the 26th of the following January, being in the house of Messer Galeazzo di San Severino, in order to arrange the festivity of his joust, and certain henchmen having undressed to try on the costumes of rustics who were to take part in the aforesaid festivity, Giacomo took the purse of one of them, which was on the bed with other clothes, and stole the money he found in it--2 lire, 4 soldi. Item: Maestro Agostino of Padua gave me while I was in the same house a Turkish hide to have a pair of shoes made of it, and Giacomo stole this from me within a month and sold it to a cobbler for 20 soldi, with which money by his own confession he bought sweets of aniseed. Item: {50} again, on the 2d of April, Giovanni Antonio left a silver point on one of his drawings, and Giacomo stole it; it was worth 24 soldi,--1 lire, 4 soldi. The first year a cloak, 2 lire; six shirts, 4 lire; three doublets, 6 lire: four pairs of socks, 7 lire, 8 soldi.

122.