TODAY IN SCIENCE HISTORY ®  •  TODAYINSCI ®
Celebrating 24 Years on the Web
Find science on or your birthday

Today in Science History - Quickie Quiz
Who said: “Environmental extremists ... wouldn�t let you build a house unless it looked like a bird�s nest.”
more quiz questions >>
Home > Category Index for Science Quotations > Category Index L > Category: Labour

Labour Quotes (99 quotes)

Between the frontiers of the three super-states Eurasia, Oceania, and Eastasia, and not permanently in possession of any of them, there lies a rough quadrilateral with its corners at Tangier, Brazzaville, Darwin, and Hongkong. These territories contain a bottomless reserve of cheap labour. Whichever power controls equatorial Africa, or the Middle East or Southern India or the Indonesian Archipelago, disposes also of the bodies of hundreds of millions of ill-paid and hardworking coolies, expended by their conquerors like so much coal or oil in the race to turn out more armaments, to capture more territory, to control more labour, to turn out more armaments, to capture more territory, to control…
Thus George Orwell—in his only reference to the less-developed world.
I wish I could disagree with him. Orwell may have erred in not anticipating the withering of direct colonial controls within the “quadrilateral” he speaks about; he may not quite have gauged the vehemence of urges to political self-assertion. Nor, dare I hope, was he right in the sombre picture of conscious and heartless exploitation he has painted. But he did not err in predicting persisting poverty and hunger and overcrowding in 1984 among the less privileged nations.
I would like to live to regret my words but twenty years from now, I am positive, the less-developed world will be as hungry, as relatively undeveloped, and as desperately poor, as today.
'The Less-Developed World: How Can We be Optimists?' (1964). Reprinted in Ideals and Realities (1984), xv-xvi. Referencing a misquote from George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty Four (1949), Ch. 9.
Science quotes on:  |  Africa (37)  |  Archipelago (7)  |  Armament (6)  |  Bottomless (6)  |  Coal (62)  |  Conqueror (8)  |  Control (176)  |  Corner (57)  |  Dare (52)  |  Develop (272)  |  Direct (225)  |  Exploitation (14)  |  Frontier (41)  |  Heartless (3)  |  Hope (308)  |  Hundred (231)  |  Hunger (21)  |  Lie (364)  |  Live (637)  |  More (2559)  |  Nation (203)  |  Oil (64)  |   George Orwell (4)  |  Persisting (2)  |  Picture (146)  |  Political (122)  |  Poor (138)  |  Positive (94)  |  Possession (67)  |  Poverty (40)  |  Power (757)  |  Race (273)  |  Regret (30)  |  Reserve (25)  |  Right (459)  |  Self (267)  |  Speak (235)  |  State (497)  |  Territory (24)  |  Today (318)  |  Turn (450)  |  Undeveloped (6)  |  Will (2352)  |  Wish (215)  |  Word (634)  |  World (1822)  |  Year (939)

[About Francis Baily] The history of the astronomy of the nineteenth century will be incomplete without a catalogue of his labours. He was one of the founders of the Astronomical Society, and his attention to its affairs was as accurate and minute as if it had been a firm of which he was the chief clerk, with expectation of being taken into partnership.
In Supplement to the Penny Cyclopaedia. Quoted in Sophia Elizabeth De Morgan, Memoir of Augustus De Morgan (1882), 46
Science quotes on:  |  19th Century (38)  |  Accurate (87)  |  Affair (29)  |  Astronomical Society (2)  |  Astronomy (245)  |  Attention (195)  |  Being (1277)  |  Catalogue (5)  |  Century (315)  |  Chief (99)  |  Clerk (13)  |  Expectation (67)  |  Firm (47)  |  Founder (26)  |  History (694)  |  Incomplete (31)  |  Minute (126)  |  Partnership (4)  |  Society (339)  |  Will (2352)

A man has a very insecure tenure of a property which another can carry away with his eyes. A few months reduced me to the cruel necessity either of destroying my machine, or of giving it to the public. To destroy it, I could not think of; to give up that for which I had laboured so long, was cruel. I had no patent, nor the means of purchasing one. In preference to destroying, I gave it to the public.
[On his inability to keep for himself a profitable income from his invention of the Spinning Mule.]
As quoted in James Mason, The Great Triumphs of Great Men (1875), 579.
Science quotes on:  |  Carry (127)  |  Cruel (25)  |  Destroy (185)  |  Eye (432)  |  Eyes (2)  |  Give (202)  |  Himself (461)  |  Inability (11)  |  Income (18)  |  Insecure (5)  |  Invention (387)  |  Long (772)  |  Machine (266)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mean (808)  |  Means (580)  |  Month (88)  |  Necessity (195)  |  Patent (34)  |  Preference (28)  |  Profitable (29)  |  Property (171)  |  Public (97)  |  Spinning (18)  |  Spinning Mule (2)  |  Tenure (7)  |  Think (1096)

A single idea, if it is right, saves us the labor of an infinity of experiences.
Reflections on America (1958), 97.
Science quotes on:  |  Experience (484)  |  Idea (861)  |  Infinity (94)  |  Labor (112)  |  Right (459)  |  Save (123)  |  Single (360)

A vast technology has been developed to prevent, reduce, or terminate exhausting labor and physical damage. It is now dedicated to the production of the most trivial conveniences and comfort.
Reflections on Behaviorism and Society (1978), 6.
Science quotes on:  |  Comfort (61)  |  Convenience (50)  |  Damage (37)  |  Dedicated (19)  |  Dedication (12)  |  Develop (272)  |  Development (431)  |  Exhaustion (17)  |  Labor (112)  |  Most (1729)  |  Physical (511)  |  Prevent (96)  |  Prevention (37)  |  Production (188)  |  Reduce (97)  |  Reduction (51)  |  Technology (273)  |  Termination (4)  |  Trivial (58)  |  Vast (180)

About the year 1772, being then an apprentice to a wheel-wright, or wagon maker, I laboured to discover some means of propelling land carriages without animal power. … one of my brothers [told me of] blacksmith’s boys, who, for amusement, had stopped up the touch hole of a gun barrel, then put in about a gill of water, and rammed down a tight wad; after which they put the breech in the smith’s fire, when it discharged itself with as loud a crack as if it had been loaded with powder. It immediately occurred to me, that here was the power to propel any wagon, if I could only apply it.
From 'On the Origin of Steam Boats and Steam Wagons', Thomas Cooper (ed.), The Emporium of Arts and Sciences (Feb 1814), 2, No. 2, 205.
Science quotes on:  |  Amusement (36)  |  Animal (634)  |  Apply (164)  |  Apprentice (4)  |  Barrel (5)  |  Being (1277)  |  Biography (249)  |  Blacksmith (5)  |  Boy (97)  |  Brother (45)  |  Carriage (11)  |  Crack (15)  |  Discharge (20)  |  Discover (566)  |  Discovery (818)  |  Down (455)  |  Fire (195)  |  Gill (3)  |  Gun (9)  |  Gunpowder (17)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Loud (9)  |  Maker (34)  |  Mean (808)  |  Means (580)  |  Powder (9)  |  Power (757)  |  Propulsion (10)  |  Ram (3)  |  Steam Power (9)  |  Touch (145)  |  Wad (2)  |  Wagon (9)  |  Water (494)  |  Wheel (51)  |  Year (939)

Accurate and minute measurement seems to the non-scientific imagination, a less lofty and dignified work than looking for something new. But nearly all the grandest discoveries of science have been but the rewards of accurate measurement and patient long-continued labour in the minute sifting of numerical results.
Presidential inaugural address, to the General Meeting of the British Association, Edinburgh (2 Aug 1871). In Report of the Forty-First Meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science (1872), xci.
Science quotes on:  |  Accuracy (81)  |  Accurate (87)  |  Dignified (13)  |  Dignity (43)  |  Discovery (818)  |  Grandest (10)  |  Imagination (342)  |  Lofty (15)  |  Long (772)  |  Looking (191)  |  Measurement (177)  |  Minute (126)  |  Minuteness (8)  |  Nearly (137)  |  New (1247)  |  Non-Scientific (7)  |  Number (704)  |  Numerical (39)  |  Patience (58)  |  Patient (205)  |  Result (688)  |  Reward (70)  |  Scientific (946)  |  Something (718)  |  Work (1374)

All human affairs follow nature's great analogue, the growth of vegetation. There are three periods of growth in every plant. The first, and slowest, is the invisible growth by the root; the second and much accelerated is the visible growth by the stem; but when root and stem have gathered their forces, there comes the third period, in which the plant quickly flashes into blossom and rushes into fruit.
The beginnings of moral enterprises in this world are never to be measured by any apparent growth. ... At length comes the sudden ripeness and the full success, and he who is called in at the final moment deems this success his own. He is but the reaper and not the labourer. Other men sowed and tilled and he but enters into their labours.
Life Thoughts (1858), 20.
Science quotes on:  |  Analogue (7)  |  Apparent (85)  |  Beginning (310)  |  Blossom (21)  |  Call (772)  |  Discovery (818)  |  Enter (142)  |  Entering (3)  |  Enterprise (55)  |  Final (121)  |  First (1290)  |  Follow (384)  |  Force (493)  |  Fruit (104)  |  Gather (74)  |  Great (1579)  |  Growth (195)  |  Human (1491)  |  Invention (387)  |  Invisible (65)  |  Laborer (7)  |  Measurement (177)  |  Moment (256)  |  Moral (198)  |  Nature (1973)  |  Never (1088)  |  Other (2233)  |  Period (198)  |  Plant (313)  |  Reaper (3)  |  Research (734)  |  Ripeness (2)  |  Root (121)  |  Science And Religion (330)  |  Soil (93)  |  Sowing (9)  |  Stem (31)  |  Success (315)  |  Sudden (68)  |  Vegetation (24)  |  Visible (86)  |  World (1822)

An inventive age
Has wrought, if not with speed of magic, yet
To most strange issues. I have lived to mark
A new and unforeseen creation rise
From out the labours of a peaceful Land:
Wielding her potent enginery to frame
And to produce, with appetite as keen
As that of war, which rests not night or day.
In The Excursion (1814). In The Works of William: Wordsworth (1994), Book 8, 875.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (501)  |  Appetite (19)  |  Creation (342)  |  Day (43)  |  Engine (98)  |  Invention (387)  |  Labor (112)  |  Magic (90)  |  Most (1729)  |  New (1247)  |  Night (123)  |  Peace (113)  |  Potent (12)  |  Rest (285)  |  Rise (166)  |  Speed (66)  |  Strange (158)  |  Unforeseen (10)  |  War (229)

And if you want the exact moment in time, it was conceived mentally on 8th March in this year one thousand six hundred and eighteen, but submitted to calculation in an unlucky way, and therefore rejected as false, and finally returning on the 15th of May and adopting a new line of attack, stormed the darkness of my mind. So strong was the support from the combination of my labour of seventeen years on the observations of Brahe and the present study, which conspired together, that at first I believed I was dreaming, and assuming my conclusion among my basic premises. But it is absolutely certain and exact that the proportion between the periodic times of any two planets is precisely the sesquialterate proportion of their mean distances.
Harmonice Mundi, The Harmony of the World (1619), book V, ch. 3. Trans. E. J. Aiton, A. M. Duncan and J. V. Field (1997), 411.
Science quotes on:  |  Attack (85)  |  Basic (142)  |  Tycho Brahe (24)  |  Calculation (132)  |  Certain (552)  |  Combination (146)  |  Conclusion (259)  |  Darkness (72)  |  Distance (166)  |  First (1290)  |  Hundred (231)  |  March (47)  |  Mean (808)  |  Mind (1359)  |  Moment (256)  |  New (1247)  |  Observation (582)  |  Period (198)  |  Planet (381)  |  Precisely (92)  |  Premise (38)  |  Present (625)  |  Proportion (136)  |  Reject (65)  |  Rejected (26)  |  Storm (54)  |  Strong (179)  |  Study (679)  |  Support (149)  |  Thousand (331)  |  Time (1890)  |  Together (389)  |  Two (936)  |  Want (498)  |  Way (1214)  |  Year (939)

Anyone who understands algebraic notation, reads at a glance in an equation results reached arithmetically only with great labour and pains.
From Recherches sur les Principes Mathématiques de la Théorie des Richesses (1838), as translated by Nathaniel T. Bacon in 'Preface', Researches Into Mathematical Principles of the Theory of Wealth (1897), 4. From the original French, “Quiconque connaît la notation algébrique, lit d'un clin-d'œil dans une équation le résultat auquel on parvient péniblement par des règles de fausse position, dans l'arithmétique de Banque.”
Science quotes on:  |  Algebra (116)  |  Arithmetic (143)  |  Equation (135)  |  Glance (35)  |  Great (1579)  |  Mathematics As A Language (20)  |  Notation (27)  |  Pain (138)  |  Reach (285)  |  Read (298)  |  Result (688)  |  Understand (634)

Ars est sine arte, cujus principium est mentiri, medium laborare, et finis mendicare.
The art is devoid of art, whose beginning is falsehood, its middle labour, and its end beggary.
[On the character of the delusive science of alchemy].
Anonymous
In Henry Thomas Riley, Dictionary of Latin Quotations, Proverbs, Maxims, and Mottos (1866), 27.
Science quotes on:  |  Alchemy (30)  |  Art (664)  |  Beginning (310)  |  Character (252)  |  End (598)  |  Falsehood (28)

As to a perfect Science of natural Bodies … we are, I think, so far from being capable of any such thing that I conclude it lost labour to seek after it.
In 'Extent of Human Knowledge', An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding (1700), Book 4, 335.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1277)  |  Body (545)  |  Capable (169)  |  Conclude (66)  |  Labor (112)  |  Lost (34)  |  Natural (796)  |  Perfect (220)  |  Physics (550)  |  Seek (216)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1096)

At the entrance to the observatory Stjerneborg located underground, Tycho Brahe built a Ionic portal. On top of this were three sculptured lions. On both sides were inscriptions and on the backside was a longer inscription in gold letters on a porfyr stone: Consecrated to the all-good, great God and Posterity. Tycho Brahe, Son of Otto, who realized that Astronomy, the oldest and most distinguished of all sciences, had indeed been studied for a long time and to a great extent, but still had not obtained sufficient firmness or had been purified of errors, in order to reform it and raise it to perfection, invented and with incredible labour, industry, and expenditure constructed various exact instruments suitable for all kinds of observations of the celestial bodies, and placed them partly in the neighbouring castle of Uraniborg, which was built for the same purpose, partly in these subterranean rooms for a more constant and useful application, and recommending, hallowing, and consecrating this very rare and costly treasure to you, you glorious Posterity, who will live for ever and ever, he, who has both begun and finished everything on this island, after erecting this monument, beseeches and adjures you that in honour of the eternal God, creator of the wonderful clockwork of the heavens, and for the propagation of the divine science and for the celebrity of the fatherland, you will constantly preserve it and not let it decay with old age or any other injury or be removed to any other place or in any way be molested, if for no other reason, at any rate out of reverence to the creator’s eye, which watches over the universe. Greetings to you who read this and act accordingly. Farewell!
(Translated from the original in Latin)
Science quotes on:  |  Act (276)  |  Age (501)  |  Application (253)  |  Astronomy (245)  |  Both (494)  |  Celestial (53)  |  Constant (145)  |  Construct (128)  |  Creator (95)  |  Decay (56)  |  Distinguish (166)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Divine (112)  |  Entrance (15)  |  Error (333)  |  Eternal (112)  |  Everything (482)  |  Expenditure (16)  |  Extent (141)  |  Eye (432)  |  Finish (61)  |  Glorious (49)  |  God (764)  |  Gold (99)  |  Good (894)  |  Great (1579)  |  Greeting (10)  |  Heaven (261)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Honour (57)  |  Incredible (42)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Industry (150)  |  Injury (36)  |  Inscription (11)  |  Instrument (150)  |  Island (48)  |  Kind (559)  |  Letter (112)  |  Lion (22)  |  Live (637)  |  Long (772)  |  Monument (45)  |  More (2559)  |  Most (1729)  |  Observation (582)  |  Observatory (18)  |  Obtain (163)  |  Old (484)  |  Old Age (35)  |  Order (635)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perfection (130)  |  Portal (8)  |  Posterity (29)  |  Preserve (87)  |  Propagation (15)  |  Purpose (324)  |  Rare (90)  |  Read (298)  |  Reason (757)  |  Reform (22)  |  Research (734)  |  Side (233)  |  Still (614)  |  Stone (167)  |  Sufficient (130)  |  Time (1890)  |  Top (98)  |  Treasure (58)  |  Underground (12)  |  Universe (883)  |  Useful (254)  |  Various (201)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2352)  |  Wonderful (151)

Criticism is as often a trade as a science, requiring, as it does, more health than wit, more labour than capacity, more practice than genius.
In John Timbs (ed.), Laconics; or, The Best Words of the Best Authors (1929), 156.
Science quotes on:  |  Capacity (103)  |  Criticism (82)  |  Genius (297)  |  Health (203)  |  More (2559)  |  Practice (208)  |  Require (223)  |  Trade (34)  |  Wit (59)

Criticism, though dignified from the earliest ages by the labours of men eminent for knowledge and sagacity, has not yet attained the certainty and stability of science.
In Samuel Austin Allibone, Prose Quotations from Socrates to Macaulay (1880), 151.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (501)  |  Attain (126)  |  Certainty (179)  |  Criticism (82)  |  Dignified (13)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Sagacity (11)  |  Stability (27)

Even those to whom Providence has allotted greater strength of understanding, can expect only to improve a single science. In every other part of learning, they must be content to follow opinions, which they are not able to examine; and, even in that which they claim as peculiarly their own, can seldom add more than some small particle of knowledge, to the hereditary stock devolved to them from ancient times, the collective labour of a thousand intellects.
In Samuel Johnson and W. Jackson Bate (Ed.), ',The Rambler, No. 121, Tuesday, 14 May 1751.' The Selected Essays from the Rambler, Adventurer, and Idler (1968), 172.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancient (194)  |  Claim (151)  |  Examine (82)  |  Expect (203)  |  Follow (384)  |  Greater (289)  |  Intellect (242)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Learning (290)  |  Men Of Science (145)  |  More (2559)  |  Must (1525)  |  Opinion (285)  |  Other (2233)  |  Particle (200)  |  Providence (18)  |  Seldom (66)  |  Single (360)  |  Small (484)  |  Strength (130)  |  Thousand (331)  |  Time (1890)  |  Understanding (525)

Every utterance from government - from justifying 90-day detention to invading other countries [and] to curtailing civil liberties - is about the dangers of religious division and fundamentalism. Yet New Labour is approving new faith schools hand over fist. We have had the grotesque spectacle of a British prime minister, on the floor of the House of Commons, defending - like some medieval crusader - the teaching of creationism in the science curriculum at a sponsor-run school whose running costs are wholly met from the public purse.
In The Guardian (10 Apr 2006).
Science quotes on:  |  Approval (11)  |  Britain (25)  |  British (42)  |  Civil (26)  |  Common (440)  |  Cost (91)  |  Country (261)  |  Creationism (8)  |  Curriculum (10)  |  Danger (119)  |  Defense (26)  |  Detention (2)  |  Division (67)  |  Faith (206)  |  Floor (20)  |  Fundamentalism (4)  |  Government (113)  |  Grotesque (6)  |  House (140)  |  House Of Commons (2)  |  Invasion (9)  |  Justification (52)  |  Medieval (10)  |  New (1247)  |  Other (2233)  |  Public (97)  |  Purse (4)  |  Religion (364)  |  Religious (130)  |  Run (157)  |  Running (61)  |  School (223)  |  Spectacle (34)  |  Sponsor (5)  |  Teaching (190)  |  Utterance (11)  |  Wholly (88)

Excellence is never granted to man, but as the reward of labour.
From 'A Discourse Delivered to the Students of the Royal Academy, on the Distribution of Prizes' (11 Dec 1769), in Seven Discourses Delivered in the Royal Academy (1778), 52.
Science quotes on:  |  Excellence (40)  |  Grant (75)  |  Man (2252)  |  Never (1088)  |  Reward (70)

For they are not given to idleness, nor go in a proud habit, or plush and velvet garments, often showing their rings upon their fingers, or wearing swords with silver hilts by their sides, or fine and gay gloves upon their hands, but diligently follow their labours, sweating whole days and nights by their furnaces. They do not spend their time abroad for recreation, but take delight in their laboratory. They wear leather garments with a pouch, and an apron wherewith they wipe their hands. They put their fingers amongst coals, into clay, and filth, not into gold rings. They are sooty and black like smiths and colliers, and do not pride themselves upon clean and beautiful faces.
As translated in Paracelsus and Arthur Edward Waite (ed.), The Hermetic and Alchemical Writings of Paracelsus (1894, 1976), Vol. 1, 167.
Science quotes on:  |  Abroad (18)  |  Apron (2)  |  Beautiful (266)  |  Blacksmith (5)  |  Clay (11)  |  Clean (52)  |  Coal (62)  |  Day And Night (3)  |  Delight (109)  |  Diligence (21)  |  Do (1905)  |  Face (213)  |  Filth (4)  |  Follow (384)  |  Furnace (12)  |  Garment (13)  |  Glove (4)  |  Gold (99)  |  Habit (172)  |  Idleness (15)  |  Laboratory (202)  |  Leather (4)  |  Pride (81)  |  Recreation (21)  |  Ring (16)  |  Side (233)  |  Silver (47)  |  Soot (9)  |  Spend (96)  |  Sweat (15)  |  Sword (15)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1890)  |  Velvet (4)  |  Wear (19)  |  Whole (746)  |  Wipe (6)

From one sublime genius—NEWTON—more light has proceeded than the labour of a thousand years preceding had been able to produce.
Familiar Letters on Chemistry (1851), 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Genius (297)  |  Light (624)  |  More (2559)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (352)  |  Proceed (131)  |  Sublime (46)  |  Thousand (331)  |  Year (939)

From the level of pragmatic, everyday knowledge to modern natural science, the knowledge of nature derives from man’s primary coming to grips with nature; at the same time it reacts back upon the system of social labour and stimulates its development.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Back (392)  |  Coming (114)  |  Derive (65)  |  Development (431)  |  Everyday (32)  |  Grip (10)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Level (67)  |  Man (2252)  |  Modern (392)  |  Natural (796)  |  Natural Science (130)  |  Nature (1973)  |  Pragmatic (2)  |  Primary (81)  |  React (7)  |  Same (157)  |  Social (258)  |  Stimulate (20)  |  System (539)  |  Time (1890)

Geometry, which should only obey Physics, when united with it sometimes commands it. If it happens that the question which we wish to examine is too complicated for all the elements to be able to enter into the analytical comparison which we wish to make, we separate the more inconvenient [elements], we substitute others for them, less troublesome, but also less real, and we are surprised to arrive, notwithstanding a painful labour, only at a result contradicted by nature; as if after having disguised it, cut it short or altered it, a purely mechanical combination could give it back to us.
From Essai d’une nouvelle théorie de la résistance des fluides (1752), translated as an epigram in Ivor Grattan-Guinness, Convolutions in French Mathematics, 1800-1840: From the Calculus and Mechanics to Mathematical Analysis and Mathematical Physics (1990), Vol. 1, 33.
Science quotes on:  |  Alter (63)  |  Altered (32)  |  Analysis (242)  |  Arrive (36)  |  Back (392)  |  Combination (146)  |  Command (59)  |  Comparison (105)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Contradict (41)  |  Cut (114)  |  Disguise (12)  |  Element (317)  |  Enter (142)  |  Examine (82)  |  Geometry (267)  |  Happen (276)  |  Inconvenient (5)  |  Less (104)  |  Mechanical (142)  |  More (2559)  |  Nature (1973)  |  Obey (45)  |  Other (2233)  |  Painful (11)  |  Physic (516)  |  Physics (550)  |  Purely (111)  |  Question (640)  |  Real (156)  |  Result (688)  |  Separate (146)  |  Short (197)  |  Sometimes (46)  |  Substitute (47)  |  Surprise (88)  |  Troublesome (7)  |  United (15)  |  Wish (215)

How greatly would the heroes and statesmen of antiquity have despised the labours of that man who devoted his life to investigate the properties of the magnet! Little could they anticipate that this humble mineral was destined to change the very form and condition of human society in every quarter of the globe.
In 'Observations on the Study of Mineralogy', The Philosophical Magazine and Journal (Jul 1819), 54, 46. Slightly edited and used by Joseph Henry in 'Introductory Lecture on Chemistry' (Jan-Mar 1832), The Papers of Joseph Henry, Vol. 1, 396.
Science quotes on:  |  Anticipate (19)  |  Antiquity (33)  |  Change (617)  |  Condition (360)  |  Contemptible (8)  |  Destined (42)  |  Devote (38)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Form (967)  |  Globe (50)  |  Hero (43)  |  Human (1491)  |  Human Society (13)  |  Humble (54)  |  Investigate (104)  |  Life (1830)  |  Little (708)  |  Magnet (22)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mineral (66)  |  Property (171)  |  Society (339)  |  Statesman (19)

I always rejoice to hear of your being still employed in experimental researches into nature, and of the success you meet with. The rapid progress true science now makes, occasions my regretting sometimes that I was born so soon: it is impossible to imagine the height to which may be carried, in a thousand years, the power of man over matter; we may perhaps learn to deprive large masses of their gravity, and give them absolute levity for the sake of easy transport. Agriculture may diminish its labour and double its produce; all diseases may by sure means be prevented or cured (not excepting even that of old age), and our lives lengthened at pleasure even beyond the antediluvian standard. Oh! that moral science were in as fair a way of improvement; that men would cease to be wolves to one another; and that human beings would at length learn what they now improperly call humanity!
Letter to Dr Priestley, 8 Feb 1780. In Memoirs of Benjamin Franklin (1845), Vol. 2, 152.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (149)  |  Age (501)  |  Agriculture (75)  |  Antediluvian (5)  |  Being (1277)  |  Beyond (310)  |  Call (772)  |  Cease (80)  |  Disease (337)  |  Easy (210)  |  Employ (114)  |  Experiment (720)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Gravity (135)  |  Hear (141)  |  Human (1491)  |  Human Being (180)  |  Humanity (178)  |  Imagine (169)  |  Impossible (258)  |  Improvement (114)  |  Large (396)  |  Learn (652)  |  Live (637)  |  Man (2252)  |  Matter (810)  |  Mean (808)  |  Means (580)  |  Moral (198)  |  Nature (1973)  |  Occasion (85)  |  Old (484)  |  Old Age (35)  |  Pleasure (188)  |  Power (757)  |  Prevent (96)  |  Progress (483)  |  Sake (59)  |  Soon (186)  |  Still (614)  |  Success (315)  |  Thousand (331)  |  Transport (30)  |  True Science (24)  |  Way (1214)  |  Year (939)

I am almost thanking God that I was never educated, for it seems to me that 999 of those who are so, expensively and laboriously, have lost all before they arrive at my age—& remain like Swift's Stulbruggs—cut and dry for life, making no use of their earlier-gained treasures:—whereas, I seem to be on the threshold of knowledge.
In Vivien Noakes, Edward Lear: the Life of a Wanderer (1969), 22.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (501)  |  Biography (249)  |  Cut (114)  |  Dry (61)  |  Education (402)  |  Expense (20)  |  Gain (146)  |  God (764)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Life (1830)  |  Making (300)  |  Never (1088)  |  Remain (352)  |  Jonathan Swift (27)  |  Thank (47)  |  Threshold (11)  |  Treasure (58)  |  Use (768)

I am busy just now again on Electro-Magnetism and think I have got hold of a good thing but can't say; it may be a weed instead of a fish that after all my labour I may at last pull up.
Letter to Richard Phillips, 23 Sep 1831. In Michael Faraday, Bence Jones (ed.), The Life and Letters of Faraday (1870), Vol. 2, 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (183)  |  Fish (127)  |  Good (894)  |  Last (425)  |  Magnetism (43)  |  Pull (43)  |  Research (734)  |  Say (985)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1096)  |  Weed (19)

I am credited with being one of the hardest workers and perhaps I am, if thought is the equivalent of labour, for I have devoted to it almost all of my waking hours. But if work is interpreted to be a definite performance in a specified time according to a rigid rule, then I may be the worst of idlers. Every effort under compulsion demands a sacrifice of life-energy. I never paid such a price. On the contrary, I have thrived on my thoughts.
In 'My Early Life', My Inventions: And Other Writings (2016), 1. Originally published in serial form in Part 1, 'My Early Life' in the series of articles, 'My Inventions', Electrical Experimenter magazine (1919).
Science quotes on:  |  Accord (35)  |  According (236)  |  Being (1277)  |  Credit (24)  |  Definite (112)  |  Devote (38)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Equivalent (45)  |  Hard (244)  |  Hour (187)  |  Interpret (22)  |  Performance (49)  |  Specify (6)  |  Thought (967)  |  Time (1890)  |  Wake (15)  |  Waking (17)  |  Work (1374)  |  Worker (33)

I am only a physicist with nothing material to show for my labours. I have never even seen the ionosphere, although I have worked on the subject for thirty years. That does show how lucky people can be. If there had been no ionosphere I would not have been standing here this morning.
Response to receiving an honour from the Institute of Mechanical Engineers. As quoted in New Scientist (22 Nov 1956), 33.
Science quotes on:  |  Luck (44)  |  Material (358)  |  Morning (95)  |  Never (1088)  |  Nothing (987)  |  People (1012)  |  Physicist (266)  |  Show (348)  |  Subject (532)  |  Work (1374)  |  Year (939)

I boast nothing, but plainely say, we all labour against our owne cure, for death is the cure of all diseases.
Religio Medici (1642), Part I, Section 9. In L. C. Martin (ed.), Thomas Browne: Religio Medici and Other Works (1964), 68.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Cure (124)  |  Death (398)  |  Disease (337)  |  Nothing (987)  |  Say (985)

I find that by confining a workman to one particular limb of the pistol until he has made two thousand, I save at least one quarter of his labor, to what I should provided I finishd them by small quantities; and the work will be as much better as it is quicker made. ... I have some seventeen thousand screws & other parts of pistols now forgd. & many parts nearly finished & the business is going on brisk and lively.
Describing subdivision of labour and standardization of parts.
Letter to the Secretary of the Navy (1808), in S.N.D. and R.H. North, Memoir of Simeon North (1913), 64. Quoted in Joseph Wickham Roe, English and American Tool Builders (1916), 134.
Science quotes on:  |  Better (486)  |  Business (151)  |  Find (1003)  |  Finish (61)  |  Labor (112)  |  Lively (17)  |  Manufacturing (29)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Other (2233)  |  Save (123)  |  Screw (17)  |  Small (484)  |  Standardization (3)  |  Thousand (331)  |  Two (936)  |  Will (2352)  |  Work (1374)

I hope that in due time the chemists will justify their proceedings by some large generalisations deduced from the infinity of results which they have collected. For me I am left hopelessly behind and I will acknowledge to you that through my bad memory organic chemistry is to me a sealed book. Some of those here, [August] Hoffman for instance, consider all this however as scaffolding, which will disappear when the structure is built. I hope the structure will be worthy of the labour. I should expect a better and a quicker result from the study of the powers of matter, but then I have a predilection that way and am probably prejudiced in judgment.
Letter to Christian Schönbein (9 Dec 1852), The Letters of Faraday and Schoenbein, 1836-1862 (1899), 209-210.
Science quotes on:  |  Acknowledge (33)  |  Acknowledgment (12)  |  Bad (180)  |  Behind (138)  |  Better (486)  |  Book (400)  |  Building (158)  |  Chemist (161)  |  Chemistry (365)  |  Collection (67)  |  Consider (417)  |  Disappear (83)  |  Disappearance (28)  |  Due (141)  |  Expect (203)  |  Generalization (59)  |  August Wilhelm von Hofmann (7)  |  Hope (308)  |  Hopelessness (6)  |  Infinity (94)  |  Judgment (136)  |  Labor (112)  |  Large (396)  |  Matter (810)  |  Memory (140)  |  Organic (159)  |  Organic Chemistry (41)  |  Power (757)  |  Predilection (4)  |  Prejudice (95)  |  Proceeding (38)  |  Quickness (5)  |  Result (688)  |  Seal (18)  |  Sealed Book (2)  |  Structure (359)  |  Study (679)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1890)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2352)  |  Worth (170)

I publish this Essay in its present imperfect state, in order to prevent the furacious attempts of the prowling plagiary, and the insidious pretender to chymistry, from arrogating to themselves, and assuming my invention, in plundering silence: for there are those, who, if they can not be chymical, never fail by stratagem, and mechanical means, to deprive industry of the fruits, and fame of her labours.
Preface to An Essay on Combustion with a View to a New Art of Dyeing and Painting (1794), vii-viii.
Science quotes on:  |  Attempt (256)  |  Essay (27)  |  Fail (189)  |  Fame (50)  |  Fruit (104)  |  Imperfect (45)  |  Industry (150)  |  Invention (387)  |  Mean (808)  |  Means (580)  |  Mechanical (142)  |  Never (1088)  |  Order (635)  |  Plagiarism (9)  |  Present (625)  |  Prevent (96)  |  Publication (102)  |  Silence (59)  |  State (497)  |  Themselves (433)

If I had been taught from my youth all the truths of which I have since sought out demonstrations, and had thus learned them without labour, I should never, perhaps, have known any beyond these; at least, I should never have acquired the habit and the facility which I think I possess in always discovering new truths in proportion as I give myself to the search.
In Discours de la Méthode (1637). In English from John Veitch (trans.), A Discourse on Method (1912), 57.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquire (44)  |  Acquired (77)  |  Beyond (310)  |  Demonstration (118)  |  Discover (566)  |  Facility (12)  |  Habit (172)  |  Know (1526)  |  Known (451)  |  Learn (652)  |  Learned (235)  |  Myself (212)  |  Never (1088)  |  New (1247)  |  Possess (156)  |  Proportion (136)  |  Search (165)  |  Seek (216)  |  Teach (287)  |  Think (1096)  |  Truth (1088)  |  Youth (107)

If the mysterious influence to which the dissymmetry of nature is due should come to change in sense or direction, the constituting elements of all living beings would take an inverse dissymmetry. Perhaps a new world would be presented to us. Who could foresee the organization of living beings, if the cellulose, which is right, should become left, if the left albumen of the blood should become right? There are here mysteries which prepare immense labours for the future, and from this hour invite the most serious meditations in science.
Lecture (3 Feb 1860), to the Chemical Society of Paris, 'On the Molecular Dissymetry of Natural Organic Products', reprinted in The Chemical News and Journal of Industrial Science (3 May 1862), 5, No. 126, 248.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (817)  |  Being (1277)  |  Blood (142)  |  Cellulose (3)  |  Change (617)  |  Direction (181)  |  Due (141)  |  Element (317)  |  Foresee (20)  |  Future (454)  |  Hour (187)  |  Immense (86)  |  Influence (227)  |  Left (15)  |  Living (492)  |  Meditation (19)  |  Most (1729)  |  Mysterious (81)  |  Mystery (185)  |  Nature (1973)  |  New (1247)  |  Organization (117)  |  Present (625)  |  Right (459)  |  Sense (776)  |  Serious (94)  |  Symmetry (44)  |  World (1822)

If the [Vestiges] be true, the labours of sober induction are in vain; religion is a lie; human law is a mass of folly, and a base injustice; morality is moonshine; our labours for the black people of Africa were works of madmen; and man and woman are only better beasts!
Letter to Charles Lyell (9 Apr 1845). In John Willis Clark and Thomas McKenny Hughes (eds.), The Life and Letters of the Reverend Adam Sedgwick (1890), Vol. 2, 84.
Science quotes on:  |  Africa (37)  |  Base (117)  |  Beast (56)  |  Better (486)  |  Black (45)  |  Folly (44)  |  Human (1491)  |  Induction (81)  |  Injustice (4)  |  Labor (112)  |  Law (907)  |  Lie (364)  |  Madman (6)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mass (156)  |  Moonshine (4)  |  Morality (54)  |  People (1012)  |  Religion (364)  |  Sober (10)  |  Vain (85)  |  Vestige (11)  |  Vestiges (2)  |  Woman (152)  |  Work (1374)

If there is any work in the world which cannot be so well finished by another as by him who has commenced it, it is that at which I labour.
In Discours de la Méthode (1637). In English from John Veitch (trans.), A Discourse on Method (1912), 57.
Science quotes on:  |  Commence (5)  |  Finish (61)  |  Work (1374)  |  World (1822)

If you do not rest on the good foundation of nature, you will labour with little honor and less profit.
As quoted in George Clausen, Six Lectures on Painting: Delivered to the Students of the Royal Arts in London, January, 1904 (1906), 30.
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Foundation (176)  |  Good (894)  |  Honor (54)  |  Little (708)  |  Nature (1973)  |  Profit (55)  |  Rest (285)  |  Will (2352)

If you have great talents, industry will improve them; if moderate abilities, industry will supply their deficiencies. Nothing is denied to well-directed labour; nothing is ever to be attained without it.
From 'A Discourse Delivered to the Students of the Royal Academy, on the Distribution of Prizes' (11 Dec 1769), in Seven Discourses Delivered in the Royal Academy (1778), 57.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (156)  |  Attain (126)  |  Deficiency (14)  |  Deny (70)  |  Direct (225)  |  Effort (233)  |  Great (1579)  |  Industry (150)  |  Moderate (6)  |  Nothing (987)  |  Supply (97)  |  Talent (99)  |  Will (2352)

In general, art has preceded science. Men have executed great, and curious, and beautiful works before they had a scientific insight into the principles on which the success of their labours was founded. There were good artificers in brass and iron before the principles of the chemistry of metals were known; there was wine among men before there was a philosophy of vinous fermentation; there were mighty masses raised into the air, cyclopean walls and cromlechs, obelisks and pyramids—probably gigantic Doric pillars and entablatures—before there was a theory of the mechanical powers. … Art was the mother of Science.
Lecture (26 Nov 1851), to the London Society of Arts, 'The General Bearing of the Great Exhibition on the Progress of Art and Science', collected in Lectures on the Results of the Great Exhibition of 1851' (1852), 7-8.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (354)  |  Art (664)  |  Artificer (5)  |  Beautiful (266)  |  Brass (5)  |  Chemistry (365)  |  Construction (113)  |  Curious (93)  |  Fermentation (15)  |  Founded (22)  |  General (516)  |  Gigantic (40)  |  Good (894)  |  Great (1579)  |  Insight (103)  |  Iron (98)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Known (451)  |  Mass (156)  |  Mechanical (142)  |  Mechanics (134)  |  Metal (85)  |  Mother (115)  |  Philosophy (394)  |  Pillar (9)  |  Power (757)  |  Preceding (8)  |  Principle (522)  |  Pyramid (9)  |  Raised (3)  |  Science And Art (193)  |  Scientific (946)  |  Success (315)  |  Theory (998)  |  Wall (70)  |  Wine (38)  |  Work (1374)

In its earliest development knowledge is self-sown. Impressions force themselves upon men’s senses whether they will or not, and often against their will. The amount of interest in which these impressions awaken is determined by the coarser pains and pleasures which they carry in their train or by mere curiosity; and reason deals with the materials supplied to it as far as that interest carries it, and no further. Such common knowledge is rather brought than sought; and such ratiocination is little more than the working of a blind intellectual instinct. It is only when the mind passes beyond this condition that it begins to evolve science. When simple curiosity passes into the love of knowledge as such, and the gratification of the æsthetic sense of the beauty of completeness and accuracy seems more desirable that the easy indolence of ignorance; when the finding out of the causes of things becomes a source of joy, and he is accounted happy who is successful in the search, common knowledge passes into what our forefathers called natural history, whence there is but a step to that which used to be termed natural philosophy, and now passes by the name of physical science.
In this final state of knowledge the phenomena of nature are regarded as one continuous series of causes and effects; and the ultimate object of science is to trace out that series, from the term which is nearest to us, to that which is at the farthest limit accessible to our means of investigation.
The course of nature as it is, as it has been, and as it will be, is the object of scientific inquiry; whatever lies beyond, above, or below this is outside science. But the philosopher need not despair at the limitation on his field of labor; in relation to the human mind Nature is boundless; and, though nowhere inaccessible, she is everywhere unfathomable.
The Crayfish: an Introduction to the Study of Zoölogy (1880), 2-3. Excerpted in Popular Science (Apr 1880), 16, 789-790.
Science quotes on:  |  Accessible (25)  |  Account (193)  |  Accuracy (81)  |  Aesthetic (47)  |  Against (332)  |  Amount (151)  |  Beauty (307)  |  Become (817)  |  Begin (265)  |  Beyond (310)  |  Blind (98)  |  Boundless (28)  |  Call (772)  |  Carry (127)  |  Cause (549)  |  Cause And Effect (21)  |  Common (440)  |  Completeness (19)  |  Condition (360)  |  Continuity (39)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Course (410)  |  Curiosity (135)  |  Deal (189)  |  Desirable (33)  |  Despair (40)  |  Determination (77)  |  Development (431)  |  Easy (210)  |  Effect (400)  |  Everywhere (96)  |  Evolution (621)  |  Field (372)  |  Final (121)  |  Finding (32)  |  Force (493)  |  Forefather (4)  |  Gratification (21)  |  Happiness (121)  |  Happy (105)  |  History (694)  |  Human (1491)  |  Human Mind (132)  |  Ignorance (249)  |  Impression (117)  |  Inaccessible (18)  |  Indolence (8)  |  Inquiry (85)  |  Instinct (90)  |  Intellect (242)  |  Intellectual (257)  |  Interest (404)  |  Investigation (242)  |  Joy (114)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Labor (112)  |  Lie (364)  |  Limit (288)  |  Limitation (52)  |  Little (708)  |  Love (317)  |  Material (358)  |  Mean (808)  |  Means (580)  |  Mind (1359)  |  More (2559)  |  Name (346)  |  Natural (796)  |  Natural History (77)  |  Natural Philosophy (52)  |  Nature (1973)  |  Object (430)  |  Outside (141)  |  Pain (138)  |  Phenomenon (329)  |  Philosopher (266)  |  Philosophy (394)  |  Physical (511)  |  Physical Science (102)  |  Pleasure (188)  |  Ratiocination (4)  |  Reason (757)  |  Regard (305)  |  Scientific (946)  |  Search (165)  |  Self (267)  |  Sense (776)  |  Series (149)  |  Simple (415)  |  State (497)  |  Step (231)  |  Successful (131)  |  Term (352)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Trace (109)  |  Tracing (3)  |  Train (116)  |  Ultimate (151)  |  Unfathomable (10)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Will (2352)

Intelligence increases mere physical ability one half. The use of the head abridges the labor of the hands.
In Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit (1887), 44.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (156)  |  Abridge (3)  |  Hand (144)  |  Increase (219)  |  Intelligence (214)  |  Labor (112)  |  Physical (511)  |  Use (768)

It has been just so in all my inventions. The first step is an intuition—and comes with a burst, then difficulties arise. This thing that gives out and then that—“Bugs” as such little faults and difficulties are called show themselves and months of anxious watching, study and labor are requisite before commercial success—or failure—is certainly reached.
Describing his invention of a storage battery that involved 10,296 experiments. Note Edison’s use of the term “Bug” in the engineering research field for a mechanical defect greatly predates the use of the term as applied by Admiral Grace Murray Hopper to a computing defect upon finding a moth in the electronic mainframe.] Letter to Theodore Puskas (18 Nov 1878). In The Yale Book of Quotations (2006), 226.
Science quotes on:  |  Anxiety (30)  |  Applied (176)  |  Arise (158)  |  Battery (12)  |  Bug (10)  |  Burst (40)  |  Call (772)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Commercial (27)  |  Defect (31)  |  Difficulty (200)  |  Engineering (180)  |  Experiment (720)  |  Failure (168)  |  Fault (56)  |  Field (372)  |  First (1290)  |  Grace (31)  |  Intuition (80)  |  Invention (387)  |  Involved (90)  |  Labor (112)  |  Little (708)  |  Mainframe (3)  |  Mechanical (142)  |  Month (88)  |  Reach (285)  |  Research (734)  |  Show (348)  |  Small (484)  |  Step (231)  |  Storage (6)  |  Study (679)  |  Success (315)  |  Term (352)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Use (768)  |  Watch (112)

It is interesting to transport one’s self back to the times when Astronomy began; to observe how discoveries were connected together, how errors have got mixed up with truth, have delayed the knowledge of it, and retarded its progress; and, after having followed the various epochs and traversed every climate, finally to contemplate the edifice founded on the labours of successive centuries and of various nations.
Description of Bailly’s plan when writing his history of astronomy books, quoted by François Arago, trans. by William Henry Smyth, Baden Powell and Robert Grant, in 'Bailly', Biographies of Distinguished Scientific Men (1859), Vol. 1, 114. Arago first presented this biography of Bailly when he read it to the Academy of Sciences (26 Feb 1844).
Science quotes on:  |  Astronomy (245)  |  Back (392)  |  Century (315)  |  Climate (100)  |  Connect (125)  |  Connection (170)  |  Contemplation (74)  |  Delay (20)  |  Discovery (818)  |  Edifice (26)  |  Epoch (45)  |  Error (333)  |  Follow (384)  |  Founded (22)  |  History Of Astronomy (2)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Mixed (6)  |  Nation (203)  |  Observation (582)  |  Observe (175)  |  Progress (483)  |  Retarded (5)  |  Self (267)  |  Successive (73)  |  Time (1890)  |  Together (389)  |  Transport (30)  |  Truth (1088)  |  Various (201)

It is unworthy of excellent men to lose hours like slaves in the labour of calculation which could safely be relegated to anyone else if machines were used.
Describing, in 1685, the value to astronomers of the hand-cranked calculating machine he had invented in 1673.
From 'Machina Arithmetica in qua non Aditio tantum Subtractio', as translated by Mark Kormes in David Eugene Smith, A Source Book in Mathematics (1929), 181.
Science quotes on:  |  Astronomer (96)  |  Calculation (132)  |  Calculator (9)  |  Crank (18)  |  Hour (187)  |  Lose (160)  |  Machine (266)  |  Slave (40)  |  Unworthy (18)  |  Value (379)

It is worth noting that the notation facilitates discovery. This, in a most wonderful way, reduces the mind's labour.
In Eberhard Zeidler, Applied Functional Analysis: main principles and their applications (1995), 225.
Science quotes on:  |  Discovery (818)  |  Facilitate (5)  |  Mind (1359)  |  Most (1729)  |  Notation (27)  |  Note (36)  |  Reduce (97)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wonderful (151)  |  Worth (170)

It would seem at first sight as if the rapid expansion of the region of mathematics must be a source of danger to its future progress. Not only does the area widen but the subjects of study increase rapidly in number, and the work of the mathematician tends to become more and more specialized. It is, of course, merely a brilliant exaggeration to say that no mathematician is able to understand the work of any other mathematician, but it is certainly true that it is daily becoming more and more difficult for a mathematician to keep himself acquainted, even in a general way, with the progress of any of the branches of mathematics except those which form the field of his own labours. I believe, however, that the increasing extent of the territory of mathematics will always be counteracted by increased facilities in the means of communication. Additional knowledge opens to us new principles and methods which may conduct us with the greatest ease to results which previously were most difficult of access; and improvements in notation may exercise the most powerful effects both in the simplification and accessibility of a subject. It rests with the worker in mathematics not only to explore new truths, but to devise the language by which they may be discovered and expressed; and the genius of a great mathematician displays itself no less in the notation he invents for deciphering his subject than in the results attained. … I have great faith in the power of well-chosen notation to simplify complicated theories and to bring remote ones near and I think it is safe to predict that the increased knowledge of principles and the resulting improvements in the symbolic language of mathematics will always enable us to grapple satisfactorily with the difficulties arising from the mere extent of the subject.
In Presidential Address British Association for the Advancement of Science, Section A., (1890), Nature, 42, 466.
Science quotes on:  |  Access (21)  |  Accessibility (3)  |  Acquaint (10)  |  Additional (6)  |  Area (32)  |  Arise (158)  |  Arising (22)  |  Attain (126)  |  Become (817)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Belief (596)  |  Both (494)  |  Branch (152)  |  Brilliant (55)  |  Bring (92)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Chosen (48)  |  Communication (100)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Conduct (69)  |  Counteract (4)  |  Course (410)  |  Daily (89)  |  Danger (119)  |  Decipher (7)  |  Devise (15)  |  Difficult (256)  |  Difficulty (200)  |  Discover (566)  |  Display (57)  |  Ease (37)  |  Effect (400)  |  Enable (120)  |  Exaggeration (15)  |  Exercise (112)  |  Expansion (43)  |  Exploration (156)  |  Express (189)  |  Extent (141)  |  Facility (12)  |  Faith (206)  |  Field (372)  |  First (1290)  |  First Sight (6)  |  Form (967)  |  Future (454)  |  General (516)  |  Genius (297)  |  Grapple (10)  |  Great (1579)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Himself (461)  |  Improvement (114)  |  Increase (219)  |  Invent (54)  |  Keep (100)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Language (303)  |  Less (104)  |  Mathematician (400)  |  Mathematics (1363)  |  Mean (808)  |  Means (580)  |  Mere (84)  |  Merely (315)  |  Method (517)  |  More (2559)  |  Most (1729)  |  Must (1525)  |  New (1247)  |  Notation (27)  |  Number (704)  |  Of Course (20)  |  Open (275)  |  Other (2233)  |  Power (757)  |  Powerful (141)  |  Predict (84)  |  Previously (11)  |  Principle (522)  |  Progress (483)  |  Rapid (34)  |  Rapidly (67)  |  Region (40)  |  Remote (84)  |  Rest (285)  |  Result (688)  |  Safe (54)  |  Satisfactory (17)  |  Say (985)  |  Seem (145)  |  Sight (134)  |  Simplification (20)  |  Simplify (13)  |  Source (97)  |  Specialized (8)  |  Study (679)  |  Study And Research In Mathematics (61)  |  Subject (532)  |  Symbolic (15)  |  Tend (124)  |  Territory (24)  |  Theory (998)  |  Think (1096)  |  True (220)  |  Truth (1088)  |  Understand (634)  |  Way (1214)  |  Well-Chosen (2)  |  Widen (10)  |  Will (2352)  |  Work (1374)  |  Worker (33)

John Dalton was a very singular Man, a quaker by profession & practice: He has none of the manners or ways of the world. A tolerable mathematician He gained his livelihood I believe by teaching the mathematics to young people. He pursued science always with mathematical views. He seemed little attentive to the labours of men except when they countenanced or confirmed his own ideas... He was a very disinterested man, seemed to have no ambition beyond that of being thought a good Philosopher. He was a very coarse Experimenter & almost always found the results he required.—Memory & observation were subordinate qualities in his mind. He followed with ardour analogies & inductions & however his claims to originality may admit of question I have no doubt that he was one of the most original philosophers of his time & one of the most ingenious.
J. Z. Fullmer, 'Davy's Sketches of his Contemporaries', Chymia, 1967, 12, 133-134.
Science quotes on:  |  Ambition (45)  |  Attentive (14)  |  Being (1277)  |  Beyond (310)  |  Biography (249)  |  Claim (151)  |  Confirm (58)  |  John Dalton (24)  |  Doubt (311)  |  Experimenter (40)  |  Follow (384)  |  Gain (146)  |  Good (894)  |  Idea (861)  |  Induction (81)  |  Ingenious (55)  |  Little (708)  |  Livelihood (13)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mathematics (1363)  |  Memory (140)  |  Mind (1359)  |  Most (1729)  |  Observation (582)  |  People (1012)  |  Philosopher (266)  |  Practice (208)  |  Profession (103)  |  Question (640)  |  Required (108)  |  Result (688)  |  Singular (23)  |  Teaching (190)  |  Thought (967)  |  Time (1890)  |  View (494)  |  Way (1214)  |  World (1822)  |  Young (238)

Man is not the only animal who labors; but he is the only one who improves his workmanship.
Lecture 'Discoveries and Inventions', (1860) in Discoveries and Inventions (1915).
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (634)  |  Improvement (114)  |  Labor (112)  |  Man (2252)  |  Workmanship (7)

Mathematical discoveries, small or great … are never born of spontaneous generation. They always presuppose a soil seeded with preliminary knowledge and well prepared by labour, both conscious and subconscious.
As given, without citation, in Eric Temple Bell, Men of Mathematics (1937), 548.
Science quotes on:  |  Born (34)  |  Both (494)  |  Conscious (45)  |  Discovery (818)  |  Generation (251)  |  Great (1579)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Mathematics (1363)  |  Never (1088)  |  Preliminary (5)  |  Prepare (41)  |  Presuppose (15)  |  Seed (95)  |  Small (484)  |  Soil (93)  |  Spontaneous (28)  |  Spontaneous Generation (9)  |  Subconscious (4)

May not Music be described as the Mathematic of sense, Mathematic as Music of the reason? the soul of each the same! Thus the musician feels Mathematic, the mathematician thinks Music, Music the dream, Mathematic the working life each to receive its consummation from the other when the human intelligence, elevated to its perfect type, shall shine forth glorified in some future Mozart-Dirichlet or Beethoven-Gauss a union already not indistinctly foreshadowed in the genius and labours of a Helmholtz!
In paper read 7 Apr 1864, printed in 'Algebraical Researches Containing a Disquisition On Newton’s Rule for the Discovery of Imaginary Roots', Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London (1865), 154, 613, footnote. Also in Collected Mathematical Papers, Vol. 2, 419.
Science quotes on:  |  Already (222)  |  Beethoven (14)  |  Beethoven_Ludwig (8)  |  Consummation (7)  |  Describe (129)  |  Peter Gustav Lejeune Dirichlet (3)  |  Dream (217)  |  Elevate (15)  |  Feel (365)  |  Foreshadow (5)  |  Future (454)  |  Carl Friedrich Gauss (78)  |  Genius (297)  |  Glorify (6)  |  Human (1491)  |  Indistinct (2)  |  Intelligence (214)  |  Life (1830)  |  Mathematician (400)  |  Mathematics (1363)  |  Mathematics As A Fine Art (23)  |  Mozart_Amadeus (2)  |  Music (133)  |  Musician (23)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perfect (220)  |  Reason (757)  |  Receive (115)  |  Sense (776)  |  Shine (47)  |  Soul (231)  |  Think (1096)  |  Type (167)  |  Union (52)  |  Work (1374)

Medicine is a science which hath been (as we have said) more professed than laboured, and yet more laboured than advanced: the labour having been, in my judgment, rather in circle than in progression. For I find much iteration, but small addition. It considereth causes of diseases, with the occasions or impulsions; the diseases themselves, with the accidents; and the cures, with the preservation.
The Advancement of Learning (1605) in James Spedding, Robert Ellis and Douglas Heath (eds.), The Works of Francis Bacon (1887-1901), Vol. 3, 373.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (90)  |  Addition (67)  |  Cause (549)  |  Circle (114)  |  Cure (124)  |  Disease (337)  |  Find (1003)  |  Judgment (136)  |  Medicine (383)  |  More (2559)  |  Occasion (85)  |  Profess (20)  |  Progression (23)  |  Small (484)  |  Themselves (433)

Medicine, the only profession that labours incessantly to destroy the reason for its own existence.
Speech at a dinner for General W.C. Gorgas (23 Mar 1914). In Carl C. Gaither and Andrew SlocombeMedically Speaking (), 204.
Science quotes on:  |  Destroy (185)  |  Existence (475)  |  Medicine (383)  |  Physician (281)  |  Profession (103)  |  Reason (757)

My father’s collection of fossils was practically unnamed, but the appearance of Phillips’ book [Geology of the Yorkshire Coast], in which most of our specimens were figured, enabled us to remedy this defect. Every evening was devoted by us to accomplishing the work. This was my first introduction to true scientific study. … Phillips’ accurate volume initiated an entirely new order of things. Many a time did I mourn over the publication of this book, and the consequences immediately resulting from it. Instead of indulging in the games and idleness to which most lads are prone, my evenings throughout a long winter were devoted to the detested labour of naming these miserable stones. Such is the short-sightedness of boyhood. Pursuing this uncongenial work gave me in my thirteenth year a thorough practical familiarity with the palaeontological treasures of Eastern Yorkshire. This early acquisition happily moulded the entire course of my future life.
In Reminiscences of a Yorkshire naturalist (1896), 12.
Science quotes on:  |  Accomplishment (100)  |  Accurate (87)  |  Acquisition (45)  |  Appearance (144)  |  Autobiography (58)  |  Book (400)  |  Boyhood (4)  |  Coast (13)  |  Collection (67)  |  Consequence (211)  |  Course (410)  |  Defect (31)  |  Detest (5)  |  Devote (38)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Early (190)  |  Evening (12)  |  Familiarity (19)  |  Father (111)  |  First (1290)  |  Fossil (140)  |  Future (454)  |  Game (102)  |  Geology (231)  |  Idleness (15)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Indulge (15)  |  Introduction (36)  |  Life (1830)  |  Long (772)  |  Miserable (8)  |  Mold (34)  |  Most (1729)  |  Mourn (2)  |  New (1247)  |  Order (635)  |  Paleontology (32)  |  John Phillips (2)  |  Practical (213)  |  Publication (102)  |  Pursuing (27)  |  Remedy (62)  |  Result (688)  |  Scientific (946)  |  Short (197)  |  Specimen (30)  |  Stone (167)  |  Study (679)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thorough (40)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Time (1890)  |  Treasure (58)  |  True (220)  |  Uncongenial (2)  |  Winter (44)  |  Work (1374)  |  Year (939)  |  Yorkshire (2)

Nature crying out and speaking to country people in these words: Clown, wherefore dost thou behold the heavens? Why dost thou seek after the stars? When thou art now werry with short sleep, the nights are troublesome to thee. So I scatter little stars in the grass, and I shew them in the evening when thy labour is ended, and thou art miraculously allured to look upon them when thous passest by: Dost thou not see how a light like fire is covered when she closeth her wings, and she carrieth both night and day with her.
In Thomas Moffett, 'Glow-Worms', The Theater of Insects.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (664)  |  Both (494)  |  Country (261)  |  End (598)  |  Fire (195)  |  Glow-Worm (2)  |  Grass (47)  |  Heaven (261)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Light (624)  |  Little (708)  |  Look (581)  |  Nature (1973)  |  Night (123)  |  People (1012)  |  Scattering (4)  |  See (1082)  |  Seek (216)  |  Short (197)  |  Sleep (77)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Star (448)  |  Stars (304)  |  Why (491)  |  Wing (77)  |  Word (634)

No occupation is more worthy of an intelligent and enlightened mind, than the study of Nature and natural objects; and whether we labour to investigate the structure and function of the human system, whether we direct our attention to the classification and habits of the animal kingdom, or prosecute our researches in the more pleasing and varied field of vegetable life, we shall constantly find some new object to attract our attention, some fresh beauties to excite our imagination, and some previously undiscovered source of gratification and delight.
In A Practical Treatise on the Cultivation of the Dahlia (1838), 1-2.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (634)  |  Animal Kingdom (20)  |  Attention (195)  |  Attraction (60)  |  Beauty (307)  |  Classification (102)  |  Delight (109)  |  Direct (225)  |  Enlighten (30)  |  Enlightened (25)  |  Enlightenment (20)  |  Excitement (56)  |  Field (372)  |  Find (1003)  |  Fresh (69)  |  Function (230)  |  Gratification (21)  |  Habit (172)  |  Human (1491)  |  Imagination (342)  |  Intelligence (214)  |  Intelligent (102)  |  Investigate (104)  |  Investigation (242)  |  Kingdom (80)  |  Life (1830)  |  Mind (1359)  |  More (2559)  |  Natural (796)  |  Natural Science (130)  |  Nature (1973)  |  New (1247)  |  Object (430)  |  Occupation (51)  |  Prosecute (3)  |  Research (734)  |  Source (97)  |  Structure (359)  |  Study (679)  |  System (539)  |  Undiscovered (15)  |  Vegetable (48)  |  Worthy (34)

No person will deny that the highest degree of attainable accuracy is an object to be desired, and it is generally found that the last advances towards precision require a greater devotion of time, labour, and expense, than those which precede them.
Reflections on the Decline of Science in England (1830), 167.
Science quotes on:  |  Accuracy (81)  |  Advance (290)  |  Degree (276)  |  Deny (70)  |  Devotion (36)  |  Greater (289)  |  Last (425)  |  Measurement (177)  |  Object (430)  |  Person (364)  |  Precision (70)  |  Require (223)  |  Time (1890)  |  Will (2352)

No place affords a more striking conviction of the vanity of human hopes than a publick library; for who can see the wall crouded on every side by mighty volumes, the works of laborious meditation, and accurate inquiry, now scarcely known but by the catalogue, and preserved only to encrease the pomp of learning, without considering how many hours have been wasted in vain endeavours, how often imagination has anticipated the praises of futurity, how many statues have risen to the eye of vanity, how many ideal converts have elevated zeal, how often wit has exulted in the eternal infamy of his antagonists, and dogmatism has delighted in the gradual advances of his authority, the immutability of his decrees, and the perpetuity of his power.
Non unquam dedit
Documenta fors majora, quam fragili loco
Starent superbi.

Seneca, Troades, II, 4-6
Insulting chance ne'er call'd with louder voice,
On swelling mortals to be proud no more.
Of the innumerable authors whose performances are thus treasured up in magnificent obscurity, most are forgotten, because they never deserved to be remembered, and owed the honours which they have once obtained, not to judgment or to genius, to labour or to art, but to the prejudice of faction, the stratagem of intrigue, or the servility of adulation.
Nothing is more common than to find men whose works are now totally neglected, mentioned with praises by their contemporaries, as the oracles of their age, and the legislators of science. Curiosity is naturally excited, their volumes after long enquiry are found, but seldom reward the labour of the search. Every period of time has produced these bubbles of artificial fame, which are kept up a while by the breath of fashion and then break at once and are annihilated. The learned often bewail the loss of ancient writers whose characters have survived their works; but perhaps if we could now retrieve them we should find them only the Granvilles, Montagus, Stepneys, and Sheffields of their time, and wonder by what infatuation or caprice they could be raised to notice.
It cannot, however, be denied, that many have sunk into oblivion, whom it were unjust to number with this despicable class. Various kinds of literary fame seem destined to various measures of duration. Some spread into exuberance with a very speedy growth, but soon wither and decay; some rise more slowly, but last long. Parnassus has its flowers of transient fragrance as well as its oaks of towering height, and its laurels of eternal verdure.
The Rambler, Number 106, 23 Mar 1751. In W. J. Bate and Albrecht B. Strauss (eds.), The Rambler (1969), Vol. 2, 200-1.
Science quotes on:  |  Accurate (87)  |  Advance (290)  |  Age (501)  |  Ancient (194)  |  Art (664)  |  Author (171)  |  Authority (99)  |  Break (104)  |  Breath (61)  |  Bubble (23)  |  Call (772)  |  Caprice (10)  |  Chance (240)  |  Character (252)  |  Class (167)  |  Common (440)  |  Conviction (99)  |  Curiosity (135)  |  Decay (56)  |  Decree (9)  |  Delight (109)  |  Destined (42)  |  Dogmatism (15)  |  Endeavour (63)  |  Enquiry (89)  |  Eternal (112)  |  Eye (432)  |  Faction (4)  |  Fame (50)  |  Find (1003)  |  Flower (109)  |  Forgotten (53)  |  Genius (297)  |  Growth (195)  |  Honour (57)  |  Hope (308)  |  Hour (187)  |  Human (1491)  |  Ideal (104)  |  Imagination (342)  |  Innumerable (55)  |  Inquiry (85)  |  Judgment (136)  |  Kind (559)  |  Known (451)  |  Laborious (17)  |  Last (425)  |  Learn (652)  |  Learned (235)  |  Learning (290)  |  Library (52)  |  Long (772)  |  Loss (112)  |  Magnificent (45)  |  Measure (240)  |  Meditation (19)  |  Mention (82)  |  More (2559)  |  Mortal (55)  |  Most (1729)  |  Neglect (63)  |  Neglected (23)  |  Never (1088)  |  Nothing (987)  |  Notice (78)  |  Number (704)  |  Oak (16)  |  Oblivion (10)  |  Obtain (163)  |  Performance (49)  |  Period (198)  |  Perpetuity (9)  |  Power (757)  |  Prejudice (95)  |  Produced (187)  |  Remember (186)  |  Reward (70)  |  Rise (166)  |  Scarcely (74)  |  Search (165)  |  See (1082)  |  Seldom (66)  |  Side (233)  |  Soon (186)  |  Spread (86)  |  Statue (16)  |  Striking (48)  |  Time (1890)  |  Towering (11)  |  Transient (13)  |  Vain (85)  |  Various (201)  |  Wall (70)  |  Wit (59)  |  Wonder (247)  |  Work (1374)  |  Writer (89)

Not to know what has been transacted in former times is to be always a child. If no use is made of the labors of past ages, the world must remain always in the infancy of knowledge.
In Samuel Johnson and Arthur Murphy, The works of Samuel Johnson (1837), 237.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (501)  |  Child (322)  |  Former (137)  |  History (694)  |  Infancy (13)  |  Know (1526)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Labor (112)  |  Must (1525)  |  Past (343)  |  Remain (352)  |  Time (1890)  |  Transact (2)  |  Use (768)  |  World (1822)

Now having (I know not by what accident) engaged my thoughts upon the Bills of Mortality, and so far succeeded therein, as to have reduced several great confused Volumes into a few perspicuous Tables, and abridged such Observations as naturally flowed from them, into a few succinct Paragraphs, without any long Series of multiloquious Deductions, I have presumed to sacrifice these my small, but first publish'd, Labours unto your Lordship, as unto whose benign acceptance of some other of my Papers even the birth of these is due; hoping (if I may without vanity say it) they may be of as much use to persons in your Lordships place, as they are of none to me, which is no more than fairest Diamonds are to the Journeymen Jeweller that works them, or the poor Labourer that first digg'd them from Earth.
[An early account demonstrating the value of statistical analysis of public health data. Graunt lived in London at the time of the plague epidemics.]
From Graunt's 'Epistle Dedicatory', for Natural and Political Observations Mentioned in a Following Index and Made upon Bills of Mortality (1662). Reproduced in Cornelius Walford, The Insurance Cyclopaedia (1871), Vol. 1, 286. (This text used abbreviations for “Mort.” and “vols.”) The italicized words are given as from other sources. Note: bills of mortality are abstracts from parish registers showing the numbers that have died in each week, month or year.
Science quotes on:  |  Acceptance (54)  |  Accident (90)  |  Account (193)  |  Analysis (242)  |  Birth (152)  |  Data (161)  |  Deduction (86)  |  Diamond (21)  |  Due (141)  |  Early (190)  |  Earth (1034)  |  Epidemic (7)  |  First (1290)  |  Flow (87)  |  Great (1579)  |  Health (203)  |  Journeyman (3)  |  Know (1526)  |  Laborer (7)  |  Long (772)  |  More (2559)  |  Mortality (16)  |  Observation (582)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paper (190)  |  Person (364)  |  Plague (42)  |  Poor (138)  |  Public Health (10)  |  Sacrifice (57)  |  Say (985)  |  Series (149)  |  Small (484)  |  Statistics (162)  |  Succeed (112)  |  Table (105)  |  Thought (967)  |  Time (1890)  |  Use (768)  |  Value (379)  |  Work (1374)

October 9, 1863
Always, however great the height of the balloon, when I have seen the horizon it has roughly appeared to be on the level of the car though of course the dip of the horizon is a very appreciable quantity or the same height as the eye. From this one might infer that, could the earth be seen without a cloud or anything to obscure it, and the boundary line of the plane approximately the same height as the eye, the general appearance would be that of a slight concavity; but I have never seen any part of the surface of the earth other than as a plane.
Towns and cities, when viewed from the balloon are like models in motion. I shall always remember the ascent of 9th October, 1863, when we passed over London about sunset. At the time when we were 7,000 feet high, and directly over London Bridge, the scene around was one that cannot probably be equalled in the world. We were still so low as not to have lost sight of the details of the spectacle which presented itself to our eyes; and with one glance the homes of 3,000,000 people could be seen, and so distinct was the view, that every large building was easily distinguishable. In fact, the whole of London was visible, and some parts most clearly. All round, the suburbs were also very distinct, with their lines of detached villas, imbedded as it were in a mass of shrubs; beyond, the country was like a garden, its fields, well marked, becoming smaller and smaller as the eye wandered farther and farther away.
Again looking down, there was the Thames, throughout its whole length, without the slightest mist, dotted over its winding course with innumerable ships and steamboats, like moving toys. Gravesend was visible, also the mouth of the Thames, and the coast around as far as Norfolk. The southern shore of the mouth of the Thames was not so clear, but the sea beyond was seen for many miles; when at a higher elevation, I looked for the coast of France, but was unable to see it. On looking round, the eye was arrested by the garden-like appearance of the county of Kent, till again London claimed yet more careful attention.
Smoke, thin and blue, was curling from it, and slowly moving away in beautiful curves, from all except one part, south of the Thames, where it was less blue and seemed more dense, till the cause became evident; it was mixed with mist rising from the ground, the southern limit of which was bounded by an even line, doubtless indicating the meeting of the subsoils of gravel and clay. The whole scene was surmounted by a canopy of blue, everywhere free from cloud, except near the horizon, where a band of cumulus and stratus extended all round, forming a fitting boundary to such a glorious view.
As seen from the earth, the sunset this evening was described as fine, the air being clear and the shadows well defined; but, as we rose to view it and its effects, the golden hues increased in intensity; their richness decreased as the distance from the sun increased, both right and left; but still as far as 90º from the sun, rose-coloured clouds extended. The remainder of the circle was completed, for the most part, by pure white cumulus of well-rounded and symmetrical forms.
I have seen London by night. I have crossed it during the day at the height of four miles. I have often admired the splendour of sky scenery, but never have I seen anything which surpassed this spectacle. The roar of the town heard at this elevation was a deep, rich, continuous sound the voice of labour. At four miles above London, all was hushed; no sound reached our ears.
Travels in the Air (1871), 99-100.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (354)  |  Appearance (144)  |  Attention (195)  |  Balloon (16)  |  Beautiful (266)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Being (1277)  |  Beyond (310)  |  Both (494)  |  Bound (120)  |  Boundary (55)  |  Bridge (48)  |  Building (158)  |  Canopy (8)  |  Car (72)  |  Cause (549)  |  Circle (114)  |  Claim (151)  |  Cloud (109)  |  Completed (30)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Country (261)  |  Course (410)  |  Curve (49)  |  Deep (234)  |  Detail (148)  |  Distance (166)  |  Distinct (97)  |  Down (455)  |  Ear (69)  |  Earth (1034)  |  Effect (400)  |  Elevation (13)  |  Everywhere (96)  |  Evident (91)  |  Extend (128)  |  Eye (432)  |  Fact (1236)  |  Farther (51)  |  Field (372)  |  Flight (99)  |  Form (967)  |  Forming (42)  |  Free (234)  |  Garden (63)  |  General (516)  |  Glance (35)  |  Glorious (49)  |  Golden (47)  |  Great (1579)  |  Ground (221)  |  High (365)  |  Home (179)  |  Horizon (46)  |  Innumerable (55)  |  Intensity (34)  |  Large (396)  |  Limit (288)  |  Look (581)  |  Looking (191)  |  Low (83)  |  Marked (55)  |  Mass (156)  |  Mist (17)  |  Model (103)  |  More (2559)  |  Most (1729)  |  Motion (317)  |  Mouth (53)  |  Never (1088)  |  Obscure (64)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pass (238)  |  People (1012)  |  Present (625)  |  Pure (295)  |  Quantity (134)  |  Reach (285)  |  Remainder (7)  |  Remember (186)  |  Right (459)  |  Rising (44)  |  Rose (34)  |  Scene (36)  |  Sea (321)  |  See (1082)  |  Shadow (73)  |  Ship (67)  |  Shrub (5)  |  Sight (134)  |  Sky (171)  |  Smoke (31)  |  Sound (186)  |  South (39)  |  Spectacle (34)  |  Splendour (8)  |  Steamboat (7)  |  Still (614)  |  Suburb (6)  |  Sun (402)  |  Sunset (27)  |  Surface (216)  |  Surface Of The Earth (36)  |  Surpass (32)  |  Thames (6)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Time (1890)  |  Toy (21)  |  View (494)  |  Visible (86)  |  Wander (42)  |  White (129)  |  Whole (746)  |  Winding (8)  |  World (1822)

Of Science generally we can remark, first, that it is the most perfect embodiment of Truth, and of the ways of getting at Truth. More than anything else does it impress the mind with the nature of Evidence, with the labour and precautions necessary to prove a thing. It is the grand corrective of the laxness of the natural man in receiving unaccredited facts and conclusions. It exemplifies the devices for establishing a fact, or a law, under every variety of circumstances; it saps the credit of everything that is affirmed without being properly attested.
In Education as a Science (1879), 147-148.
Science quotes on:  |  Affirmation (8)  |  Being (1277)  |  Circumstance (137)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Conclusion (259)  |  Corrective (2)  |  Device (70)  |  Embodiment (9)  |  Everything (482)  |  Evidence (263)  |  Fact (1236)  |  Facts (553)  |  First (1290)  |  Impress (65)  |  Law (907)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1359)  |  More (2559)  |  Most (1729)  |  Natural (796)  |  Nature (1973)  |  Necessary (365)  |  Perfect (220)  |  Proof (297)  |  Prove (256)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Truth (1088)  |  Variety (136)  |  Way (1214)

Science has gone down into the mines and coal-pits, and before the safety-lamp the Gnomes and Genii of those dark regions have disappeared… Sirens, mermaids, shining cities glittering at the bottom of quiet seas and in deep lakes, exist no longer; but in their place, Science, their destroyer, shows us whole coasts of coral reef constructed by the labours of minute creatures; points to our own chalk cliffs and limestone rocks as made of the dust of myriads of generations of infinitesimal beings that have passed away; reduces the very element of water into its constituent airs, and re-creates it at her pleasure.
Book review of Robert Hunt, Poetry of Science (1848), in the London Examiner (1848). Although uncredited in print, biographers identified his authorship from his original handwritten work. Collected in Charles Dickens and Frederic George Kitton (ed.) Old Lamps for New Ones: And Other Sketches and Essays (1897), 86-87.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (354)  |  Being (1277)  |  Bottom (33)  |  Chalk (9)  |  City (85)  |  Cliff (22)  |  Coal (62)  |  Coast (13)  |  Constituent (47)  |  Construct (128)  |  Constructing (3)  |  Coral (10)  |  Coral Reef (14)  |  Create (243)  |  Creature (239)  |  Dark (141)  |  Deep (234)  |  Destroyer (4)  |  Disappear (83)  |  Disappearance (28)  |  Down (455)  |  Dust (67)  |  Element (317)  |  Exist (447)  |  Generation (251)  |  Genius (297)  |  Glitter (9)  |  Infinitesimal (30)  |  Lake (35)  |  Lamp (36)  |  Limestone (6)  |  Mermaid (5)  |  Mine (78)  |  Minute (126)  |  Myriad (31)  |  Pass (238)  |  Pit (20)  |  Pleasure (188)  |  Point (583)  |  Pointing (4)  |  Quiet (36)  |  Reduce (97)  |  Reef (7)  |  Region (40)  |  Rock (169)  |  Safety (56)  |  Safety Lamp (3)  |  Sea (321)  |  Shining (35)  |  Show (348)  |  Siren (4)  |  Water (494)  |  Whole (746)

SCIENCE! thou fair effusive ray
From the great source of mental Day,
Free, generous, and refin'd!
Descend with all thy treasures fraught,
Illumine each bewilder'd thought,
And bless my labour'g mind.
'Hymn to Science' (1739). In Robin Dix (ed.), The Poetical Works of Mark Akenside (1996), 406.
Science quotes on:  |  Bless (25)  |  Descend (47)  |  Free (234)  |  Generous (17)  |  Great (1579)  |  Mental (178)  |  Mind (1359)  |  Ray (114)  |  Thought (967)  |  Treasure (58)

Scientists and Drapers. Why should the botanist, geologist or other-ist give himself such airs over the draper’s assistant? Is it because he names his plants or specimens with Latin names and divides them into genera and species, whereas the draper does not formulate his classifications, or at any rate only uses his mother tongue when he does? Yet how like the sub-divisions of textile life are to those of the animal and vegetable kingdoms! A few great families—cotton, linen, hempen, woollen, silk, mohair, alpaca—into what an infinite variety of genera and species do not these great families subdivide themselves? And does it take less labour, with less intelligence, to master all these and to acquire familiarity with their various habits, habitats and prices than it does to master the details of any other great branch of science? I do not know. But when I think of Shoolbred’s on the one hand and, say, the ornithological collections of the British Museum upon the other, I feel as though it would take me less trouble to master the second than the first.
Samuel Butler, Henry Festing Jones (ed.), The Note-Books of Samuel Butler (1917), 218.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (354)  |  Animal (634)  |  Assistant (6)  |  Botanist (24)  |  Branch (152)  |  British (42)  |  British Museum (2)  |  Classification (102)  |  Collection (67)  |  Cotton (8)  |  Detail (148)  |  Divide (76)  |  Division (67)  |  Do (1905)  |  Familiarity (19)  |  Family (96)  |  Feel (365)  |  First (1290)  |  Genus (26)  |  Geologist (80)  |  Great (1579)  |  Habit (172)  |  Habitat (17)  |  Himself (461)  |  Infinite (236)  |  Intelligence (214)  |  Kingdom (80)  |  Know (1526)  |  Latin (41)  |  Life (1830)  |  Linen (8)  |  Master (181)  |  Mother (115)  |  Mother Tongue (3)  |  Museum (35)  |  Name (346)  |  Nomenclature (152)  |  Ornithology (21)  |  Other (2233)  |  Plant (313)  |  Price (56)  |  Say (985)  |  Scientist (856)  |  Silk (13)  |  Species (419)  |  Specimen (30)  |  Textile (2)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Think (1096)  |  Tongue (44)  |  Trouble (111)  |  Use (768)  |  Variety (136)  |  Various (201)  |  Vegetable (48)  |  Why (491)  |  Wool (4)

Shun no toil to make yourself remarkable by some talent or other; yet do not devote yourself to one branch exclusively. Strive to get clear notions about all. Give up no science entirely; for science is but one.
In Henry Southgate (ed.), Many Thoughts of Many Minds (1862), 340.
Science quotes on:  |  Branch (152)  |  Devote (38)  |  Do (1905)  |  Education (402)  |  Notion (118)  |  Other (2233)  |  Shun (4)  |  Strive (51)  |  Talent (99)  |  Toil (26)

Taking him for all and all, I think it will be conceded that Michael Faraday was the greatest experimental philosopher the world has ever seen; and I will add the opinion, that the progress of future research will tend, not to dim or to diminish, but to enhance and glorify the labours of this mighty investigator.
In Faraday as a Discoverer (1868), 147.
Science quotes on:  |  Enhance (17)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Michael Faraday (90)  |  Future (454)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Investigator (68)  |  Opinion (285)  |  Philosopher (266)  |  Progress (483)  |  Research (734)  |  Tend (124)  |  Think (1096)  |  Will (2352)  |  World (1822)

That the machine of Heaven is not a hard and impervious body full of various real spheres, as up to now has been believed by most people. It will be proved that it extends everywhere, most fluid and simple, and nowhere presents obstacles as was formerly held, the circuits of the Planets being wholly free and without the labour and whirling round of any real spheres at all, being divinely governed under a given law.
De Mundi Aetherei Recentioribus Phaenomenis (On Recent Phenomena in the Aetherial World) (1588). Quoted in M. Boas Hall, The Scientific Renaissance 1450-1630 (1962), 117.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1277)  |  Body (545)  |  Circuit (29)  |  Everywhere (96)  |  Extend (128)  |  Fluid (53)  |  Free (234)  |  Govern (66)  |  Hard (244)  |  Heaven (261)  |  Impervious (5)  |  Law (907)  |  Machine (266)  |  Most (1729)  |  Obstacle (42)  |  People (1012)  |  Planet (381)  |  Present (625)  |  Simple (415)  |  Sphere (116)  |  Various (201)  |  Wholly (88)  |  Will (2352)

The “British Association for the Promotion of Science,” … is almost necessary for the purposes of science. The periodical assemblage of persons, pursuing the same or différent branches of knowledge, always produces an excitement which is favourable to the development of new ideas; whilst the long period of repose which succeeds, is advantageous for the prosecution of the reasonings or the experiments then suggested; and the récurrence of the meeting in the succeeding year, will stimulate the activity of the inquirer, by the hope of being then enabled to produce the successful result of his labours.
In 'Future Prospects', On the Economy of Machinery and Manufactures (1st ed., 1832), chap. 32, 274. Note: The British Association for the Advancement of Science held its first meeting at York in 1831, the year before the first publication of this book in 1832.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (215)  |  Advancement (62)  |  Advantageous (10)  |  Assemblage (17)  |  Assembly (13)  |  Association (48)  |  Being (1277)  |  Branch (152)  |  British (42)  |  Conference (18)  |  Development (431)  |  Different (581)  |  Enable (120)  |  Exchange (37)  |  Excitement (56)  |  Experiment (720)  |  Favourable (3)  |  Hope (308)  |  Idea (861)  |  Information (172)  |  Inquirer (9)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Long (772)  |  Meeting (21)  |  Necessary (365)  |  New (1247)  |  New Ideas (17)  |  Period (198)  |  Periodic (3)  |  Person (364)  |  Produce (109)  |  Promotion (8)  |  Purpose (324)  |  Pursue (61)  |  Pursuing (27)  |  Reasoning (211)  |  Reasonings (2)  |  Research (734)  |  Result (688)  |  Same (157)  |  Society (339)  |  Stimulate (20)  |  Succeed (112)  |  Succeeding (14)  |  Success (315)  |  Successful (131)  |  Suggest (36)  |  Will (2352)  |  Year (939)

The advancement of science is slow; it is effected only by virtue of hard work and perseverance. And when a result is attained, should we not in recognition connect it with the efforts of those who have preceded us, who have struggled and suffered in advance? Is it not truly a duty to recall the difficulties which they vanquished, the thoughts which guided them; and how men of different nations, ideas, positions, and characters, moved solely by the love of science, have bequeathed to us the unsolved problem? Should not the last comer recall the researches of his predecessors while adding in his turn his contribution of intelligence and of labor? Here is an intellectual collaboration consecrated entirely to the search for truth, and which continues from century to century.
[Respecting how the work of prior researchers had enabled his isolation of fluorine.]
Proceedings of the Royal Institution (1897). In Annual Report of the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution to July 1897 (1898), 262.
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (290)  |  Advancement (62)  |  Attain (126)  |  Attainment (48)  |  Century (315)  |  Character (252)  |  Collaboration (15)  |  Connect (125)  |  Consecration (3)  |  Continuation (20)  |  Continue (170)  |  Contribution (89)  |  Different (581)  |  Difficulty (200)  |  Duty (70)  |  Effect (400)  |  Effort (233)  |  Fluorine (5)  |  Guide (105)  |  Hard (244)  |  Hard Work (23)  |  Idea (861)  |  Intellect (242)  |  Intellectual (257)  |  Intelligence (214)  |  Isolation (32)  |  Labor (112)  |  Last (425)  |  Love (317)  |  Nation (203)  |  Perseverance (23)  |  Position (81)  |  Predecessor (29)  |  Problem (708)  |  Recognition (91)  |  Recollection (12)  |  Research (734)  |  Researcher (35)  |  Result (688)  |  Search (165)  |  Slow (103)  |  Struggle (109)  |  Thought (967)  |  Truly (117)  |  Truth (1088)  |  Turn (450)  |  Unsolved (15)  |  Virtue (111)  |  Work (1374)

The cases of action at a distance are becoming, in a physical point of view, daily more and more important. Sound, light, electricity, magnetism, gravitation, present them as a series.
The nature of sound and its dependence on a medium we think we understand, pretty well. The nature of light as dependent on a medium is now very largely accepted. The presence of a medium in the phenomena of electricity and magnetism becomes more and more probable daily. We employ ourselves, and I think rightly, in endeavouring to elucidate the physical exercise of these forces, or their sets of antecedents and consequents, and surely no one can find fault with the labours which eminent men have entered upon in respect of light, or into which they may enter as regards electricity and magnetism. Then what is there about gravitation that should exclude it from consideration also? Newton did not shut out the physical view, but had evidently thought deeply of it; and if he thought of it, why should not we, in these advanced days, do so too?
Letter to E. Jones, 9 Jun 1857. In Michael Faraday, Bence Jones (ed.), The Life and Letters of Faraday (1870), Vol. 2, 387.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (194)  |  Action (332)  |  Become (817)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Consequent (19)  |  Consideration (142)  |  Daily (89)  |  Dependence (46)  |  Distance (166)  |  Do (1905)  |  Electricity (166)  |  Employ (114)  |  Enter (142)  |  Evidently (26)  |  Exercise (112)  |  Fault (56)  |  Find (1003)  |  Force (493)  |  Gravitation (71)  |  Gravity (135)  |  Light (624)  |  Magnetism (43)  |  More (2559)  |  Nature (1973)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (352)  |  Ourselves (245)  |  Physical (511)  |  Point (583)  |  Point Of View (84)  |  Presence (63)  |  Present (625)  |  Regard (305)  |  Respect (210)  |  Series (149)  |  Set (396)  |  Shut (41)  |  Sound (186)  |  Surely (101)  |  Think (1096)  |  Thought (967)  |  Understand (634)  |  View (494)  |  Why (491)

The feudal model of agriculture collided, first, with environmental limits and then with a massive external shock – the Black Death. After that, there was a demographic shock: too few workers for the land, which raised their wages and made the old feudal obligation system impossible to enforce. The labour shortage also forced technological innovation. The new technologies that underpinned the rise of merchant capitalism were the ones that stimulated commerce (printing and accountancy), the creation of tradeable wealth (mining, the compass and fast ships) and productivity (mathematics and the scientific method).
In 'The End of Capitalism Has Begun', The Guardian (17 Jul 2015) (online).
Science quotes on:  |  Accountant (4)  |  Agriculture (75)  |  Black Death (2)  |  Capitalism (12)  |  Commerce (23)  |  Compass (37)  |  Creation (342)  |  Environment (223)  |  Innovation (44)  |  Limit (288)  |  Mathematics (1363)  |  Mining (21)  |  Plague (42)  |  Printing (24)  |  Productivity (22)  |  Scientific Method (185)  |  Ship (67)  |  Shortage (6)  |  Stimulate (20)  |  Technology (273)  |  Trade (34)  |  Wage (6)  |  Wealth (99)  |  Worker (33)

The framing of hypotheses is, for the enquirer after truth, not the end, but the beginning of his work. Each of his systems is invented, not that he may admire it and follow it into all its consistent consequences, but that he may make it the occasion of a course of active experiment and observation. And if the results of this process contradict his fundamental assumptions, however ingenious, however symmetrical, however elegant his system may be, he rejects it without hesitation. He allows no natural yearning for the offspring of his own mind to draw him aside from the higher duty of loyalty to his sovereign, Truth, to her he not only gives his affections and his wishes, but strenuous labour and scrupulous minuteness of attention.
Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences (1847), Vol. 2, 57.
Science quotes on:  |  Active (79)  |  Affection (43)  |  Assumption (96)  |  Attention (195)  |  Beginning (310)  |  Consequence (211)  |  Consistent (50)  |  Contradict (41)  |  Contradiction (69)  |  Course (410)  |  Draw (139)  |  Elegance (39)  |  Elegant (37)  |  End (598)  |  Enquiry (89)  |  Experiment (720)  |  Follow (384)  |  Frame (26)  |  Fundamental (258)  |  Hesitation (19)  |  Hypothesis (311)  |  Ingenious (55)  |  Invention (387)  |  Loyalty (10)  |  Mind (1359)  |  Minuteness (8)  |  Natural (796)  |  Observation (582)  |  Occasion (85)  |  Offspring (27)  |  Process (430)  |  Reject (65)  |  Rejection (35)  |  Result (688)  |  Scrupulous (6)  |  Sovereign (5)  |  Strenuous (5)  |  System (539)  |  Truth (1088)  |  Work (1374)  |  Yearning (12)

The increasing technicality of the terminology employed is also a serious difficulty. It has become necessary to learn an extensive vocabulary before a book in even a limited department of science can be consulted with much profit. This change, of course, has its advantages for the initiated, in securing precision and concisement of statement; but it tends to narrow the field in which an investigator can labour, and it cannot fail to become, in the future, a serious impediment to wide inductive generalisations.
Year Book of Science (1892), preface, from review in Chemical News and Journal of Physical Science (14 Apr 1892), 65, 190.
Science quotes on:  |  Advantage (137)  |  Become (817)  |  Book (400)  |  Change (617)  |  Conciseness (3)  |  Consulting (11)  |  Course (410)  |  Department (92)  |  Difficulty (200)  |  Employ (114)  |  Extensive (33)  |  Fail (189)  |  Failure (168)  |  Field (372)  |  Future (454)  |  Generalization (59)  |  Impediment (11)  |  Induction (81)  |  Inductive (20)  |  Investigator (68)  |  Learn (652)  |  Limit (288)  |  Limited (102)  |  Narrow (84)  |  Necessary (365)  |  Necessity (195)  |  Precision (70)  |  Profit (55)  |  Serious (94)  |  Statement (146)  |  Technicality (5)  |  Tend (124)  |  Terminology (12)  |  Vocabulary (9)  |  Wide (96)

The native intellectual powers of men in different times, are not so much the causes of the different success of their labours, as the peculiar nature of the means and artificial resources in their possession‎. Independent of vessels of glass, there could have been no accurate manipulations in common chemistry: the air pump was necessary for live investigation of the properties of gaseous matter; and without the Voltaic apparatus, there was no possibility of examining the relations of electrical polarities to chemical attractions.
In Elements of Chemical Philosophy (1812), Vol. 1, Part 1, 28-29.
Science quotes on:  |  Accurate (87)  |  Air (354)  |  Air Pump (2)  |  Apparatus (69)  |  Artificial (37)  |  Attraction (60)  |  Cause (549)  |  Chemical (296)  |  Chemistry (365)  |  Common (440)  |  Different (581)  |  Electrical (57)  |  Examine (82)  |  Gas (86)  |  Glass (93)  |  Independent (69)  |  Intellectual (257)  |  Investigation (242)  |  Live (637)  |  Manipulation (19)  |  Matter (810)  |  Mean (808)  |  Means (580)  |  Native (41)  |  Nature (1973)  |  Necessary (365)  |  Peculiar (113)  |  Polarity (5)  |  Possession (67)  |  Possibility (167)  |  Power (757)  |  Property (171)  |  Relation (160)  |  Resource (69)  |  Success (315)  |  Time (1890)  |  Vessel (63)  |  Voltaic (9)

The persons who have been employed on these problems of applying the properties of matter and the laws of motion to the explanation of the phenomena of the world, and who have brought to them the high and admirable qualities which such an office requires, have justly excited in a very eminent degree the admiration which mankind feels for great intellectual powers. Their names occupy a distinguished place in literary history; and probably there are no scientific reputations of the last century higher, and none more merited, than those earned by great mathematicians who have laboured with such wonderful success in unfolding the mechanism of the heavens; such for instance as D ’Alembert, Clairaut, Euler, Lagrange, Laplace.
In Astronomy and General Physics (1833), Bk. 3, chap. 4, 327.
Science quotes on:  |  Admirable (19)  |  Admiration (60)  |  Apply (164)  |  Bring (92)  |  Century (315)  |  Alexis Claude Clairaut (2)  |  Jean le Rond D’Alembert (13)  |  Degree (276)  |  Distinguish (166)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Earn (8)  |  Eminent (19)  |  Employ (114)  |  Leonhard Euler (35)  |  Excited (8)  |  Explanation (241)  |  Feel (365)  |  Great (1579)  |  Heaven (261)  |  Heavens (125)  |  High (365)  |  History (694)  |  Instance (33)  |  Intellectual (257)  |  Justly (6)  |  Count Joseph-Louis de Lagrange (26)  |  Pierre-Simon Laplace (63)  |  Last (425)  |  Law (907)  |  Law Of Motion (14)  |  Laws Of Motion (10)  |  Literary (14)  |  Mankind (351)  |  Mathematician (400)  |  Matter (810)  |  Mechanism (100)  |  Merit (50)  |  More (2559)  |  Motion (317)  |  Name (346)  |  Occupy (27)  |  Office (71)  |  Person (364)  |  Phenomenon (329)  |  Place (184)  |  Power (757)  |  Probably (49)  |  Problem (708)  |  Properties Of Matter (7)  |  Quality (137)  |  Reputation (33)  |  Require (223)  |  Scientific (946)  |  Success (315)  |  Unfold (14)  |  Unfolding (16)  |  Wonderful (151)  |  World (1822)

The position of the anthropologist of to-day resembles in some sort the position of classical scholars at the revival of learning. To these men the rediscovery of ancient literature came like a revelation, disclosing to their wondering eyes a splendid vision of the antique world, such as the cloistered of the Middle Ages never dreamed of under the gloomy shadow of the minster and within the sound of its solemn bells. To us moderns a still wider vista is vouchsafed, a greater panorama is unrolled by the study which aims at bringing home to us the faith and the practice, the hopes and the ideals, not of two highly gifted races only, but of all mankind, and thus at enabling us to follow the long march, the slow and toilsome ascent, of humanity from savagery to civilization. And as the scholar of the Renaissance found not merely fresh food for thought but a new field of labour in the dusty and faded manuscripts of Greece and Rome, so in the mass of materials that is steadily pouring in from many sides—from buried cities of remotest antiquity as well as from the rudest savages of the desert and the jungle—we of to-day must recognise a new province of knowledge which will task the energies of generations of students to master.
'Author’s Introduction' (1900). In Dr Theodor H. Gaster (ed.), The New Golden Bough (1959), xxv-xxvi.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (501)  |  Aim (172)  |  Ancient (194)  |  Anthropology (60)  |  Antiquity (33)  |  Bell (35)  |  Civilization (215)  |  Classical (49)  |  Desert (57)  |  Dream (217)  |  Eye (432)  |  Fad (10)  |  Faith (206)  |  Field (372)  |  Follow (384)  |  Food (206)  |  Fresh (69)  |  Generation (251)  |  Gift (104)  |  Gifted (25)  |  Greater (289)  |  Home (179)  |  Hope (308)  |  Humanity (178)  |  Ideal (104)  |  Jungle (23)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Learning (290)  |  Literature (110)  |  Long (772)  |  Mankind (351)  |  March (47)  |  Mass (156)  |  Master (181)  |  Material (358)  |  Merely (315)  |  Middle Age (18)  |  Middle Ages (12)  |  Modern (392)  |  Must (1525)  |  Never (1088)  |  New (1247)  |  Panorama (5)  |  Practice (208)  |  Province (35)  |  Race (273)  |  Rediscovery (2)  |  Renaissance (15)  |  Resemble (64)  |  Revelation (51)  |  Rome (19)  |  Scholar (52)  |  Shadow (73)  |  Side (233)  |  Slow (103)  |  Solemn (20)  |  Sound (186)  |  Splendid (23)  |  Still (614)  |  Student (310)  |  Study (679)  |  Task (149)  |  Thought (967)  |  Two (936)  |  Vision (125)  |  Vista (11)  |  Will (2352)  |  World (1822)

The story of scientific discovery has its own epic unity—a unity of purpose and endeavour—the single torch passing from hand to hand through the centuries; and the great moments of science when, after long labour, the pioneers saw their accumulated facts falling into a significant order—sometimes in the form of a law that revolutionised the whole world of thought—have an intense human interest, and belong essentially to the creative imagination of poetry.
In Prefactory Note, Watchers of the Sky (1922), v.
Science quotes on:  |  Accumulated (2)  |  Belong (164)  |  Belonging (36)  |  Century (315)  |  Creative (141)  |  Discovery (818)  |  Endeavor (68)  |  Endeavour (63)  |  Epic (12)  |  Essential (203)  |  Fact (1236)  |  Facts (553)  |  Falling (6)  |  Form (967)  |  Great (1579)  |  Hand (144)  |  Human (1491)  |  Imagination (342)  |  Intense (21)  |  Interest (404)  |  Law (907)  |  Long (772)  |  Moment (256)  |  Order (635)  |  Passing (76)  |  Pioneer (37)  |  Poetry (146)  |  Purpose (324)  |  Saw (160)  |  Scientific (946)  |  Significant (75)  |  Single (360)  |  Story (119)  |  Thought (967)  |  Through (846)  |  Torch (12)  |  Unity (80)  |  Whole (746)  |  Whole World (29)  |  World (1822)

The valuable properties of this cement depend in a great measure on the mode of preparing it for use. The mixing should therefore be conducted with care in order to form a perfect union of the powdered cement, sand and water. This can be best accomplished by the use of the New England corn hoe on a board floor or by beating with a hand stamper; not much labour is required if properly applied. Mechanics can judge when the mixture is perfect by the appearance of the mortar, which, when properly prepared, very much resembles putty.
Directions for Using White's Patent Hydraulic Cement.
Science quotes on:  |  Appearance (144)  |  Applied (176)  |  Best (464)  |  Care (197)  |  Cement (10)  |  Conduct (69)  |  Corn (19)  |  Depend (231)  |  Engineering (180)  |  Form (967)  |  Great (1579)  |  Judge (111)  |  Measure (240)  |  Mechanic (119)  |  Mechanics (134)  |  Mixture (42)  |  New (1247)  |  Order (635)  |  Perfect (220)  |  Powder (9)  |  Preparing (21)  |  Required (108)  |  Resemble (64)  |  Sand (63)  |  Union (52)  |  Use (768)  |  Water (494)

Theories cannot claim to be indestructible. They are only the plough which the ploughman uses to draw his furrow and which he has every right to discard for another one, of improved design, after the harvest. To be this ploughman, to see my labours result in the furtherance of scientific progress, was the height of my ambition, and now the Swedish Academy of Sciences has come, at this harvest, to add the most brilliant of crowns.
'The Method of Direct Hydrogenation by Catalysis', Nobel Lecture (11 Dec 1912). Noble Lectures in Chemistry 1901-1921 (1966), 230-1.
Science quotes on:  |  Academy (36)  |  Academy Of Sciences (4)  |  Ambition (45)  |  Brilliant (55)  |  Claim (151)  |  Crown (39)  |  Design (199)  |  Discard (30)  |  Draw (139)  |  Furrow (4)  |  Furtherance (4)  |  Harvest (27)  |  Height (33)  |  Improvement (114)  |  Indestructible (12)  |  Most (1729)  |  Plough (14)  |  Ploughman (3)  |  Progress (483)  |  Result (688)  |  Right (459)  |  Scientific (946)  |  Scientific Progress (14)  |  See (1082)  |  Sweden (3)  |  Theory (998)  |  Use (768)

There was yet another disadvantage attaching to the whole of Newton’s physical inquiries, ... the want of an appropriate notation for expressing the conditions of a dynamical problem, and the general principles by which its solution must be obtained. By the labours of LaGrange, the motions of a disturbed planet are reduced with all their complication and variety to a purely mathematical question. It then ceases to be a physical problem; the disturbed and disturbing planet are alike vanished: the ideas of time and force are at an end; the very elements of the orbit have disappeared, or only exist as arbitrary characters in a mathematical formula
Address to the Mechanics Institute, 'An Address on the Genius and Discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton' (1835), excerpted in paper by Luis M. Laita, Luis de Ledesma, Eugenio Roanes-Lozano and Alberto Brunori, 'George Boole, a Forerunner of Symbolic Computation', collected in John A. Campbell and Eugenio Roanes-Lozano (eds.), Artificial Intelligence and Symbolic Computation: International Conference AISC 2000 (2001), 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Alike (60)  |  Appropriate (61)  |  Arbitrary (26)  |  Cease (80)  |  Character (252)  |  Complication (29)  |  Condition (360)  |  Disadvantage (10)  |  Disappear (83)  |  Disappearance (28)  |  Disturb (29)  |  Disturbance (33)  |  Disturbed (15)  |  Dynamical (15)  |  Dynamics (10)  |  Element (317)  |  End (598)  |  Exist (447)  |  Expression (178)  |  Force (493)  |  Formula (99)  |  General (516)  |  Idea (861)  |  Inquiry (85)  |  Count Joseph-Louis de Lagrange (26)  |  Motion (317)  |  Must (1525)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (352)  |  Notation (27)  |  Obtain (163)  |  Orbit (84)  |  Physical (511)  |  Planet (381)  |  Principle (522)  |  Problem (708)  |  Pure Mathematics (67)  |  Purely (111)  |  Question (640)  |  Solution (275)  |  Time (1890)  |  Vanishing (11)  |  Variety (136)  |  Want (498)  |  Whole (746)

This Academy [at Lagado] is not an entire single Building, but a Continuation of several Houses on both Sides of a Street; which growing waste, was purchased and applied to that Use.
I was received very kindly by the Warden, and went for many Days to the Academy. Every Room hath in it ' one or more Projectors; and I believe I could not be in fewer than five Hundred Rooms.
The first Man I saw was of a meagre Aspect, with sooty Hands and Face, his Hair and Beard long, ragged and singed in several Places. His Clothes, Shirt, and Skin were all of the same Colour. He had been Eight Years upon a Project for extracting Sun-Beams out of Cucumbers, which were to be put into Vials hermetically sealed, and let out to warm the Air in raw inclement Summers. He told me, he did not doubt in Eight Years more, that he should be able to supply the Governor's Gardens with Sunshine at a reasonable Rate; but he complained that his Stock was low, and interested me to give him something as an Encouragement to Ingenuity, especially since this had been a very dear Season for Cucumbers. I made him a small Present, for my Lord had furnished me with Money on purpose, because he knew their Practice of begging from all who go to see them.
I saw another at work to calcine Ice into Gunpowder; who likewise shewed me a Treatise he had written concerning the Malleability of Fire, which he intended to publish.
There was a most ingenious Architect who had contrived a new Method for building Houses, by beginning at the Roof, and working downwards to the Foundation; which he justified to me by the life Practice of those two prudent Insects the Bee and the Spider.
In another Apartment I was highly pleased with a Projector, who had found a device of plowing the Ground with Hogs, to save the Charges of Plows, Cattle, and Labour. The Method is this: In an Acre of Ground you bury at six Inches Distance, and eight deep, a quantity of Acorns, Dates, Chestnuts, and other Masts or Vegetables whereof these Animals are fondest; then you drive six Hundred or more of them into the Field, where in a few Days they will root up the whole Ground in search of their Food, and make it fit for sowing, at the same time manuring it with their Dung. It is true, upon Experiment they found the Charge and Trouble very great, and they had little or no Crop. However, it is not doubted that this Invention may be capable of great Improvement.
I had hitherto seen only one Side of the Academy, the other being appropriated to the Advancers of speculative Learning.
Some were condensing Air into a dry tangible Substance, by extracting the Nitre, and letting the acqueous or fluid Particles percolate: Others softening Marble for Pillows and Pin-cushions. Another was, by a certain Composition of Gums, Minerals, and Vegetables outwardly applied, to prevent the Growth of Wool upon two young lambs; and he hoped in a reasonable Time to propagate the Breed of naked Sheep all over the Kingdom.
Gulliver's Travels (1726, Penguin ed. 1967), Part III, Chap. 5, 223.
Science quotes on:  |  Academy (36)  |  Acorn (4)  |  Acre (12)  |  Air (354)  |  Animal (634)  |  Applied (176)  |  Architect (30)  |  Aspect (125)  |  Beam (24)  |  Bee (42)  |  Beginning (310)  |  Being (1277)  |  Both (494)  |  Breed (24)  |  Building (158)  |  Capable (169)  |  Cattle (18)  |  Certain (552)  |  Charge (60)  |  Chestnut (2)  |  Composition (85)  |  Continuation (20)  |  Crop (26)  |  Cucumber (4)  |  Date (13)  |  Deep (234)  |  Device (70)  |  Distance (166)  |  Doubt (311)  |  Dry (61)  |  Dung (10)  |  Encouragement (25)  |  Experiment (720)  |  Face (213)  |  Field (372)  |  Fire (195)  |  First (1290)  |  Fit (135)  |  Fluid (53)  |  Food (206)  |  Foundation (176)  |  Furnish (96)  |  Garden (63)  |  Governor (13)  |  Great (1579)  |  Ground (221)  |  Growing (98)  |  Growth (195)  |  Gunpowder (17)  |  Hermetic Seal (2)  |  Hog (4)  |  House (140)  |  Hundred (231)  |  Ice (56)  |  Improvement (114)  |  Ingenious (55)  |  Ingenuity (41)  |  Insect (87)  |  Interest (404)  |  Invention (387)  |  Kingdom (80)  |  Lamb (6)  |  Learning (290)  |  Life (1830)  |  Little (708)  |  Long (772)  |  Lord (96)  |  Low (83)  |  Man (2252)  |  Marble (20)  |  Mast (3)  |  Method (517)  |  Mineral (66)  |  Money (177)  |  More (2559)  |  Most (1729)  |  New (1247)  |  Other (2233)  |  Particle (200)  |  Pillow (4)  |  Pin (19)  |  Plow (7)  |  Practice (208)  |  Present (625)  |  Prevent (96)  |  Project (76)  |  Projector (3)  |  Publish (38)  |  Purpose (324)  |  Quantity (134)  |  Raw (28)  |  Root (121)  |  Save (123)  |  Saw (160)  |  Seal (18)  |  Search (165)  |  Season (47)  |  See (1082)  |  Sheep (12)  |  Side (233)  |  Single (360)  |  Skin (47)  |  Small (484)  |  Something (718)  |  Soot (9)  |  Sowing (9)  |  Spider (14)  |  Substance (252)  |  Summer (54)  |  Sun (402)  |  Sunbeam (3)  |  Supply (97)  |  Tangible (15)  |  Time (1890)  |  Treatise (44)  |  Trouble (111)  |  Two (936)  |  Use (768)  |  Vegetable (48)  |  Vial (4)  |  Warm (71)  |  Warmth (21)  |  Waste (106)  |  Whole (746)  |  Will (2352)  |  Wool (4)  |  Work (1374)  |  Year (939)  |  Young (238)

This prime matter which is proper for the form of the Elixir is taken from a single tree which grows in the lands of the West. It has two branches, which are too high for whoso seeks to eat the fruit thereof to reach them without labour and trouble; and two other branches, but the fruit of these is drier and more tanned than that of the two preceding. The blossom of one of the two is red [corresponding to gold], and the blossom of the second is between white and black [corresponding to silver]. Then there are two other branches weaker and softer than the four preceding, and the blossom of one of them is black [referring to iron] and the other between white and yellow [probably tin]. And this tree grows on the surface of the ocean [the material prima from which all metals are formed] as plants grow on the surface of the earth. This is the tree of which whosoever eats, man and jinn obey him; it is also the tree of which Adam (peace be upon him!) was forbidden to eat, and when he ate thereof he was transformed from his angelic form to human form. And this tree may be changed into every animal shape.
Al- Iraqi
'Cultivation of Gold', trans. E. J. Holmyard (1923), 23. Quoted and annotated in Seyyed Hossein Nasr, Science and Civilization in Islam (1968), 279.
Science quotes on:  |  Angel (45)  |  Animal (634)  |  Blossom (21)  |  Creation (342)  |  Earth (1034)  |  Eat (108)  |  Elixir (6)  |  Forbidden (18)  |  Form (967)  |  Fruit (104)  |  Gold (99)  |  Grow (240)  |  High (365)  |  Human (1491)  |  Iron (98)  |  Man (2252)  |  Material (358)  |  Matter (810)  |  Metal (85)  |  More (2559)  |  Obey (45)  |  Ocean (207)  |  Other (2233)  |  Peace (113)  |  Plant (313)  |  Proper (148)  |  Reach (285)  |  Science In Islam (2)  |  Seek (216)  |  Silver (47)  |  Single (360)  |  Surface (216)  |  Surface Of The Earth (36)  |  Tin (18)  |  Transform (73)  |  Tree (260)  |  Trouble (111)  |  White (129)  |  Yellow (31)

Those who are unacquainted with the details of scientific investigation have no idea of the amount of labour expended in the determination of those numbers on which important calculations or inferences depend. They have no idea of the patience shown by a Berzelius in determining atomic weights; by a Regnault in determining coefficients of expansion; or by a Joule in determining the mechanical equivalent of heat.
In Sound: A Course of Eight Lectures Delivered at the Royal Institution of Great Britain (1867), 26.
Science quotes on:  |  Amount (151)  |  Atomic Weight (6)  |  Jöns Jacob Berzelius (13)  |  Calculation (132)  |  Coefficient (5)  |  Depend (231)  |  Detail (148)  |  Determination (77)  |  Equivalent (45)  |  Expansion (43)  |  Heat (176)  |  Idea (861)  |  Important (219)  |  Inference (45)  |  Investigation (242)  |  James Prescott Joule (7)  |  Labor (112)  |  Measurement (177)  |  Mechanical (142)  |  Number (704)  |  Patience (58)  |  Research (734)  |  Scientific (946)  |  Unacquainted (3)  |  Weight (137)

Those who intend to practise Midwifery, ought first of all to make themselves masters of anatomy, and acquire a competent knowledge in surgery and physic; because of their connections with the obstetric art, if not always, at least in many cases. He ought to take the best opportunities he can find of being well instructed; and of practising under a master, before he attempts to deliver by himself. ... He should also embrace every occasion of being present at real labours, ... he will assist the poor as well as the rich, behaving always with charity and compassion.
In A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Midwifery (1766), 440-441.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquire (44)  |  Anatomy (73)  |  Art (664)  |  Assist (9)  |  Attempt (256)  |  Behave (17)  |  Being (1277)  |  Best (464)  |  Charity (11)  |  Compassion (11)  |  Competent (20)  |  Connection (170)  |  Deliver (29)  |  Embrace (46)  |  Find (1003)  |  First (1290)  |  Himself (461)  |  Instruction (97)  |  Intend (16)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Master (181)  |  Obstetrics (3)  |  Occasion (85)  |  Physic (516)  |  Poor (138)  |  Practise (7)  |  Practising (2)  |  Present (625)  |  Rich (63)  |  Surgery (53)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Will (2352)

Thou, O God, dost sell unto us all good things at the price of labour.
Quotation credited to Leonardo da Vinci that she chose for her bookplate, and which reflects her outlook on her work.
In Philip D. McMaster and Michael Heidelberger, 'Florence Rena Sabin', National Academy of Sciences, Biographical Memoirs (1960), Vol. 34, 272.
Science quotes on:  |  Leonardo da Vinci (87)  |  God (764)  |  Good (894)  |  Outlook (32)  |  Price (56)  |  Quotation (18)  |  Selling (6)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Work (1374)

To create a little flower is the labour of ages.
In 'Proverbs', The Poems: With Specimens of the Prose Writings of William Blake (1885), 281.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (501)  |  Create (243)  |  Flower (109)  |  Little (708)

To describe all the several pairs of the spinal Nerves, and to rehearse all their branchings, and to unfold the uses and actions of them, would be a work of an immense labour and trouble: and as this Neurologie cannot be learned nor understood without an exact knowledge of the Muscles, we may justly here forbear entring upon its particular institution.
In Anatomy of the Brain and Nerves (1664), trans. Samuel Pordage (1681), reprinted in William Peindel (ed.), Thomas Willis: Anatomy of the Brain and Nerves (1965), Vol. 2, 178.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (332)  |  Branch (152)  |  Branching (10)  |  Describe (129)  |  Immense (86)  |  Institution (69)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Learn (652)  |  Learned (235)  |  Muscle (47)  |  Nerve (82)  |  Pair (9)  |  Rehearse (4)  |  Spine (9)  |  Trouble (111)  |  Understood (156)  |  Use (768)  |  Work (1374)

To expect that the intricacies of science will be pierced by a careless glance, or the eminences of fame ascended without labour, is to expect a peculiar privilege, a power denied to the rest of mankind; but to suppose that the maze is inscrutable to diligence, or the heights inaccessible to perseverance, is to submit tamely to the tyranny of fancy, and enchain the mind in voluntary shackles.
'The Need For General Knowledge,' Rambler No. 137 (9 Jul 1751). In Samuel Johnson, Donald Greene (ed.), Samuel Johnson (1984), 223.
Science quotes on:  |  Ascend (30)  |  Diligence (21)  |  Eminence (25)  |  Expect (203)  |  Fame (50)  |  Fancy (50)  |  Glance (35)  |  Inaccessible (18)  |  Mankind (351)  |  Mind (1359)  |  Peculiar (113)  |  Perseverance (23)  |  Power (757)  |  Privilege (41)  |  Rest (285)  |  Suppose (157)  |  Tyranny (14)  |  Will (2352)

Unconscious, perhaps, of the remote tendency of his own labours, he [Joseph Black] undermined that doctrine of material heat, which he seemed to support. For, by his advocacy of latent heat, he taught that its movements constantly battle, not only some of our senses, but all of them; and that, while our feelings make us believe that heat is lost, our intellect makes us believe that it is not lost. Here, we have apparent destructability, and real indestructibility. To assert that a body received heat without its temperature rising, was to make the understanding correct the touch, and defy its dictates. It was a bold and beautiful paradox, which required courage as well as insight to broach, and the reception of which marks an epoch in the human mind, because it was an immense step towards idealizing matter into force.
History of Civilization in England (1861), Vol. 2, 494.
Science quotes on:  |  Apparent (85)  |  Assert (67)  |  Beautiful (266)  |  Joseph Black (14)  |  Body (545)  |  Bold (22)  |  Courage (77)  |  Defy (11)  |  Epoch (45)  |  Feeling (257)  |  Feelings (51)  |  Force (493)  |  Heat (176)  |  Human (1491)  |  Human Mind (132)  |  Immense (86)  |  Insight (103)  |  Intellect (242)  |  Latent Heat (7)  |  Material (358)  |  Matter (810)  |  Mind (1359)  |  Movement (158)  |  Paradox (54)  |  Reception (16)  |  Remote (84)  |  Required (108)  |  Rising (44)  |  Sense (776)  |  Step (231)  |  Support (149)  |  Temperature (79)  |  Tendency (103)  |  Touch (145)  |  Understanding (525)

We may, I think, draw a yet higher and deeper teaching from the phenomena of degeneration. We seem to learn from it the absolute necessity of labour and effort, of struggle and difficulty, of discomfort and pain, as the condition of all progress, whether physical or mental, and that the lower the organism the more need there is of these ever-present stimuli, not only to effect progress, but to avoid retrogression. And if so, does not this afford us the nearest attainable solution of the great problem of the origin of evil? What we call evil is the essential condition of progress in the lower stages of the development of conscious organisms, and will only cease when the mind has become so thoroughly healthy, so well balanced, and so highly organised, that the happiness derived from mental activity, moral harmony, and the social affections, will itself be a sufficient stimulus to higher progress and to the attainment of a more perfect life.
In 'Two Darwinian Essays', Nature (1880), 22, 142.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (149)  |  Activity (215)  |  Affection (43)  |  Attainment (48)  |  Avoid (118)  |  Become (817)  |  Call (772)  |  Cease (80)  |  Condition (360)  |  Degeneration (11)  |  Development (431)  |  Difficulty (200)  |  Draw (139)  |  Effect (400)  |  Effort (233)  |  Essential (203)  |  Evil (117)  |  Great (1579)  |  Happiness (121)  |  Harmony (105)  |  Health (203)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Learn (652)  |  Life (1830)  |  Mental (178)  |  Mind (1359)  |  Moral (198)  |  More (2559)  |  Necessary (365)  |  Necessity (195)  |  Organism (225)  |  Origin (246)  |  Pain (138)  |  Perfect (220)  |  Phenomenon (329)  |  Physical (511)  |  Present (625)  |  Problem (708)  |  Progress (483)  |  Retrogression (6)  |  Social (258)  |  Solution (275)  |  Stage (146)  |  Stimulus (30)  |  Struggle (109)  |  Sufficient (130)  |  Teaching (190)  |  Think (1096)  |  Thoroughly (67)  |  Will (2352)

What signifies Philosophy that does not apply to some Use? May we not learn from hence, that black Clothes are not so fit to wear in a hot Sunny Climate or Season, as white ones; because in such Cloaths the Body is more heated by the Sun when we walk abroad, and are at the same time heated by the Exercise, which double Heat is apt to bring on putrid dangerous Fevers? The Soldiers and Seamen, who must march and labour in the Sun, should in the East or West Indies have an Uniform of white?
Letter to Miss Mary Stevenson, 20 Sep 1761. In Albert Henry Smyth (ed.), The Writings of Benjamin Franklin (1906), Vol. 4, 115.
Science quotes on:  |  Abroad (18)  |  Apply (164)  |  Body (545)  |  Climate (100)  |  Dangerous (107)  |  Exercise (112)  |  Fever (30)  |  Fit (135)  |  Heat (176)  |  Hot (60)  |  Learn (652)  |  March (47)  |  More (2559)  |  Must (1525)  |  Philosophy (394)  |  Radiation (45)  |  Season (47)  |  Soldier (28)  |  Sun (402)  |  Time (1890)  |  Use (768)  |  Walk (131)  |  White (129)

When we no longer look at an organic being as a savage looks at a ship, as something wholly beyond his comprehension; when we regard every production of nature as one which has had a long history; when we contemplate every complex structure and instinct as the summing up of many contrivances, each useful to the possessor, in the same way as any great mechanical invention is the summing up of the labour, the experience, the reason, and even the blunders of numerous workmen; when we thus view each organic being, how far more interesting, I speak from experience, does the study of natural history become!
From the Conclusion of Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, Or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (3rd. ed., 1861), 521.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (817)  |  Being (1277)  |  Beyond (310)  |  Blunder (21)  |  Complex (196)  |  Comprehension (67)  |  Contemplate (20)  |  Contrivance (10)  |  Experience (484)  |  Great (1579)  |  History (694)  |  Instinct (90)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Invention (387)  |  Long (772)  |  Look (581)  |  Mechanical (142)  |  Mechanism (100)  |  More (2559)  |  Natural (796)  |  Natural History (77)  |  Nature (1973)  |  Numerous (68)  |  Organic (159)  |  Organism (225)  |  Production (188)  |  Reason (757)  |  Regard (305)  |  Savage (31)  |  Ship (67)  |  Something (718)  |  Speak (235)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Structure (359)  |  Study (679)  |  Summation (3)  |  Useful (254)  |  Usefulness (89)  |  View (494)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wholly (88)  |  Workman (13)

Whereas there is nothing more necessary for promoting the improvement of Philosophical Matters, than the communicating to such, as apply their Studies and Endeavours that way, such things as are discovered or put in practice by others; it is therefore thought fit to employ the Press, as the most proper way to gratifie those, whose engagement in such Studies, and delight in the advancement of Learning and profitable Discoveries, doth entitle them to the knowledge of what this Kingdom, or other parts of the World, do, from time to time, afford as well of the progress of the Studies, Labours, and attempts of the Curious and learned in things of this kind, as of their compleat Discoveries and performances: To the end, that such Productions being clearly and truly communicated, desires after solid and usefull knowledge may be further entertained, ingenious Endeavours and Undertakings cherished, and those, addicted to and conversant in such matters, may be invited and encouraged to search, try, and find out new things, impart their knowledge to one another, and contribute what they can to the Grand design of improving Natural knowledge, and perfecting all Philosophical Arts, and Sciences. All for the Glory of God, the Honour and Advantage of these Kingdoms, and the Universal Good of Mankind.
'Introduction', Philosophical Transactions (1665), 1, 1-2.
Science quotes on:  |  Advancement (62)  |  Advantage (137)  |  Apply (164)  |  Art (664)  |  Attempt (256)  |  Being (1277)  |  Cherish (24)  |  Communication (100)  |  Curiosity (135)  |  Curious (93)  |  Delight (109)  |  Design (199)  |  Desire (210)  |  Discover (566)  |  Discovery (818)  |  Do (1905)  |  Employ (114)  |  End (598)  |  Endeavour (63)  |  Engagement (9)  |  Entertain (25)  |  Find (1003)  |  Fit (135)  |  God (764)  |  Good (894)  |  Gratification (21)  |  Honour (57)  |  Impart (24)  |  Improvement (114)  |  Ingenious (55)  |  Kind (559)  |  Kingdom (80)  |  Knowledge (1610)  |  Learn (652)  |  Learned (235)  |  Learning (290)  |  Mankind (351)  |  Matter (810)  |  More (2559)  |  Most (1729)  |  Natural (796)  |  Necessary (365)  |  Necessity (195)  |  New (1247)  |  Nothing (987)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perfecting (6)  |  Performance (49)  |  Practice (208)  |  Press (21)  |  Production (188)  |  Profitable (29)  |  Progress (483)  |  Proper (148)  |  Search (165)  |  Solid (118)  |  Study (679)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (967)  |  Time (1890)  |  Truly (117)  |  Try (286)  |  Undertaking (16)  |  Universal (192)  |  Way (1214)  |  World (1822)

Wouldst thou enjoy a long Life, a healthy Body, and a vigorous Mind, and be acquainted also with the wonderful Works of God? labour in the first place to bring thy Appetite into Subjection to Reason.
In Poor Richard's Almanack (1742).
Science quotes on:  |  Acquaintance (37)  |  Appetite (19)  |  Body (545)  |  Diet (56)  |  Enjoyment (37)  |  First (1290)  |  God (764)  |  Health (203)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Life (1830)  |  Long (772)  |  Mind (1359)  |  Reason (757)  |  Subjection (2)  |  Vigour (18)  |  Wonder (247)  |  Wonderful (151)  |  Work (1374)

[Alchemists] finde out men so covetous of so much happiness, whom they easily perswade that they shall finde greater Riches in Hydargyrie [mercury], than Nature affords in Gold. Such, whom although they have twice or thrice already been deluded, yet they have still a new Device wherewith to deceive um again; there being no greater Madness…. So that the smells of Coles, Sulphur, Dung, Poyson, and Piss, are to them a greater pleasure than the taste of Honey; till their Farms, Goods, and Patrimonies being wasted, and converted into Ashes and Smoak, when they expect the rewards of their Labours, births of Gold, Youth, and Immortality, after all their Time and Expences; at length, old, ragged, famisht, with the continual use of Quicksilver [mercury] paralytick, onely rich in misery, … a laughing-stock to the people: … compell’d to live in the lowest degree of poverty, and … at length compell’d thereto by Penury, they fall to Ill Courses, as Counterfeiting of Money.
In The Vanity of the Arts and Sciences (1530), translation (1676), 313.
Science quotes on:  |  Alchemist (23)  |  Already (222)  |  Being (1277)  |  Birth (152)  |  Coal (62)  |  Continual (43)  |  Counterfeit (2)  |  Course (410)  |  Covetous (2)  |  Deceive (26)  |  Degree (276)  |  Delude (3)  |  Deluded (7)  |  Device (70)  |  Dung (10)  |  Expect (203)  |  Fall (235)  |  Farm (27)  |  Gold (99)  |  Good (894)  |  Greater (289)  |  Happiness (121)  |  Honey (15)  |  Live (637)  |  Madness (33)  |  Mercury (53)  |  Misery (31)  |  Money (177)  |  Nature (1973)  |  New (1247)  |  Old (484)  |  Penury (3)  |  People (1012)  |  Persuade (11)  |  Piss (3)  |  Pleasure (188)  |  Poison (44)  |  Poverty (40)  |  Quicksilver (7)  |  Reward (70)  |  Smell (29)  |  Smoke (31)  |  Still (614)  |  Sulphur (19)  |  Taste (91)  |  Time (1890)  |  Use (768)  |  Youth (107)

[Man] … his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his loves and his beliefs are but the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms; that no fire, no heroism, no intensity of thought and feeling can preserve an individual life beyond the grave; that all the labour of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius are destined to extinction in the vast death of the solar system, and that the whole temple of Man's achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the debris of a universe in ruins…
From 'A Free Man's Worship', Independent Review (Dec 1903). Collected in Mysticism and Logic: And Other Essays (1918), 47-48.
Science quotes on:  |  Accidental (27)  |  Achievement (183)  |  Age (501)  |  Atom (377)  |  Belief (596)  |  Beneath (64)  |  Beyond (310)  |  Brightness (12)  |  Death (398)  |  Destined (42)  |  Devotion (36)  |  Extinction (78)  |  Fear (207)  |  Feeling (257)  |  Fire (195)  |  Genius (297)  |  Grave (52)  |  Growth (195)  |  Hope (308)  |  Human (1491)  |  Individual (411)  |  Inspiration (79)  |  Intensity (34)  |  Life (1830)  |  Love (317)  |  Man (2252)  |  Must (1525)  |  Origin (246)  |  Preserve (87)  |  Ruin (43)  |  Solar System (79)  |  System (539)  |  Temple (44)  |  Thought (967)  |  Universe (883)  |  Vast (180)  |  Whole (746)

[Radius]: You will work. You will build ... You will serve them... Robots of the world... The power of man has fallen... A new world has arisen. The rule of the Robots... March!
The word 'robot' was coined in this play for a new working class of automatons (from the Czech word robota meaning compulsory labour)
R.U.R. (1920), 89-90 in 1961 ed.
Science quotes on:  |  Automaton (12)  |  Build (204)  |  Class (167)  |  Man (2252)  |  March (47)  |  Meaning (239)  |  New (1247)  |  Power (757)  |  Robot (13)  |  Rule (299)  |  Will (2352)  |  Word (634)  |  Work (1374)  |  World (1822)

…by shortening the labours doubled the life of the astronomer.
On the benefit of Napier’s logarithms.
Quoted in H. Eves, In Mathematical Circles (1969).
Science quotes on:  |  Astronomer (96)  |  Benefit (118)  |  Life (1830)  |  Logarithm (12)  |  John Napier (4)


Carl Sagan Thumbnail In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion. (1987) -- Carl Sagan
Quotations by:Albert EinsteinIsaac NewtonLord KelvinCharles DarwinSrinivasa RamanujanCarl SaganFlorence NightingaleThomas EdisonAristotleMarie CurieBenjamin FranklinWinston ChurchillGalileo GalileiSigmund FreudRobert BunsenLouis PasteurTheodore RooseveltAbraham LincolnRonald ReaganLeonardo DaVinciMichio KakuKarl PopperJohann GoetheRobert OppenheimerCharles Kettering  ... (more people)

Quotations about:Atomic  BombBiologyChemistryDeforestationEngineeringAnatomyAstronomyBacteriaBiochemistryBotanyConservationDinosaurEnvironmentFractalGeneticsGeologyHistory of ScienceInventionJupiterKnowledgeLoveMathematicsMeasurementMedicineNatural ResourceOrganic ChemistryPhysicsPhysicianQuantum TheoryResearchScience and ArtTeacherTechnologyUniverseVolcanoVirusWind PowerWomen ScientistsX-RaysYouthZoology  ... (more topics)
Sitewide search within all Today In Science History pages:
Visit our Science and Scientist Quotations index for more Science Quotes from archaeologists, biologists, chemists, geologists, inventors and inventions, mathematicians, physicists, pioneers in medicine, science events and technology.

Names index: | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z |

Categories index: | 1 | 2 | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z |
Thank you for sharing.
- 100 -
Sophie Germain
Gertrude Elion
Ernest Rutherford
James Chadwick
Marcel Proust
William Harvey
Johann Goethe
John Keynes
Carl Gauss
Paul Feyerabend
- 90 -
Antoine Lavoisier
Lise Meitner
Charles Babbage
Ibn Khaldun
Euclid
Ralph Emerson
Robert Bunsen
Frederick Banting
Andre Ampere
Winston Churchill
- 80 -
John Locke
Bronislaw Malinowski
Bible
Thomas Huxley
Alessandro Volta
Erwin Schrodinger
Wilhelm Roentgen
Louis Pasteur
Bertrand Russell
Jean Lamarck
- 70 -
Samuel Morse
John Wheeler
Nicolaus Copernicus
Robert Fulton
Pierre Laplace
Humphry Davy
Thomas Edison
Lord Kelvin
Theodore Roosevelt
Carolus Linnaeus
- 60 -
Francis Galton
Linus Pauling
Immanuel Kant
Martin Fischer
Robert Boyle
Karl Popper
Paul Dirac
Avicenna
James Watson
William Shakespeare
- 50 -
Stephen Hawking
Niels Bohr
Nikola Tesla
Rachel Carson
Max Planck
Henry Adams
Richard Dawkins
Werner Heisenberg
Alfred Wegener
John Dalton
- 40 -
Pierre Fermat
Edward Wilson
Johannes Kepler
Gustave Eiffel
Giordano Bruno
JJ Thomson
Thomas Kuhn
Leonardo DaVinci
Archimedes
David Hume
- 30 -
Andreas Vesalius
Rudolf Virchow
Richard Feynman
James Hutton
Alexander Fleming
Emile Durkheim
Benjamin Franklin
Robert Oppenheimer
Robert Hooke
Charles Kettering
- 20 -
Carl Sagan
James Maxwell
Marie Curie
Rene Descartes
Francis Crick
Hippocrates
Michael Faraday
Srinivasa Ramanujan
Francis Bacon
Galileo Galilei
- 10 -
Aristotle
John Watson
Rosalind Franklin
Michio Kaku
Isaac Asimov
Charles Darwin
Sigmund Freud
Albert Einstein
Florence Nightingale
Isaac Newton


by Ian Ellis
who invites your feedback
Thank you for sharing.
Today in Science History
Sign up for Newsletter
with quiz, quotes and more.