Of what use would it be to you, sir, to become King of China on condition that you forgot what you have been? Would it not be the same as if God, at the same time he destroyed you, created a King in China?
Gottfried LeibnizNow where there are no parts, there neither extension, nor shape, nor divisibility is possible. And these monads are the true atoms of nature and, in a word, the elements of things.
Gottfried LeibnizIt is unworthy of excellent men to lose hours like slaves in the labor of calculation which could be relegated to anyone else if machines were used.
Gottfried LeibnizThe greatness of a life can only be estimated by the multitude of its actions. We should not count the years, it is our actions which constitute our life.
Gottfried LeibnizThe words 'Here you can find perfect peace' can be written only over the gates of a cemetery.
Gottfried LeibnizAccording to their [Newton and his followers] doctrine, God Almighty wants to wind up his watch from time to time: otherwise it would cease to move. He had not, it seems, sufficient foresight to make it a perpetual motion. Nay, the machine of God's making, so imperfect, according to these gentlemen; that he is obliged to clean it now and then by an extraordinary concourse, and even to mend it, as clockmaker mends his work.
Gottfried Leibniz