Never make heads straight on the shoulders, but turn them aside to the right or to the left, even though they look down, or upward, or straight ahead, because it is necessary for them to look lively and awake and not asleep. And do not depict the front or rear half of the whole person so that too much straightness is displaced, one half above or below the other half; and if you should wish to use stiff figures, do so only in portraying old people.
Leonardo da VinciFeathers shall raise men even as they do birds towards heaven :- That is by letters written with their quills.
Leonardo da VinciPeople reveal themselves completely only when they are thrown out of the customary conditions of their life.
Leonardo da VinciO Time with your teethy years! You swallow up all things little by little in a slow-motion, wrinkling process of dying.
Leonardo da VinciO time, swift robber of all created things, how many kings, how many nations hast thou undone, and how many changes of states and of various events have happened since the wondrous forms of this fish perished here in this cavernous and winding recess. Now destroyed by time thou liest patiently in this confined space with bones stripped and bare; serving as a support and prop for the superimposed mountain.
Leonardo da Vinci