“A poet knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.”

“Study without desire spoils the memory, and it retains nothing that it takes in.”

“He who truly knows has no occasion to shout.”

“Nothing strengthens authority so much as silence.”

“Nothing can be loved or hated unless it is first understood.”

“While human ingenuity may devise various inventions to the same ends, it will never devise anything more beautiful, nor more simple, nor more to the purpose than nature does, because in her inventions nothing is lacking and nothing is superfluous.”

“Every now and then go away, have a little relaxation, for when you come back to your work your judgment will be surer. Go some distance away because then the work appears smaller and more of it can be taken in at a glance and a lack of harmony and proportion is more readily seen.”