Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon
A prominent naturalist who authored the monumental 'Histoire Naturelle', a 36-volume encyclopedia that influenced generations of naturalists.
Most quoted
"The first truth that results from this examination is that the Earth is a planet, a star, which has its own movement, which turns around the Sun, and which, consequently, is subject to the same laws as all the other planets."
— from Histoire Naturelle, générale et particulière, 1749
"Man is the only animal that can laugh and weep; for he is the only animal that is struck with the difference between what things are, and what they ought to be."
— from Attributed
"Man is the only animal that laughs and weeps; for he is the only animal that is struck with the difference between what things are and what they ought to be."
— from Histoire Naturelle, générale et particulière, 1749
All quotes by Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (406)
The history of the earth is perhaps more obscure than that of the heavens.
Man is a reasoning animal.
The power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man.
Nature is a factory of infinite productivity.
The most sublime effects of poetry and music have been produced by the simplest means.
The insect world is Nature's most extraordinary phenomenon.
Everything that can be, is.
The bird is a machine worked out by the laws of equilibrium.
The whale is the largest and most tremendous of all the inhabitants of the globe.
The camel is the ship of the desert.
The beaver is an amphibious quadruped, whose industry is as remarkable as its form.
The errors of great men are more fruitful than the truths of little ones.
The present is pregnant with the future.
To err is human, but to persist in error is diabolical.
The love of study is the most necessary passion for the happiness of mankind.
The number of species is perhaps not as great as we imagine.
The surface of the earth has undergone great revolutions.
The interior of the earth is a great chemical laboratory.
The magnet is a body whose properties are as obscure as they are admirable.
The atmosphere is an ocean of air in which we are submerged.
Contemporaries of Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon
Other Biologys born within 50 years of Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (1707–1788).