Philosophical Sayings

Life has more imagination than we carry in our dreams.

No one should fear to undertake any task in the name of our Saviour, if it is just and if the intention is purely for His holy service.

It is easy to discover what another has discovered before.

The sea will grant each man new hope, and sleep will bring dreams of home.

I am the saddest man in the world, because I do not recognize them.

I recognized that they were people who would be better freed [from error] and converted to our Holy Faith by love than by force.

I am a most noteworthy sinner, but I have cried out to the Lord for grace and mercy, and they have covered me completely. I have found the sweetest consolation since I made it my whole purpose to enjoy His marvellous Presence.

It was the Lord who put into my mind (I could feel His hand upon me) the fact that it would be possible to sail from here to the Indies. All who heard of my project rejected it with laughter, ridiculing me. There is no question that the inspiration w…

Nothing that results in human progress is achieved with unanimous consent. Those that are enlightened before the others are condemned to pursue that light in spite of the others.

I prayed to the most merciful Lord about my heart's great desire, and He gave me the spirit and the intelligence for the task: seafaring, astronomy, geometry, arithmetic, skill in drafting spherical maps and placing correctly the cities, rivers, moun…

Go forth to meet the shadowy future without fear and with a manly heart.

Unlike the mediocre, intrepid spirits seek victory over those things that seem impossible... It is with an iron will that they embark on the most daring of all endeavors... to meet the shadowy future without fear and conquer the unknown.

The Church says that the Earth is flat, but I know that it is round. For I have seen the shadow of the earth on the moon and I have more faith in the Shadow than in the Church.

There is no room for cowards on this enterprise.

Better to die than to turn back.

Music is the hidden arithmetical exercise of a mind unconscious that it is calculating.

Why is there anything at all rather than nothing whatsoever?

Nihil est sine ratione. There is nothing without a reason.

To love is to be delighted by the happiness of someone, or to experience pleasure upon the happiness of another. I define this as true love.

Every mind has a horizon in respect to its present intellectual capacity but not in respect to its future intellectual capacity.