“I’ve spent more time than many will believe [making microscopic observations], but I’ve done them with joy, and I’ve taken no notice those who have said why take so much trouble and what good is it?”

In it, that sometimes more than a thousand were moving about in an amount of material the size of a grain of sand…

Whenever I found something remarkable, I have thought it my duty to put down my discovery on paper, so that all ingenious people be informed thereof.

Man has always to be busy with his thoughts if anything is to be accomplished.

In the year 1657 I discovered very small living creatures in rain water.

And I judge that some of these little creatures were above a thousand times smaller than the smallest ones I have ever yet seen, upon the rind of cheese, in wheaten flour, mould, and the like.

I’ve spent more time than many will believe [making microscopic observations], but I’ve done them with joy, and I’ve taken no notice those who have said why take so much trouble and what good is it?

The 31th of May, I perceived in the same water more of those Animals, as also some that were somewhat bigger.

And therewithal, whenever I found out anything remarkable, I have thought it my duty to put down my discovery on paper, so that all ingenious people might be informed thereof.

This particle I concluded to be the heart.

For, the circumference of one of these little Animals in water, is not so big as the thickness of a hair in a Cheese-mite.

And I imagine, that [ten hundred thousand] of these little Creatures do not equal an ordinary grain of Sand in bigness: And comparing them with a Cheese-mite (which may be seen to move with the naked eye)

Ten hundred thousand of them could not equal the dimensions of a grain of such course Sand.

I observed certain animalcules, within whole bodies I saw so quick a motion as to exceed belief; they were about the size of a large grain of sand, and their bodies being transparent, that the internal motion could plainly be seen.

I have divers times endeavoured to see and to know, what parts the Blood consists of; and at length I have observ’d, taking some Blood out of my own hand, that it consists of small round globuls driven through a Crystalline humidity or water.

The whole circumference of each of these streaks was about the thickness of a hair of one’s head. … all consisted of very small green globules joined together: and there were very many small green globules as well. [The earliest recorded observation of the common green alga Spyrogyra.]

I saw this vast number of animalcules not all through the semen, but only in the liquid matter adhering to the thicker part.

It’s not enough merely to believe there is a God. You must believe in the God who is there.

It appears, accordingly, from the experience of all ages and nations, I believe, that the work done by freemen comes cheaper in the end than that performed by slaves.

I believe in the dignity of labor, whether with head or hand; that the world owes no man a living but that it owes every man an opportunity to make a living.

I wish to believe in immortality-I wish to live with you forever.

While I am a capitalist at heart and I have no problems with commercialization as such, I believe that while it’s okay if education becomes a profitable business, it’s not okay if it becomes corrupt.

We believe in freedom, freedom for the people of each country to follow their destiny without external interference.

You will become on the outside, what you believe on the inside.

I think many people believe the best way they can help others is to criticize them, to give them the benefit of their ‘wisdom.’ I disagree. The best way to help people is to see the best in them.