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Our reasonings are grounded upon two great principles, that of contradiction, in virtue of which we judge false that which involves a contradiction, and true that which is opposed or contradictory to the false.

Gottfried Leibniz

Now where there are no parts, there neither extension, nor shape, nor divisibility is possible. And these monads are the true atoms of nature and, in a word, the elements of things.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Divisible Element Extension Nature Part Shape
Imaginary numbers are a fine and wonderful refuge of the divine spirit almost an amphibian between being and non-being.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Divine Fine Imagination Spirit Wonderful
I hold that it is only when we can prove everything we assert that we understand perfectly the thing under consideration.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Evidence Hold Perfection Understand
The larger the mass of collected things, the less will be their usefulness. Therefore, one should not only strive to assemble new goods from everywhere, but one must endeavor to put in the right order those that one already possesses.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Assemble Collection Goodness Mass Order Possession Right
There is a certain destiny of everything, regulated by the foreknowledge and providence of God in His works.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Certain Destiny God Himself Work
The Divine Spirit found a sublime outlet in that wonder of analysis, that portent of the ideal world, that amphibian between being and not-being, which we call the imaginary root of negative unity.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Divine Finding Imagination Negative Spirit Unity
The words ‘Here you can find perfect peace’ can be written only over the gates of a cemetery.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Gate Peace Perfection Writing
Whence it follows that God is absolutely perfect, since perfection is nothing but magnitude of positive reality, in the strict sense, setting aside the limits or bounds in things which are limited.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Follow God Limitation Perfection Positive Reality
One cannot explain words without making incursions into the sciences themselves, as is evident from dictionaries; and, conversely, one cannot present a science without at the same time defining its terms.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Dictionary Explanation Present Science
When God works miracles, he does not do it in order to supply the wants of nature, but those of grace. Whoever thinks otherwise, must needs have a very mean notion of the wisdom and power of God.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

God Miracle Nature Power Wisdom Work
Each portion of matter may be conceived of as a garden full of plants, and as a pond full of fishes. But each branch of the plant, each member of the animal, each drop of its humors, is also such a garden or such a pond.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Animal Garden Humor Plants Portion
It is God who is the ultimate reason things, and the Knowledge of God is no less the beginning of science than his essence and will are the beginning of things.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Beginning God Himself Knowledge Reason Science
Music is a secret and unconscious mathematical problem of the soul.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Music Secret Soul Unconscious Yourself
There never is absolute birth nor complete death, in the strict sense, consisting in the separation of the soul from the body. What we call births are developments and growths, while what we call deaths are envelopments and diminutions.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Absolute Birth Call Death Development Strict
He who understands Archimedes and Apollonius will admire less the achievements of the foremost men of later times.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Knowledge Man Time Understand Wisdom
Natural religion itself, seems to decay very much. Many will have human souls to be material: others make God himself a corporeal being.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

God Human Natural Religion Soul
But in simple substances the influence of one monad over another is ideal only.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Ideal Influence Simplicity
Although the whole of this life were said to be nothing but a dream and the physical world nothing but a phantasm, I should call this dream or phantasm real enough, if, using reason well, we were never deceived by it.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Dreams Enough Life Myself Physical Reason
Take what you need, do what you should, you will get what you want.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Inspirational Necessary Need Yourself
I am convinced that the unwritten knowledge scattered among men of different callings surpasses in quantity and in importance anything we find in books, and that the greater part of our wealth has yet to be recorded.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Convince Knowledge Quantity Record Wealth Writing
To love is to place happiness in the heart of another.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Happiness Heart Love Place
The present is saturated with the past and pregnant with the future.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Future Past Pregnant Present
If you have a clear idea of a soul, you will have a clear idea of a form; for it is of the same genus, though a different species.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Clear Different Form Ideas Soul Species Yourself
There is nothing waste, nothing sterile, nothing dead in the universe; no chaos, no confusions, save in appearance.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Appearance Chaos Confusion Death Save Universe Wasted
God makes nothing without order, and everything that forms itself develops imperceptibly out of small parts.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Development Form God Order Small
There is nothing without a reason.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Philosophy Reason
Music is a hidden arithmetic exercise of the soul, which does not know that it is counting.
GOTTFRIED LEIBNIZ

Count Exercise Hide Music

Our reasonings are grounded upon two great principles, that of contradiction, in virtue of which we judge false that which involves a contradiction, and true that which is opposed or contradictory to the false.

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Our reasonings are grounded upon two great principles, that of contradiction, in virtue of which we judge false that which involves a contradiction, and true that which is opposed or contradictory to the false.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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