The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci (87 page)

Very often a thing that is itself broken is the occasion of much
union. (That is the Comb made of split Cane which unites the threads
of Silk.)

The wind passing through the skins of animals will make men dance.
(That is the Bag-pipe, which makes people dance.)

1303.

(Of Walnut trees, that are beaten.)

Those which have done best will be most beaten, and their offspring
taken and flayed or peeled, and their bones broken or crushed.

(Of Sculpture.)

Alas! what do I see? The Saviour cru- cified anew.

(Of the Mouth of Man, which is a Sepulchre.)

Great noise will issue from the sepulchres of those who died evil
and violent deaths.

(Of the Skins of Animals which have the sense of feeling what is in
the things written.)

The more you converse with skins covered with sentiments, the more
wisdom will you acquire.

(Of Priests who bear the Host in their body.)

Then almost all the tabernacles in which dwells the Corpus Domini,
will be plainly seen walking about of themselves on the various
roads of the world.

1304.

And those who feed on grass will turn night into day (Tallow.)

And many creatures of land and water will go up among the stars
(that is Planets.)

The dead will be seen carrying the living (in Carts and Ships in
various places.)

Food shall be taken out of the mouth of many ( the oven's mouth.)

And those which will have their food in their mouth will be deprived
of it by the hands of others (the oven.)

1305.

(Of Crucifixes which are sold.)

I see Christ sold and crucified afresh, and his Saints suffering
Martyrdom.

(Of Physicians, who live by sickness.)

Men will come into so wretched a plight that they will be glad that
others will derive profit from their sufferings or from the loss of
their real wealth, that is health.

(Of the Religion of Friars, who live by the Saints who have been
dead a great while.)

Those who are dead will, after a thou- sand years be those who will
give a livelihood to many who are living.

(Of Stones converted into Lime, with which prison walls are made.)

Many things that have been before that time destroyed by fire will
deprive many men of liberty.

1306.

(Of Children who are suckled.)

Many Franciscans, Dominicans and Benedictines will eat that which at
other times was eaten by others, who for some months to come will
not be able to speak.

(Of Cockles and Sea Snails which are thrown up by the sea and which
rot inside their shells.)

How many will there be who, after they are dead, will putrefy inside
their own houses, filling all the surrounding air with a fetid
smell.

1307.

(Of Mules which have on them rich burdens of silver and gold.)

Much treasure and great riches will be laid upon four-footed beasts,
which will convey them to divers places.

1308.

(Of the Shadow cast by a man at night with a light.)

Huge figures will appear in human shape, and the nearer you get to
them, the more will their immense size diminish.

[Footnote page 1307: It seems to me probable that this note, which
occurs in the note book used in 1502, when Leonardo, in the service
of Cesare Borgia, visited Urbino, was suggested by the famous
pillage of the riches of the palace of Guidobaldo, whose treasures
Cesare Borgia at once had carried to Cesena (see GREGOROVIUS,
Geschichte der Stadt Rom im Mittelalter
. XIII, 5, 4). ]

1309.

(Of Snakes, carried by Storks.)

Serpents of great length will be seen at a great height in the air,
fighting with birds.

(Of great guns, which come out of a pit and a mould.)

Creatures will come from underground which with their terrific noise
will stun all who are near; and with their breath will kill men and
destroy cities and castles.

1310.

(Of Grain and other Seeds.)

Men will fling out of their houses those victuals which were
intended to sustain their life.

(Of Trees, which nourish grafted shoots.)

Fathers and mothers will be seen to take much more delight in their
step-children then in their own children.

(Of the Censer.)

Some will go about in white garments with arrogant gestures
threatening others with metal and fire which will do no harm at all
to them.

1311.

(Of drying Fodder.)

Innumerable lives will be destroyed and innumerable vacant spaces
will be made on the earth.

(Of the Life of Men, who every year change their bodily substance.)

Men, when dead, will pass through their own bowels.

1312.

(Shoemakers.)

Men will take pleasure in seeing their own work destroyed and
injured.

1313.

(Of Kids.)

The time of Herod will come again, for the little innocent children
will be taken from their nurses, and will die of terrible wounds
inflicted by cruel men.

Schemes for fables, etc. (1314-1323).

1314.

The crab standing under the rock to catch the fish which crept under
it, it came to pass that the rock fell with a ruinous downfall of
stones, and by their fall the crab was crushed.

The spider, being among the grapes, caught the flies which were
feeding on those grapes. Then came the vintage, and the spider was
cut down with the grapes.

The vine that has grown old on an old tree falls with the ruin of
that tree, and through that bad companionship must perish with it.

The torrent carried so much earth and stones into its bed, that it
was then constrained to change its course.

The net that was wont to take the fish was seized and carried away
by the rush of fish.

The ball of snow when, as it rolls, it descends from the snowy
mountains, increases in size as it falls.

The willow, which by its long shoots hopes as it grows, to outstrip
every other plant, from having associated itself with the vine which
is pruned every year was always crippled.

1315.

Fable of the tongue bitten by the teeth.

The cedar puffed up with pride of its beauty, separated itself from
the trees around it and in so doing it turned away towards the wind,
which not being broken in its fury, flung it uprooted on the earth.

The traveller's joy, not content in its hedge, began to fling its
branches out over the high road, and cling to the opposite hedge,
and for this it was broken away by the passers by.

1316.

The goldfinch gives victuals to its caged young. Death rather than
loss of liberty. [Footnote: Above this text is another note, also
referring to liberty; see No. 694.]

1317.

(Of Bags.)

Goats will convey the wine to the city.

1318.

All those things which in winter are hidden under the snow, will be
uncovered and laid bare in summer. (for Falsehood, which cannot
remain hidden).

1319.

The lily set itself down by the shores of the Ticino, and the
current carried away bank and the lily with it.

1320.

Why Hungarian ducats have a double cross on them.

1321.

A vase of unbaked clay, when broken, may be remoulded, but not a
baked one.

1322.

Seeing the paper all stained with the deep blackness of ink, it he
deeply regrets it; and this proves to the paper that the words,
composed upon it were the cause of its being preserved.

1323.

The pen must necessarily have the penknife for a companion, and it
is a useful companionship, for one is not good for much without the
other.

Schemes for prophecies (1324-1329).

1324.

The knife, which is an artificial weapon, deprives man of his nails,
his natural weapons.

The mirror conducts itself haughtily holding mirrored in itself the
Queen. When she departs the mirror remains there …

1325.

Flax is dedicated to death, and to the corruption of mortals. To
death, by being used for snares and nets for birds, animals and
fish; to corruption, by the flaxen sheets in which the dead are
wrapped when they are buried, and who become corrupt in these
winding sheets.— And again, this flax does not separate its fibre
till it has begun to steep and putrefy, and this is the flower with
which garlands and decorations for funerals should be made.

1326.

(Of Peasants who work in shirts)

Shadows will come from the East which will blacken with great colour
darkness the sky that covers Italy.

(Of the Barbers.)

All men will take refuge in Africa.

1327.

The cloth which is held in the hand in the current of a running
stream, in the waters of which the cloth leaves all its foulness and
dirt, is meant to signify this &c.

By the thorn with inoculated good fruit is signified those natures
which of themselves were not disposed towards virtue, but by the aid
of their preceptors they have the repudation of it.

1328.

A wretched person will be flattered, and these flatterers are always
the deceivers, robbers and murderers of the wretched person.

The image of the sun where it falls appears as a thing which covers
the person who attempts to cover it.

(Money and Gold.)

Out of cavernous pits a thing shall come forth which will make all
the nations of the world toil and sweat with the greatest torments,
anxiety and labour, that they may gain its aid.

(Of the Dread of Poverty.)

The malicious and terrible [monster] will cause so much terror of
itself in men that they will rush together, with a rapid motion,
like madmen, thinking they are escaping her boundless force.

(Of Advice.)

The man who may be most necessary to him who needs him, will be
repaid with ingratitude, that is greatly contemned.

1329.

(Of Bees.)

They live together in communities, they are destroyed that we may
take the honey from them. Many and very great nations will be
destroyed in their own dwellings.

1330.

This animal has a horror of the poor, because they eat poor food,
and it loves the rich, because they have good living and especially
meat. And the excrement of animals always retains some virtue of its
origin as is shown by the faeces …

Now dogs have so keen a smell, that they can discern by their nose
the virtue remaining in these faeces, and if they find them in the
streets, smell them and if they smell in them the virtue of meat or
of other things, they take them, and if not, they leave them: And to
return to the question, I say that if by means of this smell they
know that dog to be well fed, they respect him, because they judge
that he has a powerful and rich master; and if they discover no such
smell with the virtue of meet, they judge that dog to be of small
account and to have a poor and humble master, and therefore they
bite that dog as they would his master.

1331.

The circular plans of carrying earth are very useful, inasmuch as
men never stop in their work; and it is done in many ways. By one of
these ways men carry the earth on their shoulders, by another in
chests and others on wheelbarrows. The man who carries it on his
shoulders first fills the tub on the ground, and he loses time in
hoisting it on to his shoulders. He with the chests loses no time.
[Footnote: The subject of this text has apparently no connection
with the other texts of this section.]

Irony (1332).

1332.

If Petrarch was so fond of bay, it was because it is of a good taste
in sausages and with tunny; I cannot put any value on their foolery.
[Footnote: Conte Porro has published these lines in the
Archivio
Stor. Lombarda
VIII, IV; he reads the concluding line thus:
I no
posso di loro gia (sic) co' far tesauro.
—This is known to be by a
contemporary poet, as Senatore Morelli informs me.]

Tricks (1333-1335).

1333.

We are two brothers, each of us has a brother. Here the way of
saying it makes it appear that the two brothers have become four.

1334.

Take in each hand an equal number; put 4 from the right hand into
the left; cast away the remainder; cast away an equal number from
the left hand; add 5, and now you will find 13 in this [left] hand;
that is-I made you put 4 from the right hand into the left, and cast
away the remainder; now your right hand has 4 more; then I make you
throw away as many from the right as you threw away from the left;
so, throwing from each hand a quantity of which the remainder may be
equal, you now have 4 and 4, which make 8, and that the trick may
not be detec- ted I made you put 5 more, which made 13.

Take any number less than 12 that you please; then take of mine
enough to make up the number 12, and that which remains to me is the
number which you at first had; because when I said, take any number
less than 12 as you please, I took 12 into my hand, and of that 12
you took such a number as made up your number of 12; and what you
added to your number, you took from mine; that is, if you had 8 to
go as far as to 12, you took of my 12, 4; hence this 4 transferred
from me to you reduced my 12 to a remainder of 8, and your 8 became
12; so that my 8 is equal to your 8, before it was made 12.

[Footnote 1334: G. Govi
says in the
'Saggio' p. 22:
Si dilett
Leonarda, di giuochi di prestigi e molti (?) ne descrisse, che si
leggono poi riportati dal Paciolo nel suo libro:
de Viribus
Quantitatis,
e che, se non tutti, sono certo in gran parte
invenzioni del Vinci.
]