“A single and distinct luminous body causes stronger relief in the object than a diffused light; as may be seen by comparing one side of a landscape illuminated by the sun, and one overshadowed by clouds, and so illuminated only by the diffused light of the atmosphere.”

— Leonardo Da Vinci

The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), III Six books on Light and Shade

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Leonardo Da Vinci 363

Italian Renaissance polymath 1452–1519

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“A luminous body when obscured by a dense atmosphere will appear smaller; as may be seen by the moon or sun veiled by fogs.”

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath

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“Every body in light and shade fills the surrounding air with infinite images of itself; and these, by infinite pyramids diffused in the air, represent this body throughout space and on every side.”

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath

The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), II Linear Perspective

“Whoever consults the light within himself (it is within everyone) excels at judging the object this light illumines.”

Joseph Joubert (1754–1824) French moralist and essayist

“A glimmer of light is better than no illumination at all.”

John James Cowperthwaite (1915–2006) British colonial administrator

February 26, 1964, page 52.
Official Report of Proceedings of the Hong Kong Legislative Council

“Love, infusing with light all who share Your splendor,
You teach us the true light
Is not to be found in the light of this world.
Light that enlightens, light that teaches,
He who is not illumined by You
Does not reach the fullness of love.
Love, You give light
To the intellect in darkness
And illumine the Object of love. Love, Your ardor,
Which enflames the heart,
Unites it with the Incarnate One.”

Jacopone da Todi (1236–1306) Italian Franciscan mystic

The Lauds

“No dignity is higher in the eyes of God than royalty… Royalty is a light emanating from God, and a ray from the sun, the illuminator of the universe.”

Abu'l-Fazl ibn Mubarak (1551–1602) vizier

Ain-i-Akbari by Abul Fazl. trans. by H. Blochmann, quoted from Lal, K. S. (1992). The legacy of Muslim rule in India. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan.

“All objects project their whole image and likeness, diffused and mingled in the whole of the atmosphere, opposite to themselves.”

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath

The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci (1883), II Linear Perspective
Context: All objects project their whole image and likeness, diffused and mingled in the whole of the atmosphere, opposite to themselves. The image of every point of the bodily surface, exists in every part of the atmosphere. All the images of the objects are in every part of the atmosphere.

“Gazing into the golden rage of the sun shreds vision into scraps of light and darkness. A white sun is congealed from patches of light, floating ephemerally at the edge of blindness. This is the illuminating sun, giving what we can keep, the sun whose outpourings are acquired by the body as nutrition, and by the eye as (assimilable) sensation. (…) Mixed with this nourishing radiance, as its very heart, is the other sun, the deeper one, dark and contagious, provoking a howl from Bataille: ‘the sun is black’. From this second sun—the sun of malediction—we receive not illumination but disease, for whatever it squanders on us we are fated to squander in turn.”

Nick Land (1962) British philosopher

Source: The Thirst for Annihilation: Georges Bataille and Virulent Nihilism (1992), Chapter 2: "The curse of the sun", p. 20

“The Phoenicians who from their sagacity and learning possess great insight into things divine, hold the doctrine that this universally diffused radiance is a part of the "Soul of the Stars." This opinion is consistent with sound reason: if we consider the light that is without body, we shall perceive that of such light the source cannot be a body, but rather the simple action of a mind, which spreads itself by means of illumination as far as its proper seat; to which the middle region of the heavens is contiguous, from which place it shines forth with all its vigour and fills the heavenly orbs, illuminating at the same time the whole universe with its divine and pure radiance.”

Julian (emperor) (331–363) Roman Emperor, philosopher and writer

Upon the Sovereign Sun (362)

“It has shown me that everything is illuminated in the light of the past. It is always along the side of us… on the inside, looking out.”

Jonathan Safran Foer (1977) Novelist

“A single and distinct luminous body causes stronger relief in the object than a diffused light; as may be seen by comparing one side of a landscape illuminated by the sun, and one overshadowed by clouds, and so illuminated only by the diffused light of the atmosphere.”

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Leonardo Da Vinci 363

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