139 Quotes by Gottfried Leibniz

And as every state of a simple substance is a natural consequence of its preceding state, so that the present state of it is big with the future.

According to their [Newton and his followers] doctrine, God Almighty wants to wind up his watch from time to time: otherwise it would cease to move. He had not, it seems, sufficient foresight to make it a perpetual motion. Nay, the machine of God's making, so imperfect, according to these gentlemen; that he is obliged to clean it now and then by an extraordinary concourse, and even to mend it, as clockmaker mends his work.

Virtue is the habit of acting according to wisdom.

All things in God are spontaneous.

There is nothing waste, nothing sterile, nothing dead in the universe; no chaos, no confusions, save in appearance.

There is no way in which a simple substance could begin in the course of nature, since it cannot be formed by means of compounding.

The pleasure we obtain from music comes from counting, but counting unconsciously. Music is nothing but unconscious arithmetic.

It is a good thing to proceed in order and to establish propositions. This is the way to gain ground and to progress with certainty.

It's easier to be original and foolish than original and wise.