Isidore of Seville Quotes
d. 636 Spain
- Spain
- Astronomers
- Historians
- Mathematicians
- Philosophers
Random Isidore of Seville quote
11 quotes
Letters are signs of things, symbols of words, whose power is so great that without a voice they speak to us the words of the absent; for they introduce words by the eye, not by the ear.
Homo is so named because he is made of humus (earth), as it is told in Genesis: “Et creavit Deus hominem de humo terrae.”
And without music there can be no perfect knowledge, for there is nothing without it. For even the universe itself is said to have been put together with a certain harmony of sounds, and the very heavens revolve under the guidance of harmony.
For brothers who pass from this life, before they are buried, a sacrifice should be offered to the Lord for the remission of their sins.
Through idleness, lusts and harmful thoughts grow, but through the exercise of labor, vices are likewise diminished.
Many creatures go through a natural change and by decay pass into different forms, as bees [are formed] by the decaying flesh of calves, as beetles from horses, locusts from mules, scorpions from crabs.
If [the monks] wish to devote themselves to reading so that they do not work, they are contumacious to reading itself, because they do not do what they read there.
A detected vice is quickly cured, but the hidden vice, the more it is concealed, the more deeply it creeps, for truly he who neglects to make it known does not wish to be cured at all.
Law will be honorable, just, possible, according to nature, according to the custom of the country, adapted to the place and time, necessary, useful, clear also, lest it contain anything in its obscurity that tends to fraud, drawn up for no one’s private advantage, but for the common good of all citizens.
Study as if you were to live forever. Live as if you were to die tomorrow.
[The abbot] will exhibit himself as one to be imitated in all examples of works; nor shall anyone be allowed to command anything that he has not done himself.