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But as for me, Emperor, nature has not given me stature, age has marred my face, and my strength is impaired by ill health. Therefore, since these advantages fail me, I shall win your approval, as I hope, by the help of my knowledge and my writings.

Marcus Vitruvius Pollio

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More quotes by Marcus Vitruvius Pollio

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Noting all these things with the great delight which learning gives, we cannot but be stirred by these discoveries when we reflect upon the influence of them one by one.
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Architecture is a science arising out of many other sciences, and adorned with much and varied learning by the help of which a judgment is formed of those works which are the result of other arts.
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Nothing suffers annihilation, but at dissolution there is a change, and things fall back to the essential element in which they were before.
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If then, at this great distance, our human vision can discern that sight, why, pray, are we to think that the divine splendor of the stars can be cast into darkness?
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At Jaffa in Syria and among the Nomads in Arabia, are lakes of enormous size that yield very large masses of asphalt, which are carried off by the inhabitants thereabouts.
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An architect ought to be an educated man so as to leave a more lasting remembrance in his treatises.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
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The architect must not only understand drawing, but music.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
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The stone in quarries is found to be of different and unlike qualities. In some it is soft, in others it is medium, in still others it is hard as in lava quarries. There are also numerous other kinds: for instance, in Campania, red and black tufas in Umbria, Picenum, and Venetia, white tufa which can be cut with a toothed saw like wood.
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When it passes towards the east, the sun begins to have less effect upon it, and a thin line on the edge of its bright side emits its splendour towards the earth.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
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If our designs for private houses are to be correct, we must at the outset take note of the countries and climates in which they are built.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
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From prescription, in the case of hypaethral edifices, open to the sky, in honor of Jupiter Lightning, the Heaven, the Sun, or the Moon: for these are gods whose semblances and manifestations we behold before our very eyes in the sky when it is cloudless and bright.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
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Philosophy treats of physics where a more careful knowledge is required because the problems which come under this head are numerous... So the reader of Ctesibius or Archimedes and the other writers of treatises of the same class will not be able to appreciate them unless he has been trained in these subjects by the philosophers.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
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For we must not build temples according to the same rules to all gods alike, since the performance of the sacred rites varies with the various gods.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
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Now architecture consists of order, which in Greek is called taxis ... Order is the balanced adjustment of the details of the work separately, and, as to the whole, the arrangement of the proportion with a view to a symmetrical result.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
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Some springs are acid, as at Lyncestus and in Italy in the Velian country, at Teano in Campania, and in many other places. These when used in drinks have the power of breaking up stones in the bladder, which form in the human body.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
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When the juices of trees have no means of escape, they clot and rot in them, making the trees hollow and good for nothing.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
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Basilicas should be constructed on a site adjoining the forum and in the warmest possible quarter, so that in winter business men may gather in them without being troubled by the weather.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
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Beauty is produced by the pleasing appearance and good taste of the whole, and by the dimensions of all the parts being duly proportioned to each other.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
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There are two styles of walls opus reticulatum, now used by everybody and the ancient style called opus incertum. Of these, the reticulatum looks better, but its construction makes it likely to crack. On the other hand, in the opus incertum, the rubble lying in courses and imbricated, makes a wall which though not beautiful, is stronger.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
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With the ripening of the fruits in Autumn the leaves begin to wither and the trees, taking up their sap from the earth through the roots, recover themselves and are restored to their former solid texture. But the strong air of winter compresses and solidifies them.
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio