Quotes from Humphry Davy

The art galleries of Paris contain the finest collection of frames I ever saw.

There are very few persons who pursue science with true dignity.

By science calmed, over the peaceful soul, Bright with eternal Wisdom's lucid ray, Peace, meek of eye, extends her soft control, And drives the puny Passions far away.

We must reason in natural philosophy not from what we hope, or even expect, but from what we perceive.

Life is made up, not of great sacrifices or duties, but of little things, in which smiles and kindness, and small obligations given habitually, are what preserve the heart and secure comfort.

Nothing tends so much to the advancement of knowledge as the application of a new instrument.

I have learned more from my mistakes than from my successes.

Consistency in opinion is the slow poison of intellectual life, the destroyer of its vividness and energy.

The ideal life is that which has few friends, but many acquaintances.

When two elements combine and form more than one compound, the masses of one element that react with a fixed mass of the other are in the ratio of small whole numbers.

Experimental science hardly ever affords us more than approximations to the truth; and whenever many agents are concerned we are in great danger of being mistaken.

In the present state of our knowledge, it would be useless to attempt to speculate on the remote cause of the electrical energy... its relation to chemical affinity is, however, sufficiently evident. May it not be identical with it, and an essential property of matter?

Language is not only the vehicle of thought, it is a great and efficient instrument in thinking.

The most important of my discoveries have been suggested to me by my failures.

Life is made up, not of great sacrifices or duties, but of little things, in which smiles and kindness, and small obligations given habitually, are what preserve the heart and secure comfort.

In the present state of our knowledge, it would be useless to attempt to speculate on the remote cause of the electrical energy... its relation to chemical affinity is, however, sufficiently evident. May it not be identical with it, and an essential property of matter?

The most important of my discoveries have been suggested to me by failures.