Leonardo da Vinci was an Italian polymath whose areas of interest included invention, painting, sculpting, architecture, music, mathematics, engineering, anatomy, geology, astronomy, botany, history, and cartography. He has been variously called the father of both palaeontology and architecture, and is widely considered one of the greatest painters of all time. Credited with inventing of the parachute and the helicopter – as well as conceptualizing solar power, the calculator, and the airplane, Leonardo epitomized the Renaissance humanist ideal.  Many historians and scholars regard Leonardo as the prime exemplar of the “Universal Genius” — an individual of unquenchable curiosity and feverishly inventive imagination.  According to art historian Helen Gardner, the scope and depth of his interests were without precedent in recorded history.  He also happened to be a man of advanced compassion, as evidenced by his ethical vegetarianism (what many today would call veganism), and his penchant for buying caged birds in order to release them.

 

“It has long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sit back and let things happen to them. They go out and happen to things … My body will not be a tomb for other creatures.  I have from an early age abjured the use of meat, and the time will come when men such as I will look upon the murder of animals as they now look upon the murder of men … Nothing strengthens the authority of the status quo as much as silence … Being willing is not enough; we must do.” ~ via Leonardo da Vinci

Filed under: In LOVE with Humanity by Scaughdt