Quotes by Michelangelo

The greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling short; but in setting our aim too low, and achieving our mark.

— Michelangelo

Success

The true work of art is but a shadow of the divine perfection.

— Michelangelo

Success

I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

My soul can find no staircase to Heaven unless it be through Earth's loveliness.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

If people knew how hard I worked to get my mastery, it wouldn't seem so wonderful at all.

— Michelangelo

Success

I am still learning.

— Michelangelo

Education

A man paints with his brains and not with his hands.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

Lord, grant that I may always desire more than I can accomplish.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

There is no greater harm than that of time wasted.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

The more the marbles wastes, the more the statue grows.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

Faith in oneself is the best and safest course.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

If in my youth I had realized that the sustaining splendour of beauty of with which I was in love would one day flood back into my heart, there to ignite a flame that would torture me without end, how gladly would I have put out the light in my eyes.

— Michelangelo

Love

Trifles make perfection, and perfection is no trifle.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

The best artist has that thought alone Which is contained within the marble shell; The sculptor's hand can only break the spell To free the figures slumbering in the stone.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

A beautiful thing never gives so much pain as does failing to hear and see it.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

The promises of this world are, for the most part, vain phantoms; and to confide in one's self, and become something of worth and value is the best and safest course.

— Michelangelo

Life

It is necessary to keep one's compass in one's eyes and not in the hand, for the hands execute, but the eye judges.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

Genius is eternal patience.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

Every beauty which is seen here by persons of perception resembles more than anything else that celestial source from which we all are come.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

What spirit is so empty and blind, that it cannot recognize the fact that the foot is more noble than the shoe, and skin more beautiful than the garment with which it is clothed?

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

Death and love are the two wings that bear the good man to heaven.

— Michelangelo

Love

From such a gentle thing, from such a fountain of all delight, my every pain is born.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom

The greatest artist has no conception which a single block of white marble does not potentially contain within its mass, but only a hand obedient to the mind can penetrate to this image.

— Michelangelo

Wisdom