15th century · Skopia

Showing 18 quotes from the 15th century

He said not "Thou shalt not be tempested, thou shall not be travailed, thou shalt not be diseased"; but he said, "Thou shalt not be overcome."

Julian of Norwich

1413

★ 3.9

Religious literature

They consider the deed but God weighs the motive.

Thomas a Kempis

The Imitation of Christ · 1418

★ 3.9

Religious literature

For man proposes, but God disposes.

Thomas a Kempis

The Imitation of Christ · 1427

★ 3.9

Religious literature

Oh how quickly the glory of the world passes away!

Thomas a Kempis

1427

★ 3.9

Personal journal

At two hours after midnight appeared the land, at a distance of two leagues. They handed all sails and set the treo, which is the mainsail without bonnets, and lay-to waiting for daylight Friday, when they arrived at an island of the Bahamas that was called in the Indians' tongue Guanahaní.

Christopher Columbus

1492

★ 3.8

Letter

And they know neither sect nor idolatry, with the exception that all believe that the source of all power and goodness is in the sky, and they believe very firmly that I, with these ships and people, came from the sky, and in this belief they everywhere received me, after they had overcome their fear.

Christopher Columbus

1493

★ 3.8

Letter

I have always read that the world, both land and water, was spherical, as the authority and researches of Ptolemy and all the others who have written this subject demonstrate and prove, as do the eclipses of the moon and other experiments that are made from east to west, and the elevation of the North Star from north to south.

Christopher Columbus

1498

★ 3.8

Letter

I should be judged as a captain who went from Spain to the Indies to conquer a people numerous and warlike, whose manners and religion are very different from ours, who live in sierras and mountains, without fixed settlements, and where by divine will I have placed under the sovereignty of the King and Queen our Lords, an Other World, whereby Spain, which was reckoned poor, is become the richest of countries.

Christopher Columbus

Letter to Dona Juana de Torres, October of 1500 · 1500

★ 3.8

Poem

I am dying of thirst by the side of the fountain.

Charles d'Orleans

1440

★ 3.7

Religious literature

Of the two evils the lesser is always to be chosen.

Thomas a Kempis

1427

★ 2.2

I could hardly find a book on morals where, even before I had read it in its entirety, I did not find several chapters or certain sections attacking women, no matter who the author was... I finally decided that God formed a vile creature when He made woman, and I wondered how such a worthy artisan could have deigned to make such an abominable work which, from what they say, is the vessel as well as the refuge and abode of ever evil and vice.

Christine de Pizan

1405

★ 2.0

The joy of love is too short, and the sorrow thereof, and what cometh thereof, dureth over long.

Sir Thomas Mallory

Le Morte d'Arthur · 1485

★ 2.0

Who so pulleth out this sword of this stone and anvil, is rightwise king born of all England.

Sir Thomas Mallory

Le Morte d'Arthur · 1485

★ 2.0

The month of May was come, when every lusty heart beginneth to blossom, and to bring forth fruit.

Sir Thomas Mallory

Le Morte d'Arthur · 1485

★ 2.0

Poem

How beautiful is youth, that is always slipping away! Whoever wants to be happy, let him be so: of tomorrow there's no knowing.

Lorenzo de Medici

1490

★ 1.9

Painting contains a divine force which not only makes absent men present, as friendship is said to do, but moreover makes the dead seem almost alive.

Leon Battista Alberti

1435

★ 1.9

Poem

The season has shed its mantle of wind and chill and rain.

Charles d'Orleans

1440

★ 1.2

Religious literature

The thread on which the different good qualities of human beings are strung as pearls, is the fear of God. When the fastenings of this fear are unloosed, the pearls roll in all directions, and are lost one by one.

Orchot Tzaddikim

1499

★ 1.0