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One of the things that always fascinated me about the Renaissance was that it was a time both of great scientific discovery and also of superstition and belief in magic. And so it was a period in which Galileo invented the telescope, but also a time when hundreds were burned at the stake because people thought they were witches.

The Renaissance of the fifteenth century was, in many things, great rather by what it designed then by what it achieved.

Scotland almost invented the modern world. I mean, all of these televisions, telephones, penicillin, we all - all of these things were invented in Scotland.

People never know what's going on while it's happening. You think, during the Renaissance, people called it 'The Renaissance'?

Civilization advances by extending the number of important operations which we can perform without thinking of them.

We owe to the Middle Ages the two worst inventions of humanity - romantic love and gunpowder.

I would certainly never consider myself a Renaissance Man; I'm not fit to look at the dust from the chariot wheels of many of those who have gone before me.

Roman civilization had achieved, within the bounds of its technology, relatively as great a mastery of time and space as we have achieved today.

Just think how much poorer we would be today if the world would have had half as many people in the 19th century as it actually did. You can get rid of Thomas Edison or Louis Pasteur; take your pick.

It is better to imitate ancient than modern work.