Juan Luis Vives Quotes
Juan Luis Vives was a Spanish Renaissance humanist, philosopher, and educational reformer of Jewish converso descent. After studies in Valencia and Paris and a long residence in Bruges, he became one of the central figures of the northern humanist circle around Erasmus and Thomas More, and for a time tutor and adviser at the English court. The quotes below are attributed to Juan Luis Vives, organized by topic.
Browse Juan Luis Vives by topic
Juan Luis Vives on Justice
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Attributed to Juan Luis Vives:
“The relief of the poor is the duty of the whole city, not of charity alone.”
Juan Luis Vives on Knowledge
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Attributed to Juan Luis Vives:
“Without the help of letters, people are dwarfs.”
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Attributed to Juan Luis Vives:
“Knowledge is the food of the soul.”
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“Quos omnes libros conscripserunt homines otiosi, male feriati, imperiti, vitiis ac spurcitiae dediti, in queis miror quid delectet nisi tam nobis flagitia blandirentur. Eruditio non est exspectanda ab hominibus qui ne umbram quidem eruditionis viderant. Iam cum narrant, quae potest esse delectatio in rebus quas tam aperte et stulte confingunt?”
All these books were written by idle, unoccupied, ignorant men, the slaves of vice and filth. I wonder what it is that delights us in these books unless it be that we are attracted by indecency. Learning is not to be expected from authors who never saw even a shadow of learning. As for their story-telling, what pleasure is to be derived from the things they invent, full of lies and stupidity? De I -
“All these books were written by idle, unoccupied, ignorant men, the slaves of vice and filth. I wonder what it is that delights us in these books unless it be that we are attracted by indecency. Learning is not to be expected from authors who never saw even a shadow of learning. As for their story-telling, what pleasure is to be derived from the things they invent, full of lies and stupidity? De Institutione Feminae Christianae (1523), trans. by C. Fantazzi (1996), Vol. I, p. 47.”
Quos omnes libros conscripserunt homines otiosi, male feriati, imperiti, vitiis ac spurcitiae dediti, in queis miror quid delectet nisi tam nobis flagitia blandirentur. Eruditio non est exspectanda ab hominibus qui ne umbram quidem eruditionis viderant. Iam cum narrant, quae potest esse delectatio in rebus quas tam aperte et stulte confingunt? -
“In corpore ipso quid forma est? nempe cuticula bene colorata?”
In the body itself what is beauty save a little skin, well colored? Opera , Introductio ad sapientiam , 61, vol. 2, cols. 72–3 (Basil, 1555), reported in William S. Walsh (ed.) The International Encyclopedia of Prose and Poetical Quotations (Philadelphia: John C. Winston Company, 1908) p. 76 Cf. Odo of Cluny -
“In the body itself what is beauty save a little skin, well colored? Opera , Introductio ad sapientiam , 61, vol. 2, cols. 72–3 (Basil, 1555), reported in William S. Walsh (ed.) The International Encyclopedia of Prose and Poetical Quotations (Philadelphia: John C. Winston Company, 1908) p. 76 Cf. Odo of Cluny”
In corpore ipso quid forma est? nempe cuticula bene colorata?
Juan Luis Vives on Mind
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Attributed to Juan Luis Vives:
“Words have a double power: they convey thought and shape it.”
Juan Luis Vives on Virtue
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Attributed to Juan Luis Vives:
“He who has begun his task has half done it.”