Antonie van Leeuwenhoek Quotes

I think there must be some other life forms, even if they're microscopic.

If an alien visited Earth, they would take some note of humans, but probably spend most of their time trying to understand the dominant form of life on our planet - microorganisms like bacteria and viruses.

The microscopic world became my obsession.

If you don't like bacteria, you're on the wrong planet.

Nature is to be found in her entirety nowhere more than in her smallest creatures.

The 31th of May, I perceived in the same water more of those Animals, as also some that were somewhat bigger. And I imagine, that [ten hundred thousand] of these little Creatures do not equal an ordinary grain of Sand in bigness: And comparing them with a Cheese-mite (which may be seen to move with the naked eye) I make the proportion of one of these small Water-creatures to a Cheese-mite, to be like that of a Bee to a Horse: For, the circumference of one of these little Animals in water, is not so big as the thickness of a hair in a Cheese-mite.

These microscopic organisms form an entire world composed of species, families and varieties whose history, which has barely begun to be written, is already fertile in prospects and findings of the highest importance. The names of these organisms are very numerous and will have to be defined and in part discarded. The word microbe which has the advantage of being shorter and carrying a more general meaning, and of having been approved by my illustrious friend, M. Littré, the most competent linguist in France, is one we will adopt.

Passing just lately over this lake, ... and examining this water next day, I found floating therein divers earthy particles, and some green streaks, spirally wound serpent-wise, and orderly arranged, after the manner of the copper or tin worms, which distillers use to cool their liquors as they distil over. The whole circumference of each of these streaks was about the thickness of a hair of one's head. ... all consisted of very small green globules joined together: and there were very many small green globules as well. [The earliest recorded observation of the common green alga Spyrogyra.]

Examining this water...I found floating therein divers earthy particles, and some green streaks, spirally wound serpent-wise...and I judge that some of these little creatures were above a thousand times smaller than the smallest ones I have ever yet seen, upon the rind of cheese, in wheaten flour, mould, and the like.

It has been recognized since the dawn of microbiology that the soil is inhabited by a living microscopic population which is responsible for the numerous reactions that take place in the soil and that affect the life and economy of man in many ways.

Life on earth is such a good story you cannot afford to miss the beginning... Beneath our superficial differences we are all of us walking communities of bacteria. The world shimmers, a pointillist landscape made of tiny living beings.

Everything I did in high school was focused on microbiology, looking at things like algae under a microscope for hours on end. When I was 13, I saved up $100 to buy a good used microscope. I was obsessed with microorganisms.

What's great about bacteria is you have a surprise every day waiting for you because they're so fast, they grow overnight.

I think if I weren't so squeamish, I would have been some sort of forensic analyst. And I can't do anything with a microscope, because then I start thinking about the world of germs around us.

There are bred certain minute creatures which cannot be seen by the eyes, which float in the air and enter the body through the mouth and nose and there cause serious diseases.

In rain water, I observed a small red worm and two other kinds of very minute insects; of those of the larger size, I judged that 30,000 together would not equal a coarse sand.

I used to like getting cups and putting tiny bits of food and liquids in them. I'd grow mould plumes in the dark wardrobe of my little back bedroom. Not to eat them, mind - just to admire the growing power.

He who drinks a tumbler of London water has literally in his stomach more animated beings than there are men, women, and children on the face of the globe.

I turned to the teeming small creatures that can be held between the thumb and forefinger: the little things that compose the foundation of our ecosystems, the little things, as I like to say, who run the world.

I play with microbes. There are, of course, many rules to this play...but when you have acquired knowledge and experience it is very pleasant to break the rules and to be able to find something nobody has thought of.

We cannot wholly rely, as though it were Medieval times, [on the notion that] the only reality is what we see in front of us. There are germs. There are changes that are happening in our planet's ecology that are happening over such a long period of time that we cannot see the changes.

You can't just boss bacteria around like that," said the younger Mrs. Hempstock. "They don't like it." "Stuff and silliness," said the old lady. "You leave wigglers alone and they'll be carrying on like anything. Show them who's boss and they can't do enough for you. You've tasted my cheese.

Let me tell you, my friend, that there are things done today in electrical science which would have been deemed unholy by the very man who discovered electricity, who would themselves not so long before been burned as wizards

Humanity has known for a long time what fractals are. It is a very strange situation in which an idea which each time I look at all documents have deeper and deeper roots, never (how to say it), jelled.