“The painter strives and competes with nature.” I believe Leonardo is making the point that nature is always one step ahead in its beauty and wonder than that of a painter who is attempting to encapsulate that beauty. “The painter ought to be solitary.” Leonardo reveals here his belief that living and seeing in a solitary fashion yields greater works. “While you are alone you are entirely alone.”

“Small rooms or dwellings discipline the mind, large ones distract it.” I believe here that Leonardo means that when a person, in this case an artist, more specifically a painter, finds greater insight into his surroundings when his/her surroundings are confining in nature. The smaller the room, the more detail a seer will intricately depict of her surroundings.

“…defining one case, a second should intervene, as happens when an object occupies the mind, then he must decide which of these cases in the more difficult to work out, and follow that until it becomes entirely clear, and then work out the explanation of the other…” I like what Leonardo states here. He claims that when examining one object with great detail, and if a second object or action comes into your mind, and intrigues you even more, go on and discover the workings of the second object/action, and continue to study until you completely understand this phenomenon, then continue with the former object that intrigues you. I like this comment because it insists the person, artist or craftsman, to be consistent and adamant to a thought, to stay focus on what is interesting the person now.

“…when you lie in bed in the dark to go over again in the imagination the outlines of the forms you have been studying…is certainly a praiseworthy exercise and useful in impressing things on the memory.” This is what makes Leonardo a crazy man. He not only insists on strict concentration during exhaustive studies but then to contemplate all of your studies again while one sleeps – to impress upon the brain. This man went to sleep every night dreaming and reviewing his thoughts on gears and nature.

“I say and assist that drawing in company is much better than alone.” I feel this is quite obviously a contradiction to what Leonardo states early about being confined and alone. Maybe, I am wrong. He says that working in front of persons will spur greatness from the natural competition between men, and the praise. I also agree with what Leonardo says, that the competition will do a young studier well.

“I say when you paint you should have a flat mirror and often look at your work as reflected in it, when you will see it reversed, and it will appear to you like some other painter’s work, so you will be better able to judge of its faults than in any other way.” I agree with Leonardo’s assertion that it is easier to find fault in another person’s work than in our own. When I look upon my own work, I usually skim it and often miss little mistakes or errors, but when reviewing another person’s work, I will be on the “look-out” for mistakes, or at least more apt to spot, and to discuss any found mistakes.

“If you wish to have knowledge of the forms of things, you will begin with their details, and not go on to the second until you have the first well fixed in memory and in practice.” Leonardo really wants to drive this message home – don’t continue until you completely understand the prior occurrence/happenstance. He pretty much reiterates his belief for the necessity and importance of patience in observation, thought, and study.