OF STUDY AND THE ORDER OF STUDY.

I say that first you ought to learn the limbs and their mechanism,
and having this knowledge, their actions should come next, according
to the circumstances in which they occur in man. And thirdly to
compose subjects, the studies for which should be taken from natural
actions and made from time to time, as circumstances allow; and pay
attention to them in the streets and _piazze_ and fields, and note
them down with a brief indication of the forms; [Footnote 5: Lines
5-7 explained by the lower portion of the sketch No. 1 on Pl. XXXI.]
thus for a head make an o, and for an arm a straight or a bent line,
and the same for the legs and the body, [Footnote 7: Lines 5-7
explained by the lower portion of the sketch No. 1 on Pl. XXXI.] and
when you return home work out these notes in a complete form. The
Adversary says that to acquire practice and do a great deal of work
it is better that the first period of study should be employed in
drawing various compositions done on paper or on walls by divers
masters, and that in this way practice is rapidly gained, and good
methods; to which I reply that the method will be good, if it is
based on works of good composition and by skilled masters. But since
such masters are so rare that there are but few of them to be found,
it is a surer way to go to natural objects, than to those which are
imitated from nature with great deterioration, and so form bad
methods; for he who can go to the fountain does not go to the
water-jar.

[Footnote: This passage has been published by Dr. M. JORDAN, _Das
Malerbuck des L. da Vinci_, p. 89; his reading however varies
slightly from mine.]

Industry and thoroughness the first conditions (491-493.)