Tesla quotes in his handwriting font

Nikola Tesla Quotes

Profound words from, or about, the world's greatest inventor
Displaying 1 - 10 of 139

Of all the frictional resistances, the one that most retards human movement is ignorance, what Buddha called 'the greatest evil in the world.' The friction which results from ignorance can be reduced only by the spread of knowledge and the unification of the heterogeneous elements of humanity. No effort could be better spent.

June, 1900

I have hundreds of inventions which I could not take the patents of, on account of my misfortune.

My project was retarded by laws of nature. The world was not prepared for it. It was too far ahead of time. But the same laws will prevail in the end and make it a triumphal success.

June, 1919

I do not hesitate to state here for future reference and as a test of the accuracy of my scientific forecast that flying machines and ships propelled by electricity transmitted without wire will have ceased to be a wonder in ten years from now. I would say five were it not that there is such a thing as "inertia of human opinion" resisting revolutionary ideas.

May 19th, 1907

I am credited with being one of the hardest workers and perhaps I am, if thought is the equivalent of labour, for I have devoted to it almost all of my waking hours. But if work is interpreted to be a definite performance in a specified time according to a rigid rule, then I may be the worst of idlers. Every effort under compulsion demands a sacrifice of life-energy. I never paid such a price. On the contrary, I have thrived on my thoughts.

February, 1919

Nikola Tesla was not only a great scientist but also a great patriot; he loved his people and his country as we are building it... We are paying our debt to him for his work for the benefit of mankind and for his love of his country.

March 19th, 1944

...I finally succeeded in reaching electrical movements or rates of delivery of electrical energy not only approximating, but, as shown in many comparative tests and measurements, actually surpassing those of lightning discharges...

May 16th, 1900

I hope this is the invention that will make war impossible.

May 20th, 1916

My mother understood human nature better and never chided. She knew that a man cannot be saved from his own foolishness or vice by someone else's efforts or protests, but only by the use of his own will.

April, 1921

To me, relativity is just a mass of error, deceptive, and violently opposed to the teachings of great men of science gone before, and even to common sense. The theory wraps all these errors and fallacies and clothes them in a mathematical god which fascinates, dazzles, and makes people blind to underlying error.

July 11th, 1935