The Deaf Judge and the Blind Judge of Painting and Poetry
The ten ornaments of nature; the delights of painted landscape lost on the blind-born
The chapter continues with the famous formula that painting is a poetry seen and not heard, and poetry a painting heard and not seen, so the two have exchanged their senses; Leonardo proposes giving painting to a judge born deaf and poetry to one born blind. Among painting's noble parts he counts gestures, the compositions of histories, and delightful landscapes of transparent waters, greenish riverbeds, waves over meadows and gravel, grasses, and darting fish. Such things, he says, could as well be told to a stone as to the blind-born, who never saw the ten ornaments of nature, light, darkness, color, body, figure, site, remoteness, proximity, motion, and rest.
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Seen but not heard; heard but not seen
Leonardo defines painting as a poetry that is seen and not heard, and poetry as a painting that is heard and not seen, so the two have exchanged the senses by which they reach the intellect. He proposes giving painting to the judgment of one born deaf and poetry to one born blind, arguing the deaf-born will grasp the actors' intentions while the blind-born never will.
The delights of painted landscape
Among painting's noble parts he counts the figuring of gestures, the compositions of histories, and delightful sites with transparent waters showing greenish riverbeds, waves sporting over meadows and fine gravel among the grasses and darting fish. Such niceties, he says, could as well be told to a stone as to one born blind.
The ten ornaments of nature
The blind-born can never grasp the things of which the world's beauty is composed: light, darkness, color, body, figure, site, remoteness, proximity, motion, and rest. These Leonardo names the ten ornaments of nature.