Thirty generations passed, and Leonardo da Vinci, spirit made flesh, scratched across his drawings (drawings so beautiful that one catches one’s breath with pain on seeing them) plans and calculations for a flying machine, and left in his notes a little phrase that, once heard, rings like a bell in the memory—“There shall be wings.” Leonardo failed and died, but life carried on the dream. Generations passed, and men said man would never fly, for it was not the will of God. And then man flew, and the agelong challenge of the bird was answered. Life is that which can hold a purpose for three
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