Archimedes.

287-212 BC Greek mathematician, engineer, and

physicist.
Soldier, stand away from my diagram.

Banach Stefan. 1892-1945

A mathematician is a person who can find analogies between
theorems, a better mathematician is one who can see analogies
between proofs and the best mathematician can notice analogies
between theories. One can imagine that the ultimate mathematician
is one who can see analogies between analogies.

Cocteau, Jean. 1891?-1963. French modernist author.

The composer opens the cage door for arithmetic,
the draftsman gives geometry its freedom.

Descartes, Ren. 1596-1650. French mathematician and

philosopher.
These long chains of perfectly simple and easy reasonings by means
of which geometers are accustomed to carry out their most difficult
demonstrations had led me to fancy that everything that can fall
under human knowledge forms a similar sequence; and that so long as
we avoid accepting as true what is not so, and always preserve the
right order of deduction of one thing from another, there can be
nothing too remote to be reached in the end, or to well hidden to be
discovered.
Discours de la Mthode. 1637.

Drer, Albrecht. 1471-1528. German artist.

And since geometry is the right foundation of all painting, I have
decided to teach its rudiments and principles to all youngsters eager
for art.
Course in the Art of Measurement
Euclid. About 325 BC-265 BC.
Ptolemy once asked Euclid whether there was any shorter way to a
knowledge of geometry than by study of the Elements, whereupon
Euclid answered that there was no royal road to geometry.
Commentary on Euclid's Elements I. Proctus Diadochus. AD 410-485.

Galileo Galilei, 1564 - 1642. Italian astronomer, mathematician,

and physicist.
The universe cannot be read until we have learnt the language and
become familiar with the characters in which it is written. It is written
in mathematical language, and the letters are triangles, circles and
other geometrical figures, without which means it is humanly
impossible to comprehend a single word.
Opere Il Saggiatore
Aubrey, John. 1626-1697. English antiquarian.
[About Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679. English philosopher):]
He was 40 years old before he looked on geometry; which happened
accidentally. Being in a gentleman's library, Euclid's Elements lay
open, and "twas the 47 El. libri I" [Pythagoras' Theorem]. He read
the proposition "By God", said he, "this is impossible:" So he reads
the demonstration of it, which referred him back to such a proposition;
which proposition he read. That referred him back to another, which he
also read. Et sic deinceps, that at last he was demonstratively
convinced of that truth. This made him in love with geometry.
In O. L. Dick (ed.) Brief Lives, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1960.
Ibn Khaldun, 1332-1406. Arab historian
Geometry enlightens the intellect and sets one's mind right. All its
proofs are very clear and orderly. It is hardly possible for errors to
enter into geometrical reasoning, because it is well arranged and
orderly. Thus, the mind that constantly applies itself to geometry is
not likely to fall into error. In this convenient way, the person who
knows geometry acquires intelligence. It has been assumed that the
following statement was written upon Plato's door: "No one who is not
a geometrician may enter our house."
Kepler Johannes. 1571-1630. German astronomer and
mathematician.
Geometry is one and eternal shining in the mind of God. That share in
it accorded to men is one of the reasons that Man is the image of God.
Conversation with the Sidereal Messenger (an open letter to Galileo
Galilei)

Lagrange, Joseph Louis. 1736-1813. French mathematician.

As long as algebra and geometry have been separated, their
progress have been slow and their uses limited, but when these two
sciences have been united, they have lent each mutual forces, and have
marched together towards perfection.
Mandelbrot, Benoit. 1924-. Mathematician born in Warsaw.
Fractal geometer.
It's ironic that fractals, many of which were invented as examples of
pathological behavior, turn out to be pathological at all. In fact they are
the rule in the universe. Shapes, which are not fractal, are the
exception. I love Euclidean geometry, but it is quite clear that it does
not give a reasonable presentation of the world. Mountains are not
cones, clouds are not spheres, trees are not cylinders, neither does
lightning travel in a straight line. Almost everything around us is non-
Euclidean.
Isaac Newton, 16421727, English mathematician and natural
philosopher
It is the glory of geometry that from so few principles, fetched from
without, it is able to accomplish so much.
Pappus of Alexandria. ca 290-350. Greek geometer
Bees. . . by virtue of a certain geometrical forethought . . . know that
the hexagon is greater than the square and the triangle and will hold
more honey for the same expenditure of material

Pedersen, Jean.
Geometry is a skill of the eyes and the hands as well as of the mind.
Plato. ca 429-347 BC. Greek philosopher.
The knowledge of which geometry aims is the knowledge of the
eternal.
Republic, VII, 52.
Plutarch. ca 46-127. Greek essayist and biographer.
[about Archimedes:]
... being perpetually charmed by his familiar siren, that is, by his
geometry, he neglected to eat and drink and took no care of his
person; that he was often carried by force to the baths, and when there
he would trace geometrical figures in the ashes of the fire, and with
his finger draws lines upon his body when it was anointed with oil,
being in a state of great ecstasy and divinely possessed by his science.
In G. Simmons Calculus Gems, New York: McGraw Hill Inc., 1992.
Poincar, Jules Henri. 1854-1912. French mathematician and
physicist.
...by natural selection our mind has adapted itself to the conditions
of the external world. It has adopted the geometry most advantageous
to the species or, in other words, the most convenient. Geometry is
not true, it is advantageous.
Science and Method.
Polya George. 1887-1985.
The elegance of a mathematical theorem is directly proportional to
the number of independent ideas one can see in the theorem and
inversely proportional to the effort it takes to see them.
Mathematical discovery (New York, 1981)
If you have to prove a theorem, do not rush. First of all, understand
fully what the theorem says, try to see clearly what it means.
Then check the theorem, it could be false. Examine the consequences,
verify as many particular instances as are needed to convince yourself
of the truth. When you have satisfied yourself that theorem is true, you
can start proving it.
How to Solve It (Princeton, 1945)
Pushkin, Aleksander Sergeevich. 1799-1837. Russian author.
Inspiration is needed in geometry, just as much as in poetry.
Likhtenshtein
Regiomontanus, Johann. 1436-1476.
You, who wish to study great and wonderful things, who wonder about
the movement of the stars, must read these theorems about triangles.
Knowing these ideas will open the door to all of astronomy and to
certain geometric problems.
De triangulis omnimodis
Riemann Bernhard. 1826-1866. German mathematician and
educator.
If only I had the theorems! Then I should find the proofs easily
enough.
Valry, Paul. 1871-1945. French poet and critic.
In the physical world, one cannot increase the size or quantity of
anything without changing its quality. Similar figures exist only in
pure geometry.
Voltaire. Franois Marie Arouet. 1694-1778. French philosopher
and author.
There are no sects in geometry.
Wittgenstein, Ludwig. 1889-1951. Austrian philosopher.
We could present spatially an atomic fact which contradicted the
laws of physics, but not one which contradicted the laws of
geometry.
Tractatus Logico Philosophicus, New York, 1922.