Trifles Make Perfection And Perfection Is

The earliest known appearance of this saying is in Charles Caleb Colton's Lacon: or Many Things in Few Words (1820, Vol. 1, §168), rendered as "Recollect that trifles make perfection, and that perfection is no trifle." Colton gave no citation for his source, leaving open the possibility that the attribution to Michelangelo is his own invention. The sentiment is entirely in keeping with Michelangelo's documented obsessions — Giorgio Vasari records numerous instances of his returning to works others considered finished to make minute refinements — but scholars cannot verify a primary source connecting the wording to Michelangelo himself.