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Francis Bacon quotes (88) He that will not apply new remedies must expect new evils for time is the greatest innovator. Francis Bacon Category: Change Men suppose their reason has command over their words; still it happens that words in return exercise authority on reason. Francis Bacon Category: Word There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion. Francis Bacon Category: Beauty Why should a man be in love with his fetters though of gold? Francis Bacon Category: Slavery Ill Fortune never crushed that man whom good Fortune deceived not Francis Bacon Category: Fortune Things alter for the worse spontaneously if they be not altered for the better designedly. Francis Bacon Category: Spontaneous It is true that a little philosophy inclineth mans mind to atheism but depth in philosophy bringeth mens minds about to religion. Francis Bacon Category: Atheism Men commonly think according to their inclinations speak according to their learning and imbibed opinions but generally act according to custom. Francis Bacon Category: Custom Riches are a good handmaid but the worst mistress. Francis Bacon Category: Wealth I would live to study not study to live. Francis Bacon Category: Study Chiefly the mold of a man's fortune is in his own hands. Francis Bacon Category: Responsibility There are three things which make a nation great and prosperous a fertile soil busy workshops and easy conveyance for men and commodities. Francis Bacon Category: Gravity Philosophy when superficially studied excites doubt when thoroughly explored it dispels it. Francis Bacon Category: Philosophy All rising to great place is by a winding stair. Francis Bacon Category: Diet Children sweeten labors but they make misfortunes more bitter. Francis Bacon Category: Children A crowd is not company and faces are but a gallery of pictures. Francis Bacon Category: Mob The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery. Francis Bacon Category: Art Universities incline wits to sophistry and affectation. Francis Bacon Category: University A king is one who has few things to desire and many things to fear. Francis Bacon Category: Desire No pleasure is comparable to the standing upon the vantage ground of truth. Francis Bacon Category: Pleasure Wives are young men's mistresses companions for middle age and old men's nurses. Francis Bacon Category: Companion There is in human nature generally more of the fool than of the wise. Francis Bacon Category: Fool Nature to be commanded must be obeyed. Francis Bacon Category: Nature Travel in the younger sort is a part of education; in the elder a part of experience. He that travelleth into a country before he hath some entrance into the language goeth to school and not to travel. Francis Bacon Category: Travel A man that studieth revenge keeps his own wounds green. Francis Bacon Category: Wisdom Knowledge itself is power. Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est. Francis Bacon Category: Knowledge Old wood best to burn old wine to drink old friends to trust and old authors to read. Francis Bacon Category: Age Man seeketh in society comfort use and protection. Francis Bacon Category: Seek The general root of superstition is that men observe when things hit and not when they miss; and commit to memory the one and pass over the other. Francis Bacon Category: Memory Nuptial love maketh mankind; friendly love perfecteth it; But wanton love corrupteth and embaseth it. Francis Bacon Category: Sex Young men are fitter to invent than to judge; fitter for execution than for counsel; and fitter for new projects than for settled business. Francis Bacon Category: Youth Prosperity is not without many fears and distastes; and adversity is not without comforts and hopes. Francis Bacon Category: Adversity In nature things move violently to their place and calmly in their place. Francis Bacon Category: Calm Acorns were good until bread was found. Francis Bacon Category: Improve Histories make men wise; poets witty; the mathematics subtle; natural philosophy deep; moral grave; logic and rhetoric able to contend. Francis Bacon Category: History But men must know that in this theater of man's life it is reserved only for God and angels to be lookers on. Francis Bacon Category: Action He that gives good advice builds with one hand; he that gives good counsel and example builds with both; but he that gives good admonition and bad example builds with one hand and pulls down with the other. Francis Bacon Category: Advice The remedy is worse than the disease. Francis Bacon Category: Disease I knew one that when he wrote a letter he would put that which was most material in the postscript as if it had been a bymatter. Francis Bacon Category: Letter Fame is like a river that beareth up things light and swollen and drowns things weighty and solid. Francis Bacon Category: False All of our actions take their hue from the complexion of the heart as landscapes their variety from light. Francis Bacon Category: Heart Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; And writing an exact man. Francis Bacon Category: Literature As is the garden such is the gardener. A mans nature runs either to herbs or weeds. Francis Bacon Category: Garden A wise man will make more opportunities than he finds. Francis Bacon Category: Find The worst solitude is to be destitute of sincere friendship. Francis Bacon Category: Friendship It is a pleasure to stand upon the shore and to see ships tost upon the sea: a pleasure to stand in the window of a castle and to see a battle and the adventures thereof below: but no pleasure is comparable to standing upon the vantage ground of truth ... and to see the errors and wanderings and mists and tempests in the vale below. Francis Bacon Category: Truth If a man be gracious and courteous to strangers it shows he is a citizen of the world. Francis Bacon Category: Citizen It is not the lie that passeth through the mind but the lie that sinketh in and settleth in it that doth the hurt. Francis Bacon Category: Lever It is impossible to love and be wise. Francis Bacon Category: Wise For what a man had rather were true he more readily believes. Francis Bacon Category: Belief A prudent question is one half of wisdom. Francis Bacon Category: Question If money be not thy servant it will be thy master. The covetous man cannot so properly be said to possess wealth as that may be said to possess him. Francis Bacon Category: Avarice The desire of power in excess caused the angels to fall; the desire of knowledge in excess caused man to fall; But in charity there is no excess neither can angel or man come in danger by it. Francis Bacon Category: Charity They are ill discoverers that think there is no land when they can see nothing but sea. Francis Bacon Category: Discovery Money is a good servant but a bad master. Francis Bacon Category: Money If we do not maintain Justice Justice will not maintain us. Francis Bacon Category: Others Seek ye first the good things of the mind and the rest will either be supplied or its loss will not be felt. Francis Bacon Category: Mind The human understanding is no dry light but receives an infusion from the will and affectionsÂ… What a man had rather were true he more readily believes. Francis Bacon Category: Understand In taking revenge a man is but even with his enemy; but in passing it over he is superior. Francis Bacon Category: Revenge Man prefers to believe what he prefers to be true. Francis Bacon Category: Thief A healthy body is a guest chamber for the soul: a sick body is a prison. Francis Bacon Category: Body A man ought warily to begin charges which once begun will continue. Francis Bacon Category: Law Nothing doth more hurt in a state than that cunning men pass for wise. Francis Bacon Category: Craftiness I will never be an old man. To me old age is always 15 years older than I am. Francis Bacon Category: Old Certainly virtue is like precious odors most fragrant when they are incensed or crushed for prosperity doth best discover vice But adversity doth best discover virtue. Francis Bacon Category: Virtue The speaking in a perpetual hyperbole is comely in nothing but love. Francis Bacon Category: Love Read not to contradict and confute nor to believe and take for granted nor to find talk and discourse but to weigh and consider. Francis Bacon Category: Book Silence is the virtue of fools. Francis Bacon Category: Sick To choose time is to save time. Francis Bacon Category: Time Our humanity is a poor thing except for the divinity that stirs within us. Francis Bacon Category: Housework He knows not his own strength that hath not met adversity. Francis Bacon Category: Strength A man must make his opportunity as oft as find it. Francis Bacon Category: Opportunity Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not; a sense of humor to console him for what he is. Francis Bacon Category: Imagination If a man will begin with certainties he shall end in doubts but if he will be content to begin with doubts he shall end in certainties. Francis Bacon Category: Certainty Discretion in speech is more than eloquence. Francis Bacon Category: Discretion Look to make your course regular that men may know beforehand what they may expect. Francis Bacon Category: Unsorted Men fear death as children fear to go in the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased with tales so is the other. Francis Bacon Category: Death As the births of living creatures at first are ill-shapen so are all innovations which are the births of time. Francis Bacon Category: Birth He that hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune; for they are impediments to great enterprises either of virtue or mischief. Francis Bacon Category: Marriage No man is angry that feels not himself hurt. Francis Bacon Category: Anger A graceful and pleasing figure is a perpetual letter of recommendation. Francis Bacon Category: Government The worlds a bubble; and the life of man Less than a span. Francis Bacon Category: Life Hope is a good breakfast but it is a bad supper. Francis Bacon Category: Breakfast Prosperity is the blessing of the Old Testament adversity is the blessing of the New. Francis Bacon Category: Bible It were better to have no opinion of God at all than such an opinion as is unworthy of him; for the one is unbelief the other is contumely. Francis Bacon Category: God Men in great place are thrice servants: servants of the sovereign or state servants of fame and servants of business. Francis Bacon Category: Servant Truth comes out of error more readily than out of confusion. Francis Bacon Category: Confuse Be so true to thyself as thou be not false to others. Francis Bacon Category: Self |
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