Francis Bacon Quotes
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All superstition is much the same whether it be that of astrology, dreams, omen, retributive judgment, or the like, in all of which the deluded believers observe events which are fulfilled, but neglect and pass over their failure, though it be much more common.
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That things are changed, and that nothing really perishes, and that the sum of matter remains exactly the same, is sufficiently certain.
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No body can be healthful without exercise, neither natural body nor politic, and certainly, to a kingdom or estate, a just and honourable war is the true exercise.
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Great riches have sold more men than they have bought.
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The genius, wit, and the spirit of a nation are discovered by their proverbs.
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Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man.
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It's always hopeless to talk about painting - one never does anything but talk around it.
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A wise man will make more opportunities than he finds.
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Discretion in speech is more than eloquence.
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If my people look as if they're in a dreadful fix, it's because I can't get them out of a technical dilemma.
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All artists are vain, they long to be recognized and to leave something to posterity. They want to be loved, and at the same time they want to be free. But nobody is free.
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I'm working for myself; what else have I got to work for? How can you work for an audience? What do you imagine an audience would want? I have got nobody to excite except myself, so I am always surprised if anyone likes my work sometimes. I suppose I'm very lucky, of course, to be able to earn my living by something that really absorbs me to try to do, if that is what you call luck.
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Those that want friends to open themselves unto are cannibals of their own hearts.
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The only hope [of science] ... is in genuine induction.
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Liberty of speech invites and provokes liberty to be used again, and so bringeth much to a man's knowledge.
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Friends are thieves of time.
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Even within the most beautiful landscape, in the trees, under the leaves the insects are eating each other; violence is a part of life.
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Hope is a good breakfast, but it is a bad supper.
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For man seeketh in society comfort, use, and protection: and they be three wisdoms of divers natures, which do often sever: wisdom of the behaviour, wisdom of business, and wisdom of state.
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If I go to the National Gallery and I look at one of the great paintings that excite me there, it's not so much the painting that excites me as that the painting unlocks all kinds of valves of sensation within me which return me to life more violently.
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The momentous thing in human life is the art of winning the soul to good or evil.
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There are many wise men that have secret hearts and transparent countenances.
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There was never law, or sect, or opinion did so much magnify goodness, as the Christian religion doth.
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You see, painting has now become, or all art has now become completely a game, by which man distracts himself. What is fascinating actually is, that it's going to become much more difficult for the artist, because he must really deepen the game to become any good at all.