Francis Bacon Quotes
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Friendship increases in visiting friends, but in visiting them seldom.
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Houses are built to live in, and not to look on: therefore let use be preferred before uniformity.
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The sun, which passeth through pollutions and itself remains as pure as before.
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And as for Mixed Mathematics, I may only make this prediction, that there cannot fail to be more kinds of them, as nature grows further disclosed.
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But by far the greatest hindrance and aberration of the human understanding proceeds from the dullness, incompetency, and deceptions of the senses; in that things which strike the sense outweigh things which do not immediately strike it, though they be more important. Hence it is that speculation commonly ceases where sight ceases; insomuch that of things invisible there is little or no observation.
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Prosperity is not without many fears and distastes; adversity not without many comforts and hopes.
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For what a man would like to be true, that he more readily believes.
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Knowledge, that tendeth but to satisfaction, is but as a courtesan, which is for pleasure, and not for fruit or generation.
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There is no doubt but men of genius and leisure may carry our method to greater perfection, but, having had long experience, we have found none equal to it for the commodiousness it affords in working with the Understanding.
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There is in man's nature a secret inclination and motion towards love of others, which, if it be not spent upon some one or a few, doth naturally spread itself towards many, and maketh men become humane and charitable, as it is seen sometimes in friars. Nuptial love maketh mankind, friendly love perfecteth it, but wanton love corrupteth and embaseth it.
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When a man laughs at his troubles he loses a great many friends. They never forgive the loss of their prerogative.
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We rise to great heights by a winding staircase of small steps.
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I feel that I am much freer if I'm on my own, but I'm sure that there are a lot of painters who would perhaps be even more inventive if they had people round them... I find that if I am on my own I can allow the paint to dictate to me. So the images that I'm putting down on the canvas dictate the thing to me and it gradually builds up and comes along.
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Everybody has his own interpretation of a painting he sees.
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So ambitious men, if they find the way open for their rising, and still get forward, they are rather busy than dangerous; but if they be checked in their desires, they become secretly discontent, and look upon men and matters with an evil eye, and are best pleased, when things go backward.
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Read not to contradict and confute; nor to believe and take for granted; nor to find talk and discourse; but to weigh and consider. Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested: that is, some books are to be read only in parts, others to be read, but not curiously, and some few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention.
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The surest way to prevent seditions...is to take away the matter of them.
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A good name is like precious ointment ; it filleth all round about, and will not easily away; for the odors of ointments are more durable than those of flowers.
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We think according to nature. We speak according to rules. We act according to custom.
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In things that a man would not be seen in himself, it is a point of cunning to borrow the name of the world; as to say, 'The world says,' or 'There is a speech abroad.'
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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 nor man come in danger by it.
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Truth is the daughter of time, not of authority.
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Fortune makes him fool, whom she makes her darling.
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Ipsa scientia potestas est. (Knowledge itself is power.)