Francis Bacon Quotes
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There is nothing makes a man suspect much, more than to know little.
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It was well said that envy keeps no holidays.
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He that cometh to seek after knowledge, with a mind to scorn, shall be sure to find matter for his humour, but no matter for his instruction.
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The eye of understanding is like the eye of the sense; for as you may see great objects through small crannies or levels, so you may see great axioms of nature through small and contemptible instances.
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Painting is the pattern of one's own nervous system being projected on canvas.
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Generally he perceived in men of devout simplicity this opinion: that the secrets of nature were the secrets of God, part of that glory into which man is not to press too boldly.
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States are great engines moving slowly.
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The errors of young men are the ruin of business, but the errors of aged men amount to this, that more might have been done, or sooner.
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All of our actions take their hue from the complexion of the heart, as landscapes their variety from light.
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The first question concerning the Celestial Bodies is whether there be a system, that is whether the world or universe compose together one globe, with a center, or whether the particular globes of earth and stars be scattered dispersedly, each on its own roots, without any system or common center.
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When any of the four pillars of government-religion, justice, counsel, and treasure-are mainly shaken or weakened, men had need to pray for fair weather.
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Laws and Institutions Must Go Hand in Hand with the Progress of the Human Mind.
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Lastly, there are Idols which have immigrated into men's minds from the various dogmas of philosophies, and also from wrong laws of demonstration. These I call Idols of the Theater, because in my judgment all the received systems are but so many stage plays, representing worlds of their own creation after an unreal and scenic fashion.
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Great art is deeply ordered. Even if within the order there may be enormously instinctive and accidental things, nevertheless they come out of a desire for ordering and for returning fact onto the nervous system in a more violent way.
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Age appears to be best in four things; old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read.
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Journeys at youth are part of the education; but at maturity, are part of the experience.
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Men suppose their reason has command over their words; still it happens that words in return exercise authority on reason.
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For the chain of causes cannot by any force be loosed or broken, nor can nature be commanded except by being obeyed.
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Truth is a naked and open daylight, that doth not shew the masks and mummeries and triumphs of the world, half so stately and daintily as candlelights.
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The partitions of knowledge are not like several lines that meet in one angle, and so touch not in a point; but are like branches of a tree, that meet in a stem, which hath a dimension and quantity of entireness and continuance, before it come to discontinue and break itself into arms and boughs.
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I had rather believe all the Fables in the Legend, and the Talmud, and the Alcoran, then that this universall Frame, is without a Minde. And therefore, God never wrought Miracle, to convince Atheisme, because his Ordinary Works Convince it. It is true, that a little Philosophy inclineth Mans Minde to Atheisme; But depth in Philosophy, bringeth Mens Mindes about to Religion.
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Mahomet made the people believe that he would call a hill to him, and from the top of it offer up his prayers for the observers of his law. The people assembled. Mahomet called the hill to come to him, again and again; and when the hill stood still he was never a whit abashed, but said, 'If the hill will not come to Mahomet, Mahomet will go to the hill.'
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There is a cunning which we in England call 'the turning of the cat in the pan;' which is, when that which a man says to another, he lays it as if another had said it to him.
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Because the acts or events of true history have not that magnitude which satisfieth the mind of man, poesy feigneth acts and events greater and more heroical.