Francis Bacon Quotes
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The pencil of the Holy Ghost hath labored more in describing the afflictions of Job than the felicities of Solomon.
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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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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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Painting is the pattern of one's own nervous system being projected on canvas.
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By indignities men come to dignities.
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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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There is another ground of hope that must not be omitted. Let men but think over their infinite expenditure of understanding, time, and means on matters and pursuits of far less use and value; whereof, if but a small part were directed to sound and solid studies, there is no difficulty that might not be overcome.
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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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The cause and root of nearly all evils in the sciences is this - that while we falsely admire and extol the powers of the human mind we neglect to seek for its true helps.
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All good moral philosophy is ... but the handmaid to religion.
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Of all virtues and dignities of the mind, goodness is the greatest.
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Reading maketh a full man; and writing an axact man. And, therefore, if a man write little, he need have a present wit; and if he read little, he need have much cunning to seem to know which he doth not.
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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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Man seeketh in society comfort, use and protection.
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One of the fathers saith . . . that old men go to death, and death comes to young men.
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Beware of sudden change, in any great point of diet, and, if necessity inforce it, fit the rest to it. For it is a secret both in nature and state, that it is safer to change many things, than one.
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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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It cannot be that axioms established by argumentation should avail for the discovery of new works, since the subtlety of nature is greater many times over than the subtlety of argument. But axioms duly and orderly formed from particulars easily discover the way to new particulars, and thus render sciences active.
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[Science is] the labor and handicraft of the mind.
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Very few people have a natural feeling for painting, and so, of course, they naturally think that painting is an expression of the artist's mood. But it rarely is. Very often he may be in greatest despair and be painting his happiest paintings.
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Philosophy when superficially studied, excites doubt, when thoroughly explored, it dispels it.
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The creative process is a cocktail of instinct, skill, culture and a highly creative feverishness. It is not like a drug; it is a particular state when everything happens very quickly, a mixture of consciousness and unconsciousness , of fear and pleasure; it's a little like making love, the physical act of love.
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Journeys at youth are part of the education; but at maturity, are part of the experience.
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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.