Francis Bacon Quotes
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Boldness is ever blind, for it sees not dangers and inconveniences whence it is bad in council though good in execution.
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To conclude, therefore, let no man upon a weak conceit of sobriety or an ill-applied moderation think or maintain that a man can search too far, or be too well studied in the book of God's word, or the book of God's works, divinity or philosophy; but rather let men endeavor an endless progress or proficience in both; only let men beware that they apply both to charity, and not to swelling; to use, and not to ostentation; and again, that they do not unwisely mingle or confound these learnings together.
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The serpent if it wants to become the dragon must eat itself.
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My Lord St. Albans said that Nature did never put her precious jewels into a garret four stories high, and therefore that exceeding tall men had ever very empty heads.
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Knowledge and human power are synonymous.
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Upon a given body to generate and superinduce a new nature or new natures is the work and aim of human power. To discover the Form of a given nature, or its true difference, or its causal nature, or fount of its emanation... this is the work and aim of human knowledge.
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There is nothing makes a man suspect much, more than to know little, and therefore men should remedy suspicion by procuring to know more, and not keep their suspicions in smother.
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We read that we ought to forgive our enemies; but we do not read that we ought to forgive our friends.
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Truth is a naked and open daylight.
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Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed.
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Seeming wise men may make shift to get opinion; but let no man choose them for employment; for certainly you were better take for business, a man somewhat absurd, than over-formal.
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But the greatest error of all the rest is the mistaking or misplacing of the last or farthest end of knowledge: for men have entered into a desire of learning and knowledge, sometimes upon a natural curiosity and inquisitive appetite; sometimes to entertain their minds with variety and delight; sometimes for ornament and reputation; and sometimes to enable them to victory of wit and contradiction; and most times for lucre and profession; and seldom sincerely to give a true account of their gift of reason, to the benefit and use of men.
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For cleanness of body was ever esteemed to proceed from a due reverence to God, to society, and to ourselves.
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Nil terribile nisi ipse timor.
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Natural abilities are like natural plants, that need pruning by study; and studies themselves do give forth directions too much at large, except they be bounded in by experience.
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Moreover, the works already known are due to chance and experiment rather than to sciences; for the sciences we now possess are merely systems for the nice ordering and setting forth of things already invented; not methods of invention or directions for new works.
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Disciples do owe their masters only a temporary belief, and a suspension of their own judgment till they be fully instructed.
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The best armor is to keep out of gunshot.
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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 says it as if another had said it to him.
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Envy is ever joined with the comparing of a man's self; and where there is no comparison, no envy.
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I'm just trying to make images as accurately as possible off my nervous system as I can.
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A graceful and pleasing figure is a perpetual letter of recommendation.
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It is true that may hold in these things, which is the general root of superstition; namely, that men observe when things hit, and not when they miss; and commit to memory the one, and forget and pass over the other.
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The subtlety of nature is greater many times over than the subtlety of the senses and understanding.