FRANCIS BACON QUOTES VI

English philosopher (1561-1626)

But by far the greatest obstacle to the progress of science and to the undertaking of new tasks and provinces therein is found in this -- that men despair and think things impossible.

FRANCIS BACON

Novum Organum

Tags: possibility


Examine thy customs of diet, sleep, exercise, apparel, and the like; and try, in any thing thou shalt judge hurtful, to discontinue it, by little and little; but so, as if thou dost find any inconvenience by the change, thou come back to it again: for it is hard to distinguish that which is generally held good and wholesome, from that which is good particularly, and fit for thine own body.

FRANCIS BACON

"Of Regiment Of Health", The Essays or Counsels, Civil and Moral

Tags: change


Hope is a good breakfast, but it is a bad supper.

FRANCIS BACON

Apothegms

Tags: hope


It is in life as it is in ways, the shortest way is commonly the foulest, and surely the fairer way is not much about.

FRANCIS BACON

Advancement of Learning

Tags: life


It would be an unsound fancy and self-contradictory to expect that things which have never yet been done can be done except by means which have never yet been tried.

FRANCIS BACON

Novum Organum


Knowledge is power.

FRANCIS BACON

Meditationes Sacrae

Tags: knowledge


Libraries ... are as the shrines where all the relics of ancient saints, full of true virtue, and that without delusion or imposture, are preserved and reposed.

FRANCIS BACON

Essays Or Counsels

Tags: library


Nature is often hidden; sometimes overcome; seldom extinguished.

FRANCIS BACON

"Of Nature in Men," Essays

Tags: nature


Since there must be borrowing and lending, and men are so hard of heart as they will not lend freely, usury must be permitted.

FRANCIS BACON

Essays

Tags: lending


Therefore, as atheism is in all respects hateful, so in this, that it depriveth human nature of the means to exalt itself, above human frailty.

FRANCIS BACON

"Of Atheism", Essays

Tags: atheism


We see then how far the monuments of wit and learning are more durable than the monuments of power or of the hands. For have not the verses of Homer continued twenty-five hundred years, or more, without the loss of a syllable or letter; during which the infinite palaces, temples, castles, cities, have been decayed and demolished?

FRANCIS BACON

The Advancement of Learning

Tags: cities


Wives are young men's mistresses, companions for middle age, and old men's nurses.

FRANCIS BACON

Essays

Tags: marriage


A man would die, though he were neither valiant nor miserable, only upon a weariness to do the same thing so oft over and over.

FRANCIS BACON

Essays


Children sweeten labours, but they make misfortunes more bitter.

FRANCIS BACON

Essays

Tags: children


Concerning speech and words, the consideration of them hath produced the science of grammar. For man still striveth to reintegrate himself in those benedictions, from which by his fault he hath been deprived; and as he hath striven against the first general curse by the invention of all other arts, so hath he sought to come forth of the second general curse (which was the confusion of tongues) by the art of grammar.

FRANCIS BACON

The Advancement of Learning

Tags: art


Fortune is to be honored and respected, and it be but for her daughters, Confidence and Reputation. For those two, Felicity breedeth; the first within a man's self, the latter in others towards him.

FRANCIS BACON

"Of Fortune", The Essays or Counsels, Civil and Moral

Tags: confidence


If a man be gracious and courteous to strangers, it shows he is a citizen of the world, and that his heart is no island cut off from other lands, but a continent that joins them.

FRANCIS BACON

Essays

Tags: courtesy


If a man look sharply and attentively, he shall see Fortune; for though she is blind, she is not invisible.

FRANCIS BACON

"Of Fortune," Essays

Tags: fortune


If a man would cross a business, that he doubts some other would handsomely and effectually move, let him pretend to wish it well, and move it himself in such sort as may foil it.

FRANCIS BACON

"Of Cunning", The Essays or Counsels, Civil and Moral

Tags: business


Prosperity is the blessing of the Old Testament, adversity is the blessing of the New.

FRANCIS BACON

Essays

Tags: adversity