English philosopher (1561-1626)
As the births of living creatures at first are ill-shapen, so are all innovations, which are the births of time.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
Riches are for spending.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
Chiefly the mould of a man's fortune is in his own hands.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
Virtue is like a rich stone, best plain set.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
Nobility of birth commonly abateth industry.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
Prosperity is the blessing of the Old Testament, adversity is the blessing of the New.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
It is a miserable state of mind to have few things to desire and many things to fear.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
It is not the lie that passeth through the mind, but the lie that sinketh in, and settleth in it, that doth the hurt.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
Truth ... is the sovereign good of human nature.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
Clear and round dealing is the honor of man's nature; and ... mixture of falsehood is like alloy in coin of gold and silver, which may make the metal work the better, but embaseth it.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
The stage is more beholding to love than the life of man. For as to the stage, love is ever matter of comedies and now and then of tragedies; but in life it doth much mischief, sometimes like a Siren, sometimes like a Fury.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
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
The monuments of wit survive the monuments of power.
FRANCIS BACON
Essex's Device
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
It is not possible to run a course aright when the goal itself has not been rightly placed.
FRANCIS BACON
Novum Organum
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
We cannot command nature except by obeying her.
FRANCIS BACON
Novum Organum
The consciousness of good intentions, however unsuccessful, affords a joy more real, pure, and agreeable to nature than all the other means that can be furnished, either for obtaining one's desire or quieting the mind.
FRANCIS BACON
"Man's Duty to Society", Physical and Metaphysical Works
Seek first the virtues of the mind; and other things either will come, or will not be wanted.
FRANCIS BACON
The Advancement of Learning