Francis Bacon Quotes - Page 2

For all knowledge and wonder (which is the seed of knowledge) is an impression of pleasure in itself.

Some books should be tasted, some devoured, but only a few should be chewed and digested thoroughly.

Read not to contradict and confute, nor to believe and take for granted ...but to weigh and consider.

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 time infinite palaces, temples, castles, cities have been decayed and demolished?

A man that is young in years may be old in hours if he have lost no time.

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.

Nature is often hidden, sometimes overcome, seldom extinguished.

Nature cannot be commanded except by being obeyed.

Great art is always a way of concentrating, reinventing what is called fact, what we know of our existence- a reconcentration… tearing away the veils, the attitudes people acquire of their time and earlier time. Really good artists tear down those veils

The poets did well to conjoin music and medicine, in Apollo, because the office of medicine is but to tune the curious harp of man's body and reduce it to harmony.

The only really interesting thing is
what happens between two people in a room.

Age appears best in four things: old wood to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust and old authors to read.

Money is a great servant but a bad master.

Seek not proud riches, but such as thou mayest get justly, use soberly, distribute cheerfully, and leave contentedly.

Money is a good servant, a dangerous master.

Books must follow sciences, and not sciences books."

[Proposition touching Amendment of Laws]