I. Frost's Selected Quotations

Everything at Amazon by and about: Francis Bacon (1551-1626)

I hold every man a debtor to his profession; from the which as men of course do seek to receive countenance and profit, so ought they of duty to endeavour themselves by way of amends to be a help and ornament thereunto.
Maxims of the Law. Preface.
No pleasure is comparable to the standing upon the vantage-ground of truth.
Of Truth.

Men fear death as children fear to go in the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased with tales, so is the other.
Of Death.

Revenge is a kind of wild justice, which the more man's nature runs to, the more ought law to weed it out.
Of Revenge.

He that hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune; for they are impediments to great enterprises, either of virtue or mischief.
Of Marriage and Single Life.

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

Mahomet made the people believe that he would call a hill to him, and from the top of it offer up his prayers for the observers of his law. The people assembled. Mahomet called the hill to come to him, again and again; and when the hill stood still he was never a whit abashed, but said, "If the hill will not come to Mahomet, Mahomet will go to the hill."
Of Boldness.

The desire of power in excess caused the angels to fall; the desire of knowledge in excess caused man to fall.
Of Goodness.

I had rather believe all the fables in the legends and the Talmud and the Alcoran, than that this universal frame is without a mind.
Of Atheism.

A little philosophy inclineth man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion.
Ibid.

Travel, in the younger sort, is a part of education; in the elder, a part of experience. He that travelleth into a country before he hath some entrance into the language, goeth to school, and not to travel.
Of Travel.

There is a wisdom in this beyond the rules of physic. A man's own observation, what he finds good of and what he finds hurt of, is the best physic to preserve health.
Of Regimen of Health.

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

Virtue is like a rich stone,- best plain set.
Of Beauty.

God Almighty first planted a garden.
Of Gardens.

And because the breath of flowers is far sweeter in the air (where it comes and goes, like the warbling of music) than in the hand, therefore nothing is more fit for that delight than to know what be the flowers and plants that do best perfume the air.
Ibid.

Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested.
Of Studies.

Reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man.
Ibid.

Histories make men wise; poets, witty; the mathematics, subtile; natural philosophy, deep; moral, grave; logic and rhetoric, able to contend.
Ibid.

Books must follow sciences, and not sciences books.
Proposition touching Amendment of Laws.

Knowledge is power.- Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est.
Meditationes Sacr†. De H†resibus.

Cleanness of body was ever deemed to proceed from a due reverence to God.
Advancement of Learning. Book i.

States as great engines move slowly.
Ibid.

The world 's a bubble, and the life of man Less than a span.
The World.

What then remains but that we still should cry For being born, and, being born, to die?
Ibid.

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.
Apothegms.No. 17.

Sir Amice Pawlet, when he saw too much haste made in any matter, was wont to say, "Stay a while, that we may make an end the sooner."
No. 76.

Alonso of Aragon was wont to say in commendation of age, that 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.
No. 97.

Cosmus, Duke of Florence, was wont to say of perfidious friends, that "We read that we ought to forgive our enemies; but we do not read that we ought to forgive our friends."
No. 206.

Cato said the best way to keep good acts in memory was to refresh them with new.
No. 247.