Francis Bacon > Quotes

“Some books should be tasted, some devoured, but only a few should be chewed and digested thoroughly.”
― Sir Francis Bacon

“If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.”
― Francis Bacon, The Oxford Francis Bacon IV: The Advancement of Learning

“Hope is a good breakfast, but it is a bad supper.”
― Francis Bacon

“A wise man will make more opportunities than he finds.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“Read not to contradict and confute; nor to believe and take for granted; nor to find talk and discourse; but to weigh and consider. Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested: that is, some books are to be read only in parts, others to be read, but not curiously, and some few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“There is no exquisite beauty… without some strangeness in the proportion.”
― Francis Bacon

“Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not; a sense of humor to console him for what he is.”
― Francis Bacon

“Begin doing what you want to do now. We are not living in eternity. We have only this moment, sparkling like a star in our hand--and melting like a snowflake...”
― Sir Francis Bacon

“Man prefers to believe what he prefers to be true.”
― Francis Bacon

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

“Money is a great servant but a bad master.”
― Francis Bacon

“Wonder is the seed of knowledge”
― Francis Bacon

“It is a sad fate for a man to die too well known to everybody else, and still unknown to himself.”
― Francis Bacon

“The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery.”
― Francis Bacon

“In order for the light to shine so brightly, the darkness must be present.”
― Francis Bacon

“Ipsa scientia potestas est.

Knowledge itself is power.”
― Francis Bacon, Meditations Sacrae and Human Philosophy

“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.”
― Francis Bacon

“It is impossible to love and be wise.”
― Francis Bacon

“Read not to contradict and confute, nor to believe and take for granted ...but to weigh and consider.”
― Francis Bacon

“There are two ways of spreading light..to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it.”
― Francis Bacon

“In taking revenge, a man is but even with his enemy; but in passing it over, he is superior.”
― Francis Bacon

“Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to be read, but not curiously; and some few are to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“If we are to achieve things never before accomplished we must employ methods never before attempted”
― Francis Bacon

“The less people speak of their greatness, the more we think of it.”
― Francis Bacon

“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.”
― Francis Bacon, The Collected Works of Sir Francis Bacon (Unexpurgated Edition)

“Champagne for my real friends, real pain for my sham friends”
― Francis Bacon

“Philosophy when superficially studied, excites doubt, when thoroughly explored, it dispels it.”
― Francis Bacon

“God has, in fact, written two books, not just one. Of course, we are all familiar with the first book he wrote, namely Scripture. But he has written a second book called creation.”
― Sir Francis Bacon

“There is no comparison between that which is lost by not succeeding and that which is lost by not trying.”
― Francis Bacon

“Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man.”
― Francis Bacon