Quotes from bacon francis ii

Seek first the virtues of the mind; and other things either will come, or will not be wanted.

It is a miserable state of mind to have few things to desire and many things to fear.

As the births of living creatures at first are ill-shapen, so are all innovations, which are the births of time.

A man that hath no virtue in himself ever envieth virtue in others.

And for matter of policy and government, that learning, should rather hurt, than enable thereunto, is a thing very improbable.

Men's weaknesses and faults are best known from their enemies.

Discretion of speech, is more than eloquence.

Who then to frail mortality shall trust But limns the water, or but writes in dust.

A man that studieth revenge keeps his own wounds green.

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.

Young men, in the conduct and manage of actions, embrace more than they can hold; stir more than they can quiet; fly to the end, without consideration of the means and degrees; pursue some few principles, which they have chanced upon absurdly; care not to innovate, which draws unknown inconveniences; use extreme remedies at first; and, that which doubleth all errors, will not acknowledge or retract them; like an unready horse, that will neither stop nor turn.