Quotes from Francis Bacon

He that seeketh to be eminent amongst able men hath a great task; but that is ever good for the public. But he that plots to be the only figure amongst ciphers is the decay of a whole age.

The inclination to goodness is imprinted deeply in the nature of man.

Mark what a generosity and courage (a dog) will put on when he finds himself maintained by a man, who to him is instead of a God

The errors of young men are the ruin of business, but the errors of aged men amount to this, that more might have been done, or sooner.

When a doubt is once received, men labour rather how to keep it a doubt still, than how to solve it; and accordingly bend their wits.

A man must make his opportunity, as oft as find it.

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

There are many wise men that have secret hearts and transparent countenances.

The noblest works and foundations have proceeded from childless men, which have sought to express the images of their minds where those of their bodies have failed.

Since custom is the principal magistrate of man's life, let men by all means endeavor to obtain good customs.

The genius of any single man can no more equal learning, than a private purse hold way with the exchequer.

Come home to men's business and bosoms.

A lie faces God and shrinks from man.

The more a man drinketh of the world, the more it intoxicateth.

Men ought to find the difference between saltiness and bitterness. Certainly, he that hath a satirical vein, as he maketh others afraid of his wit, so he had need be afraid of others' memory.

Because the acts or events of true history have not that magnitude which satisfieth the mind of man, poesy feigneth acts and events greater and more heroical.

The human understanding is no dry light, but receives an infusion from the will and affections... What a man had rather were true he more readily believes.

It is good discretion not make too much of any man at the first; because one cannot hold out that proportion.

All authority must be out of a man's self, turned . . . either upon an art, or upon a man.

Defer not charities till death; for certainly, if a man weigh it rightly, he that doth so is rather liberal of another man's than of his own.

Nothing doth so much keep men out of the Church, and drive men out of the Church, as breach of unity.

Man was formed for society.

For it is most true that a natural and secret hatred and aversation towards society in any man, hath somewhat of the savage beast.

A man were better relate himself to a statue or picture than to suffer his thoughts to pass in smother.