Francis Bacon Quotes

There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion.

Write down the thoughts of the moment. Those that come unsought for are commonly the most valuable.

Antiquitas saeculi juventus mundi.

Natural abilities are like natural plants; they need pruning by study.

But the Idols of the Market Place are the most troublesome of all — idols which have crept into the understanding through the alliances of words and names. For men believe that their reason governs words; but it is also true that words react on the understanding; and this it is that has rendered philosophy and the sciences sophistical and inactive.

Fame is of that force, as there is scarcely any great action wherein it hath not a great part, especially in the war. Mucianus undid Vitellius by a fame that he scattered, that Vitellius had in purpose to remove the legions of Syria into Germany, and the legions of Germany into Syria; whereupon the legions of Syria were infinitely inflamed. Julius Cæsar took Pompey unprovided, and laid asleep his industry and preparations by a fame that he cunningly gave out, how Cæsar’s own soldiers loved him not; and being wearied with the wars, and laden with the spoils of Gaul, would forsake him as soon as he came into Italy. Livia settled all things for the succession of her son Tiberius, by continually giving out that her husband Augustus was upon recovery and amendment; and it is a usual thing with the bashaws to conceal the death of the Grand Turk from the janizaries and men of war, to save the sacking of Constantinople, and other towns, as their manner is. Themistocles made Xerxes, king of Persia, post apace out of Græcia, by giving out that the Grecians had a purpose to break his bridge of ships which he had made athwart Hellespont.

قد لا أعتقد بجميع القصص و الأساطير التي جاءت بالكتب الدينية ولكن لا يمكن أن أعتقد بعدم وجود عقل مدبر لهذا العالم. إن القليل من الفلسفة ينزع بعقل الإنسان إلى الإلحاد ولكن التعمق فيها ينتهي بعقول الناس إلى الإيمان لأن عقل الإنسان عندما ينظر إلى الأسباب الثانوية المبعثرة قد يتوقف عندها ولا يتجاوزها، ولكن عندما يشاهد تسلسلها و اتحادها، و اتصالها بعضها بعضا ينتهي به ذلك إلى الإيمان بوجود العناية الإلهية.

But of one thing I am satisfied, that the reason for which a vacuum was introduced by Leucippus and Democritus (namely, that without it the same bodies could not embrace and fill sometimes larger and sometimes smaller spaces) is a false one. For matter is clearly capable of folding and unfolding itself in space, within certain limits, without the interposition of a vacuum; nor is there in air two thousand times as much of vacuity as there is in gold.

Knowledge, that tendeth but to satisfaction, is but as a courtesan, which is for pleasure, and not for fruit or generation.

Virtue is like precious odours, more fragrant when they are incensed or crushed; for prosperity doth best discover vice, but adversity doth best discover virtue.

...the specious meditations, speculations, and theories of mankind are but a kind of insanity, only there is no one to stand by and observe it.

You shall read (saith he) that we are commanded to forgive our enemies; but you never read, that we are commanded to forgive our friends. But yet the spirit of Job was in a better tune: Shall we (saith he) take good at God's hands, and not be content to take evil also? And so of friends in a

The beginning is from God: for the business which is in hand, having the character of good so strongly impressed upon it, appears manifestly to proceed from God, who is the author of good, and the Father of Lights. Now in divine operations even the smallest beginnings lead of a certainty to their end. And as it was said of spiritual things, "The kingdom of God cometh not with observation," so is it in all the greater works of Divine Providence; everything glides on smoothly and noiselessly, and the work is fairly going on "before men are aware that it has begun. Nor should the prophecy of Daniel be forgotten, touching the last ages of the world: —"Many shall go to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased;" clearly intimating that the thorough passage of the world (which now by so many distant voyages seems to be accomplished, or in course of accomplishment), and the advancement of the sciences, are destined by fate, that is, by Divine Providence, to meet in the same age.

Let men learn (as we have said above) the difference that exists between the idols of the human mind, and the ideas of the Divine mind. The former are mere arbitrary abstractions; the latter the true marks of the Creator on his creatures, as they are imprinted on, and defined in matter, by true and exquisite touches. Truth, therefore, and utility are here perfectly identical.

The cause and root of nearly all evils in the sciences is this — that while we falsely admire and extol the powers of the human mind we neglect to seek for its true helps.