The Essays Quotes

“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

“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

“Salomon saith, There is no new thing upon the earth. So that as Plato had an imagination, that all knowledge was but remembrance; so Salomon giveth his sentence, that all novelty is but oblivion.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“Money is like manure, its only good if you spread it around.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“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.”
― 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.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“To spend too much time in studies is sloth; to use them too much for ornament, is affectation; to make judgment wholly by their rules, is the humor of a scholar”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“A Man must make his opportunity,as oft as find it ”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays of Sir Francis Bacon

“The surest way to prevent seditions...is to take away the matter of them.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“The way of fortune, is like the Milken Way in the sky; which is a meeting or knot of a number of small stars; not seen asunder, but giving light together.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“God never wrought miracle to convince atheism, because his ordinary works convince it. It is true, that a little philosophy inclineth man’s mind to atheism; but depth in philosophy bringeth men’s minds about to religion.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“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.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“Beauty is as summer fruits, which are easy to corrupt, and cannot last; and for the most part it makes a dissolute youth, and an age a little out of countenance; but yet certainly again, if it light well, it maketh virtue shine, and vices blush.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“So if a man's wit be wandering, let him study the mathematics.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“The eye of the human understanding is not a naked organ of perception (lumen siccum), but an eye imbued with moisture by Will and Passion. Man always believes what he determines to believe.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“Salomon saith, There is no new thing upon the earth. So that as Plato had an imagination, that all knowledge was but remembrance; so Salomon giveth his sentence, that all novelty is but oblivion.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“God Almighty first planted a garden: and indeed it is the purest of human pleasures.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“Virtue is like a rich stone, best plain set.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“Where a man cannot fitly play his own part; if he have not a friend, he may quit the stage.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“Men in great place are thrice servants, servants to the sovereign or state, servants of fame, and servants of business, so as they have freedom, neither in their persons, nor in their actions, nor in their times.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“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.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“The folly of one man is the fortune of another.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“For friendship maketh indeed a fair day in the affections, from storm and tempests; but it maketh daylight in the understanding, out of darkness and confusion of thoughts.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“But it is not only the difficulty and labor which men take in finding out of truth, nor again that when it is found it imposeth upon men's thoughts, that doth bring lies in favor; but a natural though corrupt love of the lie itself.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“Certainly fame is like a river, that beareth up things light and swoln, and drowns things weighty and solid.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“Studies serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability. Their chief use for delight is in privateness and retiring; for ornament, is in discourse; and for ability, is in the judgement and execution of business.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“Doth any man doubt, that if there were taken out of men's minds vain opinions, flattering hopes, false valuations, imaginations as one would, and the like, but it would leave the minds of a number of men poor shrunken things, full of melancholy and indisposition, and unpleasing to themselves?”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays

“A man's nature runs either to herbs or weeds; therefore like him seasonably water the one, and destroy the other.”
― Francis Bacon, The Essays