Francis Bacon

A prudent question is one-half of wisdom.

Who ever is out of patience is out of possession of their soul.

Certainly virtue is like precious odors, most fragrant when they are incensed, or crushed: for prosperity does best discover vice, but adversity does best discover virtue.

Riches are for spending.

Age appears to be best in four things; old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read.

If a man’s wit be wandering, let him study the mathematics.

Prejudice is a burden that confuses the past, threatens the future and renders the present inaccessible.

Let us not be too particular; it is better to have old secondhand diamonds than none at all.

Nuptial love makes mankind; friendly love perfects it; but wanton love corrupts and debases it.

Men lose their tempers in defending their taste.

Dictators ride to and fro upon tigers which they dare not dismount. And the tigers are getting hungry.

Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome.

There is no thought in any mind, but it quickly tends to convert itself into power.

One lesson we learn early, that in spite of seeming difference, men are all of one pattern. We readily assume this with our mates, and are disappointed and angry if we find that we are premature, and that their watches are slower than ours. In fact, the only sin which we never forgive in each other is difference of opinion.

The only way to know is to live, learn, and grow.

Opening amenities are often opening inanities.

Superstition is to religion what astrology is to astronomy the mad daughter of a wise mother. These daughters have too long dominated the earth.

Since time is the one immaterial object which we cannot influence – neither speed up nor slow down, add to nor diminish – it is an imponderably valuable gift.

I said there was nothing so convincing to an Indian as a general massacre. If he could not approve of the massacre, I said the next surest thing for an Indian was soap and education. Soap and education are not as sudden as a massacre, but they are more deadly in the long run; because a half-massacred Indian may recover, but if you educate him and wash him, it is bound to finish him some time or other.

Reading made Don Quixote a gentleman, but believing what he read made him mad.

What men call social virtues, good fellowship, is commonly but the virtue of pigs in a litter, which lie close together to keep each other warm.