Francis Bacon

The pencil of the Holy Ghost hath labored more in describing the afflictions of Job than the felicities of Solomon.

Nothing is pleasant that is not spiced with variety.

It was prettily devised of Aesop, The fly sat on the axle tree of the chariot wheel and said, what dust do I raise!

When a man laughs at his troubles he loses a great many friends. They never forgive the loss of their prerogative.

A sudden bold and unexpected question does many times surprise a man and lay him open.

Histories make men wise; poets, witty; the mathematics, subtle; natural philosophy, deep; moral, grave; logic and rhetoric, able to contend.

Physically there is nothing to distinguish human society from the farm-yard except that children are more troublesome and costly than chickens and calves and that men and women are not so completely enslaved as farm stock.

There is a tendency for things to right themselves.

You have just dined, and however scrupulously the slaughterhouse is concealed in the graceful distance of miles, there is complicity.

If I repent of anything, it is very likely to be my good behavior.

I can be changed by what happens to me. But I refuse to be reduced by it.

I went to the Bach Choir concert and heard Mozart’s Requiem. I did not rise warmly to it. Then I heard an extract from Parsifal which I disliked very much. If Bach wriggles, Wagner writhes…

He has been a doctor a year now and has had two patients, no, three, I think – yes, it was three; I attended their funerals.

We do not count a man’s years until he has nothing else to count.

O friend, never strike sail to a fear! Come into port greatly, or sail with God the seas.

I want to be free; to escape. I use my pen as oars; the paper as my boat. I fill these pages to keep me afloat. I ride the waves of turmoil, so I can paddle away to calmer seas.

The secret of being a bore… is to tell everything.

Life is not long, and too much of it must not pass in idle deliberation how it shall be spent.

When we direct our thoughts properly, we can control our emotions…

If it be an evil to judge rashly or untruly any single man, how much a greater sin it is to condemn a whole people.

He is great who confers the most benefits.