Francis Bacon

Reading maketh a full man; and writing an axact man. And, therefore, if a man write little, he need have a present wit; and if he read little, he need have much cunning to seem to know which he does not.

We cannot command Nature except by obeying her.

In taking revenge, a man is but even with his enemy; but in passing it over, he is superior.

There is a wisdom in this beyond the rules of physic: a man’s own observation what he finds good of and what he finds hurt of is the best physic to preserve health.

In every great time there is some one idea at work which is more powerful than any other, and which shapes the events of the time and determines their ultimate issues.

The remedy is worse than the disease.

Having power is not nearly as important as what you choose to do with it.

Anger is short madness

Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.

We meet on the broad pathway of good faith and good will; no advantage shall be taken on either side, but all shall be openness and love. I will not call you children, — for parents sometimes chide their children too severely; nor brothers only, — for brothers differ. The friendship between me and you I will not compare to a chain; for that the rains might rust, or the falling tree might break. We are the same as if one man’s body were to be divided into two parts, we are all one flesh and blood.

Principles have no real force except when one is well-fed.

Dictionaries are like watches, the worst is better than none and the best cannot be expected to go quite true.

There are no days in life so memorable as those which vibrate to some stroke of the imagination.

All great truths begin as blasphemies.

Wine gives a man nothing. It neither gives him knowledge nor wit; it only animates a man, and enables him to bring out what a dread of the company has repressed. It only puts in motion what had been locked up in frost.

Defeat in itself was part and parcel of the great gambling game of politics. A man who could not accept it and try again was not of the stuff of which leaders are made.

Unless you try to do something beyond what you have already mastered, you will never grow.

Don’t be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better.

Intellectual work is misnamed; it is a pleasure, a dissipation, and is its own highest reward.

Fortune makes a fool of those she favors too much.

What could we accomplish if we knew we could not fail?