Francis Bacon - Essays (1597)

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There is a cunning which we in England call "the turning of the cat in the pan;" which is, when that which a man says to another, he lays it as if another had said it to him.

Francis Bacon
Death…openeth the gate to good fame, and extinguisheth envy.

Francis Bacon
Houses are built to live in and not to look on; therefore let use be preferred before uniformity, except where both may be had.

Francis Bacon
It hath been an opinion that the French are wiser than they seem, and the Spaniards seem wiser than they are; but howsoever it be between nations, certainly it is so between man and man.

Francis Bacon
To seek to extinguish anger utterly, is but a bravery of the Stoics. We have better oracles: Be angry, but sin not. Let not the sun go down upon your anger. Anger must be limited and confined, both in race and in time.

Francis Bacon
It is yet a higher speech of his than the other, It is true greatness to have in one the frailty of a man and the security of a god.

Francis Bacon
The greatest vicissitude of things amongst men is the vicissitude of sects and religions.

Francis Bacon
Young men are fitter to invent than to judge, fitter for execution than for counsel, and fitter for new projects than for settled business.

Francis Bacon
Nature is often hidden; sometimes overcome; seldom extinguished.

Francis Bacon
There is nothing that makes a man suspect much, more than to know little; and, therefore, men should remedy suspicion by procuring to know more, and not to keep their suspicions to smother.

Francis Bacon
The winning of honor, is but the revealing of a man's virtue and worth, without disadvantage.

Francis Bacon
The virtue of prosperity, is temperance; the virtue of adversity, is fortitude; which in morals is the more heroical virtue. Prosperity is the blessing of the Old Testament; adversity is the blessing of the New; which carrieth the greater benediction, and the clearer revelation of God's favor. Yet even in the Old Testament, if you listen to David's harp, you shall hear as many hearse-like airs as carols; and the pencil of the Holy Ghost hath labored more in describing the afflictions of Job, than the felicities of Solomon. Prosperity is not without many fears and distastes; and adversity is not without comforts and hopes.

Francis Bacon
The difficulties in princes' business are many and great, but the greatest difficulty is often in their own mind.

Francis Bacon
As the births of living creatures at first are ill-shapen, so are all Innovations, which are the births of time.

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

Francis Bacon
He that cannot possibly mend his own case will do what he can to impair another's.

Francis Bacon
Excusations, cessions, modesty itself well governed, are but arts of ostentation.

Francis Bacon
The colors that show best by candlelight are white, carnation, and a kind of sea-water green.

Francis Bacon
Nothing doth so much keep men out of the Church, and drive men out of the Church, as breach of unity.

Francis Bacon
The noblest works and foundations have proceeded from childless men, which have sought to express the images of their minds where those of their bodies have failed.

Francis Bacon
For fountains, they are a Great Beauty and Refreshment, but Pools mar all, and make the Garden unwholesome, and full of Flies and Frogs.

Francis Bacon
Envy is ever joined with the comparing of a man's self; and where there is no comparison, no envy.

Francis Bacon
In things that are tender and unpleasing, it is good to break the ice by some one whose words are of less weight, and to reserve the more weighty voice to come in as by chance.

Francis Bacon
A man cannot speak to his son, but as a father; to his wife, but as a husband; to his enemy, but upon terms: whereas a friend may speak, as the case requires, and not as it sorteth with the person.

Francis Bacon
A principal fruit of friendship, is the ease and discharge of the fullness and swellings of the heart, which passions of all kinds do cause and induce.

Francis Bacon
Since custom is the principal magistrate of man's life, let men by all means endeavor to obtain good customs.

Francis Bacon
Why should I be angry with a man for loving himself better than me?

Francis Bacon
A man were better relate himself to a statue or picture than to suffer his thoughts to pass in smother.

Francis Bacon
When a traveler returneth home, let him not leave the countries where he hath traveled altogether behind him.

Francis Bacon
Diseases of the body may have appropriate exercises; bowling is good for the stone and veins, shooting for the lungs and breast, gentle walking for the stomach, riding for the head and the like.

Francis Bacon