Francis Bacon

Atheism is rather in the lip than in the heart of man.

He that hath knowledge spareth his words.

He that hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune, for they are impediments to great enterprises, either of virtue or mischief. Certainly the best works and of greatest merit for the public have proceeded from the unmarried or childless men, which both in affection and means have married and endowed the public. He was reputed one of the wise men that made answer to the question, when a man should marryA young man not yet, an elder man not at all.

Things alter for the worse spontaneously, if they be not altered for the better designedly.

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

Who questions much, shall learn much, and retain much.

There are still many causes worth sacrificing for, so much history yet to be made.

Have good trust in yourself … not in the One that you think you should be, but in the One that you are.

Children demand that their heroes should be freckleless, and easily believe them so: perhaps a first discovery to the contrary is less revolutionary shock to a passionate child than the threatened downfall of habitual beliefs which makes the world seem to totter for us in maturer life.

What we hope ever to do with ease, we must learn first to do with diligence.

We estimate the wisdom of nations by seeing what they did with their surplus capital.

He is armed without who is innocent within, be this thy screen, and this thy wall of brass.

Poetry is the art of uniting pleasure with truth.

Dharma is what the Buddha taught. It is the way of understanding and love-how to understand, how to love, how to make understanding and love into real things.

As peace is the end of war, so to be idle is the ultimate purpose of the busy.

The ship of heaven guides itself and will not accept a wooden rudder.

He that will not apply new remedies must expect new evils; for time is the greatest innovator.

The roses under my window make no reference to former roses or better ones; they are what they are; they exist with God today. There is no time to them. There is simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its existence.

Nothing is to be preferred before justice.

We are all alike, on the inside.

In every author let us distinguish the man from his works.