Francis Bacon

Truth emerges more readily from error than from confusion.

Studies perfect nature and are perfected still by experience.

Suspicion amongst thoughts are like bats amongst birds, they never fly by twilight.

Lies are sufficient to breed opinion, and opinion brings on substance.

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

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

How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live.

Private men, in fine, are so much their own, that, paying common dues, they are sovereigns of all the rest. Yet the public must and will be served; and they that do it well, deserve public marks of honour and respect. To do so, men must have public minds, as well as salaries; or they will serve private ends at the public cost. Government can never be well administered, but where those intrusted make conscience of well discharging their places.

So far as a person thinks; they are free.

If life must not be taken too seriously, then so neither must death.

History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does rhyme.

There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.

When you are present, you can allow the mind to be as it is without getting entangled in it.

There are German songs which can make a stranger to the language cry.

Whatever you do, you need courage. Whatever course you decide upon, there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong. There are always difficulties arising that tempt you to believe your critics are right. To map out a course of action and follow it to an end requires some of the same courage that a soldier needs. Peace has its victories, but it takes brave men and women to win them.

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Speak what you think now in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said to-day. — `Ah, so you shall be sure to be misunderstood.’ — Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood.

If you don’t like the weather in New England, just wait a few minutes.

If it’s your job to eat a frog, it’s best to do it first thing in the morning. And If it’s your job to eat two frogs, it’s best to eat the biggest one first.

In the word of no master am I bound to believe.

All philosophies, if you ride them home, are nonsense, but some are greater nonsense than others.

This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; the being a force of Nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.