Francis Bacon

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

God has placed no limits to the exercise of the intellect he has given us, on this side of the grave.

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

A man must make his opportunity, as oft as find it.

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

He that hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune; for they are impediments to great enterprises, either of virtue or mischief.

Nobody should pin their hopes on a miracle.

As soon as questions of will or decision or reason or choice of action arise human science is at a loss.

In the middle of a recession, where we’re just climbing out of it, where the economy -unemployment is still at 9.7 percent, the idea of raising taxes and reducing spending is a prescription for disaster.

An educational system should cultivate from kindergarten to graduate school, and in the best cases sometimes does, and that leads to people who are, at least by my standards, well educated.?

An ideal form of government is democracy tempered with assassination.

The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum – even encourage the more critical and dissident views. That gives people the sense that there’s free thinking going on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate.

We have a tax-raising power in Scotland but not in English regions. I want genuine regional taxation powers [in England].

Artillery is the god of war.

Governments, like clocks, go from the motion men give them, and as governments are made and moved by men, so by them they are ruined too. Wherefore governments rather depend upon men than men upon governments. Let men be good, and the government cannot be bad; if it be ill, they will cure it. But, if men be bad, let the government be ever so good, they will endeavor to warp and spoil it to their turn.

Don’t be a bottleneck. If a matter is not a decision for the President or you, delegate it. Force responsibility down and out. Find problem areas, add structure and delegate. The pressure is to do the reverse. Resist it.

Politics are almost as exciting as war, and quite as dangerous. In war you can only be killed once, but in politics many times.

There is not, nor should there be, an irreconcilable contrast between the individual and the collective, between the interests of an individual person and the interests of the collective.

Wanton killing of innocent civilians is terrorism, not a war against terrorism.

For Russia, there is not and there may not be another political option but democracy. However, Russian democracy is… not at all the realization of standards imposed on us from outside.

The illegal immigrants who have taken jobs that should go to people here legally, while over 20 percent of Americans are currently unemployed or underemployed.