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I Use All Sorts Of Things To Work With: Old Brooms, Old Sweaters, And All Kinds Of Peculiar Tools And Materials... I Paint To Excite Myself, And Make Something For Myself.

-Francis Bacon

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I Use All Sorts

Francis Bacon

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I Use All Sorts Of Things To Work With: Old Brooms, Old Sweaters, And All Kinds Of Peculiar Tools And Materials... I Paint To Excite Myself, And Make Something For Myself.

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He That Toucheth Pitch Shall Be Defiled Therewith.

The Great Advantages Of Simulation And Dissimulation Are Three. First To Lay Asleep Opposition And To Surprise. For Where A Man's Intentions Are Published, It Is An Alarum To Call Up All That Are Against Them. The Second Is To Reserve A Man's Self A Fair Retreat: For If A Man Engage Himself, By A Manifest Declaration, He Must Go Through, Or Take A Fall. The Third Is, The Better To Discover The Mind Of Another. For To Him That Opens Himself, Men Will Hardly Show Themselves Adverse; But Will Fair Let Him Go On, And Turn Their Freedom Of Speech To Freedom Of Thought.

Money Is A Good Servant, A Dangerous Master.

There Are Many Wise Men That Have Secret Hearts And Transparent Countenances.

Ill Fortune Never Crushed That Man Whom Good Fortune Deceived Not.

Age Appears To Be Best In Four Things; Old Wood Best To Burn, Old Wine To Drink, Old Friends To Trust, And Old Authors To Read.

Truth Can Never Be Reached By Just Listening To The Voice Of An Authority.

The Natures And Dispositions Of Men Are, Not Without Truth, Distinguished From The Predominance Of The Planets.

Believing That I Was Born For The Service Of Mankind, And Regarding The Care Of The Commonwealth As A Kind Of Common Property Which, Like The Air And The Water, Belongs To Everybody, I Set Myself To Consider In What Way Mankind Might Be Best Served, And What Service I Was Myself Best Fitted By Nature To Perform.

But We Are Not Dedicating Or Building Any Capitol Or Pyramid To Human Pride, But Found A Holy Temple In The Human Intellect, On The Model Of The Universe... For Whatever Is Worthy Of Existence Is Worthy Of Knowledge-which Is The Image (or Echo) Of Existence.

An Illustrational Form Tells You Through The Intelligence Immediately What The Form Is About, Whereas A Non-illustrational Form Works First Upon Sensation And Then Slowly Leaks Back Into The Fact.

The Study Of Nature With A View To Works Is Engaged In By The Mechanic, The Mathematician, The Physician, The Alchemist, And The Magician; But By All As Things Now Are With Slight Endeavour And Scanty Success.

There Ought To Be Gardens For All Months In The Year, In Which, Severally, Things Of Beauty May Be Then In Season.

There Are Two Books Laid Before Us To Study, To Prevent Our Falling Into Error; First, The Volume Of The Scriptures, Which Reveal The Will Of God; Then The Volume Of The Creatures, Which Express His Power.

Journeys At Youth Are Part Of The Education; But At Maturity, Are Part Of The Experience.

The Registering Of Doubts Hath Two Excellent Uses: The One, That It Saveth Philosophy From Errors And Falsehoods; When That Which Is Not Fully Appearing Is Not Collected Into Assertion, Whereby Error Might Draw Error, But Reserved In Doubt: The Other, That The Entry Of Doubts Are As So Many Suckers Or Sponges To Draw Use Of Knowledge; Insomuch As That Which, If Doubts Had Not Preceded, A Man Should Never Have Advised, But Passed It Over Without Note, By The Suggestion And Solicitation Of Doubts, Is Made To Be Attended And Applied.

The Root Of All Superstition Is That Men Observe When A Thing Hits, But Not When It Misses.

Why Should A Man Be In Love With His Fetters, Though Of Gold?

Nothing Is To Be Feared But Fear Itself. Nothing Grievous But To Yield To Grief.

All Bravery Stands Upon Comparisons.

By Indignities Men Come To Dignities.

Boldness Is A Child Of Ignorance

Nobility Of Birth Commonly Abateth Industry.

Young People Are Fitter To Invent Than To Judge; Fitter For Execution Than For Counsel; And More Fit For New Projects Than For Settled Business.

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 Doth Not.

It Is A Great Happiness When Men's Professions And Their Inclinations Accord.

Nature, To Be Commanded, Must Be Obeyed.

For It Is Not Possible To Join Serpentine Wisdom With Columbine Innocence, Except Men Know Exactly All The Conditions Of The Serpent: His Baseness And Going Upon His Belly, His Volubility And Lubricity, His Envy And Sting, And The Rest; That Is, All Forms And Natures Of Evil: For Without This, Virtue Lieth Open And Unfenced.

I Had Rather Believe All The Fables In The Legend, And The Talmud, And The Alcoran, Then That This Universall Frame, Is Without A Minde. And Therefore, God Never Wrought Miracle, To Convince Atheisme, Because His Ordinary Works Convince It. It Is True, That A Little Philosophy Inclineth Mans Minde To Atheisme; But Depth In Philosophy, Bringeth Mens Mindes About To Religion.

Money Is Like Manure, Of Very Little Use Except It Be Spread.

Liberty Of Speech Invites And Provokes Liberty To Be Used Again, And So Bringeth Much To A Man's Knowledge.

Nuptial Love Makes Mankind; Friendly Love Perfects It; But Wanton Love Corrupts And Debases It.

Some Paint Comes Across Directly Onto The Nervous System And Other Paint Tells You The Story In A Long Diatribe Through The Brain.

There Is No Great Concurrence Between Learning And Wisdom.

Disciples Do Owe Their Masters Only A Temporary Belief, And A Suspension Of Their Own Judgment Till They Be Fully Instructed.

The Greatest Trust Between Man And Man Is The Trust Of Giving Counsel.

If A Man Will Begin With Certainties, He Shall End In Doubts, But If He Will Content To Begin With Doubts, He Shall End In Certainties.

I Like, You May Say, The Glitter And Colour That Comes From The Mouth, And I've Always Hoped In A Sense To Be Able To Paint The Mouth Like Monet Painted A Sunset.

It Is The Peculiar And Perpetual Error Of The Human Understanding To Be More Moved And Excited By Affirmatives Than By Negatives

Knowledge Is A Rich Storehouse For The Glory Of The Creator And The Relief Of Man's Estate.

When A Bee Stings, She Dies. She Cannot Sting And Live. When Men Sting, Their Better Selves Die. Every Sting Kills A Better Instinct. Men Must Not Turn Bees And Kill Themselves In Stinging Others.

The Errors Of Young Men Are The Ruin Of Business, But The Errors Of Aged Men Amount To This, That More Might Have Been Done, Or Sooner.

Truth Is A Good Dog; But Always Beware Of Barking Too Close To The Heels Of An Error, Lest You Get Your Brains Kicked Out.

There Was Never Law, Or Sect, Or Opinion Did So Much Magnify Goodness, As The Christian Religion Doth.

Cure The Disease And Kill The Patient.

Painting Is A Duality And Abstract Painting Is An Entirely Aesthetic Thing. It Always Remains On One Level. It Is Only Really Interesting In The Beauty Of Its Patterns Or Its Shapes.

Abstract Painting

In All Negotiations Of Difficulty, A Man May Not Look To Sow And Reap At Once; But Must Prepare Business, And So Ripen It By Degrees.

The Correlative To Loving Our Neighbors As Ourselves Is Hating Ourselves As We Hate Our Neighbors.

We Think According To Nature. We Speak According To Rules. We Act According To Custom.

Men Seem Neither To Understand Their Riches Nor Their Strength. Of The Former They Believe Greater Things Than They Should; Of The Latter, Less.

There Was A Young Man In Rome That Was Very Like Augustus Caesar; Augustus Took Knowledge Of It And Sent For The Man, And Asked Him "was Your Mother Never At Rome?" He Answered "no Sir; But My Father Was."

For Many Parts Of Nature Can Neither Be Invented With Sufficient Subtlety, Nor Demonstrated With Sufficient Perspicuity, Nor Accommodated Unto Use With Sufficient Dexterity, Without The Aid And Intervening Of The Mathematics, Of Which Sort Are Perspective, Music, Astronomy, Cosmography, Architecture, Engineery, And Divers Others.

He That Seeketh To Be Eminent Amongst Able Men Hath A Great Task; But That Is Ever Good For The Public. But He That Plots To Be The Only Figure Amongst Ciphers Is The Decay Of A Whole Age.

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.

Doctor Johnson Said, That In Sickness There Were Three Things That Were Material; The Physician, The Disease, And The Patient: And If Any Two Of These Joined, Then They Get The Victory; For, Ne Hercules Quidem Contra Duos [not Even Hercules Himself Is A Match For Two]. If The Physician And The Patient Join, Then Down Goes The Disease; For Then The Patient Recovers: If The Physician And The Disease Join, That Is A Strong Disease; And The Physician Mistaking The Cure, Then Down Goes The Patient: If The Patient And The Disease Join, Then Down Goes The Physician; For He Is Discredited.

It Cannot Be Denied That Outward Accidents Conduce Much To Fortune, Favor, Opportunity, Death Of Others, Occasion Fitting Virtue; But Chiefly, The Mold Of A Man's Fortune Is In His Own Hands

The Inquiry Of Truth, Which Is The Love-making, Or The Wooing Of It, The Knowledge Of Truth, Which Is The Presence Of It, And The Belief Of Truth, Which Is The Enjoying Of It, Is The Sovereign Good Of Human Nature.

I Have To Hope That My Instincts Will Do The Right Thing, Because I Can't Erase What I Have Done. And If I Drew Something First, Then My Paintings Would Be Illustrations Of Drawings.

Nothing Is To Be Feared But Fear.

When Christ Came Into The World, Peace Was Sung; And When He Went Out Of The World, Peace Was Bequeathed.

God Almighty First Planted A Garden. And Indeed, It Is The Purest Of Human Pleasures.

Philosophers Make Imaginary Laws For Imaginary Commonwealths, And Their Discourses Are As The Stars, Which Give Little Light Because They Are So High.

It's Such An Extraordinary Supple Medium That You Never Do Quite Know What Paint Will Do.

A Man Were Better Relate Himself To A Statue Or Picture Than To Suffer His Thoughts To Pass In Smother.

There Is Little Friendship In The World, And Least Of All Between Equals.

Atheism Leaves A Man To Sense, To Philosophy, To Natural Piety, To Laws, To Reputation, All Which May Be Guides To An Outward Moral Virtue, Though Religion Were Not; But Superstition Dismounts All These, And Erects An Absolute Monarchy In The Minds Of Men.

There Is Nothing Makes A Man Suspect Much, More Than To Know Little.

They Are Happy Men Whose Natures Sort With Their Vocations.

I Foresee It And Yet I Hardly Ever Carry It Out As I Foresee It. It Transforms Itself By The Actual Paint. I Don't In Fact Know Very Often What The Paint Will Do, And It Does Many Things Which Are Very Much Better Than I Could Make It Do.

Parents Who Wish To Train Up Their Children In The Way They Should Go Must Go In The Way In Which They Would Have Their Children Go.

The Human Understanding Is No Dry Light, But Receives An Infusion From The Will And Affections... What A Man Had Rather Were True He More Readily Believes.

It Is The True Office Of History To Represent The Events Themselves, Together With The Counsels, And To Leave The Observations And Conclusions Thereupon To The Liberty And Faculty Of Every Man's Judgment

It Is Madness And A Contradiction To Expect That Things Which Were Never Yet Performed Should Be Effected, Except By Means Hitherto Untried.

It Is A Good Point Of Cunning For A Man To Shape The Answer He Would Have In His Own Words And Propositions, For It Makes The Other Party Stick The Less.

God Almighty First Planted A Garden. And Indeed It Is The Purest Of Human Pleasures. It Is The Greatest Refreshment To The Spirits Of Man, Without Which Buildings And Palaces Are But Gross Handiworks. And A Man Shall Ever See, That When Ages Grow To Civility And Elegancy, Men Come To Build Stately Sooner Than To Garden Finely, As If Gardening Were The Greater Perfection.

Great Riches Have Sold More Men Than They Have Bought.

If A Man's Wit Be Wandering, Let Him Study The Mathematics.

Nothing Is Pleasant That Is Not Spiced With Variety.

Variety Is The Spice Of Life

If I Go To The National Gallery And I Look At One Of The Great Paintings That Excite Me There, It's Not So Much The Painting That Excites Me As That The Painting Unlocks All Kinds Of Valves Of Sensation Within Me Which Return Me To Life More Violently.

...neither Is It Possible To Discover The More Remote And Deeper Parts Of Any Science, If You Stand But Upon The Level Of The Same Science, And Ascend Not To A Higher Science.

A Forbidden Writing Is Thought To Be A Certain Spark Of Truth, That Flies Up In The Face Of Them Who Seek To Tread It Out.

Begin Doing What You Want To Do Now. We Are Not Living In Eternity. We Have Only This Moment, Sparkling Like A Star In Our Hand - And Melting Like A Snowflake.

Human Knowledge And Human Power Meet In One; For Where The Cause Is Not Known The Effect Cannot Be Produced. Nature To Be Commanded Must Be Obeyed; And That Which In Contemplation Is As The Cause Is In Operation As The Rule.

The Nature Of Things Betrays Itself More Readily Under The Vexations Of Art Than In Its Natural Freedom.

Nay, Number Itself In Armies Importeth Not Much, Where The People Is Of Weak Courage; For, As Virgil Saith, It Never Troubles The Wolf How Many The Sheep Be.

No One Has Yet Been Found So Firm Of Mind And Purpose As Resolutely To Compel Himself To Sweep Away All Theories And Common Notions, And To Apply The Understanding, Thus Made Fair And Even, To A Fresh Examination Of Particulars. Thus It Happens That Human Knowledge, As We Have It, Is A Mere Medley And Ill-digested Mass, Made Up Of Much Credulity And Much Accident, And Also Of The Childish Notions Which We At First Imbibed.

Painting Gave Meaning To My Life Which Without It Would Not Have Had

Rebellions Of The Belly Are The Worst.

It Is In Life As It Is In Ways, The Shortest Way Is Commonly The Foulest, And Surely The Fairer Way Is Not Much About.

Truth Is The Daughter Of Time, Not Of Authority.

If You Dissemble Sometimes Your Knowledge Of That You Are Thought To Know, You Shall Be Thought, Another Time, To Know That You Know Not.

Spouses Are Great Impediments To Great Enterprises.

Lies Are Sufficient To Breed Opinion, And Opinion Brings On Substance.

Of All The Things In Nature, The Formation And Endowment Of Man Was Singled Out By The Ancients.

A Much Talking Judge Is An Ill-tuned Cymbal.

Those That Want Friends To Open Themselves Unto Are Cannibals Of Their Own Hearts.

Mind Your Own Business

The Best Preservative To Keep The Mind In Health Is The Faithful Admonition Of A Friend.

The Greatest Vicissitude Of Things Amongst Men, Is The Vicissitude Of Sects And Religions.

Libraries Are As The Shrine Where All The Relics Of The Ancient Saints, Full Of True Virtue, And That Without Delusion Or Imposture, Are Preserved And Reposed.

It Is A Secret Both In Nature And State, That It Is Safer To Change Many Things Than One.

Beauty Itself Is But The Sensible Image Of The Infinite.

Write Down The Thoughts Of The Moment. Those That Come Unsought For Are Commonly The Most Valuable.

Anger Is Certainly A Kind Of Baseness; As It Appears Well In The Weakness Of Those Subjects In Whom It Reigns; Children, Women, Old Folks, Sick Folks. Only Men Must Beware, That They Carry Their Anger Rather With Scorn, Than With Fear; So That They May Seem Rather To Be Above The Injury, Than Below It; Which Is A Thing Easily Done, If A Man Will Give Law To Himself In It.

[science Is] The Labor And Handicraft Of The Mind.

God Has Placed No Limits To The Exercise Of The Intellect He Has Given Us, On This Side Of The Grave.

There Is A Cunning Which We In England Call The Rning Of The Cat In The Pan.

In Mathematics I Can Report No Deficiency, Except It Be That Men Do Not Sufficiently Understand The Excellent Use Of Pure Mathematics.

First Therefore Let Us Seek The Dignity Of Knowledge In The Archetype Or First Platform, Which Is In The Attributes And Acts Of God, As Far As They Are Revealed To Man And May Be Observed With Sobriety; Wherein We May Not Seek It By The Name Of Learning; For All Learning Is Knowledge Acquired, And All Knowledge In God Is Original: And Therefore We Must Look For It By Another Name, That Of Wisdom Or Sapience, As The Scriptures Call It.

For No Man Can Forbid The Spark Nor Tell Whence It May Come.

Prosperity Discovers Vice, Adversity Discovers Virtue.

There Is No Comparison Between That Which Is Lost By Not Succeeding And That Which Is Lost By Not Trying.

The Mold Of Our Fortunes Is In Our Own Hands.

Great Art Is Deeply Ordered. Even If Within The Order There May Be Enormously Instinctive And Accidental Things, Nevertheless They Come Out Of A Desire For Ordering And For Returning Fact Onto The Nervous System In A More Violent Way.

The Person Is A Poor Judge Who By An Action Can Be Disgraced More In Failing Than They Can Be Honored In Succeeding.

To Spend Too Much Time In Studies Is Sloth; To Use Them Too Much For Ornament Is Affection; To Make Judgment Wholly By Their Rules Is The Humor Of A Scholar.

Of All Virtues And Dignities Of The Mind, Goodness Is The Greatest

The Master Of Superstition, Is The People; And In All Superstition, Wise Men Follow Fools; And Arguments Are Fitted To Practice, In A Reversed Order.

One Always Starts Work With The Subject, No Matter How Tenuous It Is, And One Constructs An Artificial Structure By Which One Can Trap The Reality Of The Subject-matter That One Has Started From.

But The Images Of Men's Wits And Knowledges Remain In Books, Exempted From The Wrong Of Time, And Capable Of Perpetual Renovation.

I Should Have Been, I Don't Know, A Con-man, A Robber Or A Prostitute. But It Was Vanity That Made Me Choose Painting, Vanity And Chance.

I Want To Make Portraits And Images. I Don't Know How. Out Of Despair, I Just Use Paint Anyway. Suddenly The Things You Make Coagulate And Take On Just The Shape You Intend. Totally Accurate Marks, Which Are Outside Representational Marks.

Judges Must Beware Of Hard Constructions And Strained Inferences, For There Is No Worse Torture Than That Of Laws.

One Of The Seven [wise Men Of Greece] Was Wont To Say: That Laws Were Like Cobwebs, Where The Small Flies Are Caught And The Great Break Through.

Always Let Losers Have Their Words.

I Would Like My Pictures To Look As If A Human Being Had Passed Between Them, Like A Snail, Leaving A Trail Of The Human Presence And Memory Trace Of Past Events, As The Snail Leaves Its Slime.

A Picture Should Be A Re-creation Of An Event Rather Than An Illustration Of An Object; But There Is No Tension In The Picture Unless There Is A Struggle With The Object.

Nothing Destroys Authority More Than The Unequal And Untimely Interchange Of Power Stretched Too Far And Relaxed Too Much.

Therefore If A Man Look Sharply And Attentively, He Shall See Fortune; For Though She Be Blind, Yet She Is Not Invisible.

We Are Much Beholden To Machiavel And Others, That Write What Men Do, And Not What They Ought To Do.

A Little Science Estranges A Man From God; A Lot Of Science Brings Him Back.

The Human Understanding When It Has Once Adopted An Opinion (either As Being The Received Opinion Or As Being Agreeable To Itself) Draws All Things Else To Support And Agree With It. And Though There Be A Greater Number And Weight Of Instances To Be Found On The Other Side, Yet These It Either Neglects And Despises, Or Else By Some Distinction Sets Aside And Rejects, In Order That By This Great And Pernicious Predetermination The Authority Of Its Former Conclusions May Remain Inviolate.

God Loveth The Clean.

People Usually Think According To Their Inclinations, Speak According To Their Learning And Ingrained Opinions, But Generally Act According To Custom.

The Human Understanding, When Any Preposition Has Been Once Laid Down... Forces Everything Else To Add Fresh Support And Confirmation; And Although More Cogent And Abundant Instances May Exist To The Contrary, Yet It Either Does Not Observe Them Or It Despises Them, Or It Gets Rid Of And Rejects Them By Some Distinction, With Violent And Injurious Prejudice, Rather Than Sacrifice The Authority Of Its First Conclusions.

When I Paint I Am Ageless, I Just Have The Pleasure Or The Difficulty Of Painting.

Acorns Were Good Until Bread Was Found.

Natural Abilities Are Like Natural Plants, That Need Pruning By Study; And Studies Themselves Do Give Forth Directions Too Much At Large, Except They Be Bounded In By Experience.

Great Boldness Is Seldom Without Some Absurdity.

Death Is A Friend Of Ours; And He That Is Not Ready To Entertain Him Is Not At Home.

Philosophy When Superficially Studied, Excites Doubt, When Thoroughly Explored, It Dispels It.

Overcoming Doubt

Riches Are For Spending.

The Creative Process Is A Cocktail Of Instinct, Skill, Culture And A Highly Creative Feverishness.

The End Of Our Foundation Is The Knowledge Of Causes; And Secret Motions Of Things; And The Enlarging Of The Bounds Of Human Empire, To The Effecting Of All Things Possible.

Discretion Of Speech Is More Than Eloquence, And To Speak Agreeably To Him With Whom We Deal Is More Than To Speak In Good Words, Or In Good Order.

Time Is The Author Of Authors.

Men Leave Their Riches Either To Their Kindred Or Their Friends, And Moderate Portions Prosper Best In Both.

Ipsa Scientia Potestas Est. (knowledge Itself Is Power.)

Custom Is The Principle Magistrate Of Man's Life.

Again Men Have Been Kept Back As By A Kind Of Enchantment From Progress In Science By Reverence For Antiquity, By The Authority Of Men Counted Great In Philosophy, And Then By General Consent.

A Lie Faces God And Shrinks From Man.

Nature Is Often Hidden, Sometimes Overcome, Seldom Extinguished.

But I Account The Use That A Man Should Seek Of The Publishing Of His Own Writings Before His Death, To Be But An Untimely Anticipation Of That Which Is Proper To Follow A Man, And Not To Go Along With Him.

To Conclude, Therefore, Let No Man Upon A Weak Conceit Of Sobriety Or An Ill-applied Moderation Think Or Maintain That A Man Can Search Too Far, Or Be Too Well Studied In The Book Of God's Word, Or The Book Of God's Works, Divinity Or Philosophy; But Rather Let Men Endeavor An Endless Progress Or Proficience In Both; Only Let Men Beware That They Apply Both To Charity, And Not To Swelling; To Use, And Not To Ostentation; And Again, That They Do Not Unwisely Mingle Or Confound These Learnings Together.

Nothing Doth So Much Keep Men Out Of The Church, And Drive Men Out Of The Church, As Breach Of Unity.

Man, As The Minister And Interpreter Of Nature, Is Limited In Act And Understanding By His Observation Of The Order Of Nature; Neither His Understanding Nor His Power Extends Further.

The Human Understanding Of Its Own Nature Is Prone To Suppose The Existence Of More Order And Regularity In The World Than It Finds.

The Joys Of Parents Are Secret, And So Are Their Grieves And Fears.

Travel, In The Younger Sort, Is A Part Of Education; In The Elder, A Part Of Experience. He That Travelleth Into A Country Before He Hath Some Entrance Into The Language, Goeth To School, And Not To Travel.

I Do Not Believe That Any Man Fears To Be Dead, But Only The Stroke Of Death.

The Dignity Of This End Of Endowment Of Man's Life With New Commodity Appeareth By The Estimation That Antiquity Made Of Such As Guided Thereunto ; For Whereas Founders Of States, Lawgivers, Extirpators Of Tyrants, Fathers Of The People, Were Honoured But With The Titles Of Demigods, Inventors Ere Ever Consecrated Among The Gods Themselves.

Suspicion Amongst Thoughts Are Like Bats Amongst Birds, They Never Fly By Twilight.

The Eye Of Understanding Is Like The Eye Of The Sense; For As You May See Great Objects Through Small Crannies Or Levels, So You May See Great Axioms Of Nature Through Small And Contemptible Instances.

For Friends... Do But Look Upon Good Books: They Are True Friends, That Will Neither Flatter Nor Dissemble.

When A Doubt Is Once Received, Men Labour Rather How To Keep It A Doubt Still, Than How To Solve It; And Accordingly Bend Their Wits.

Nor Do Apophthegms Only Serve For Ornament And Delight, But Also For Action And Civil Use, As Being The Edge-tools Of Speech Which Cut And Penetrate The Knots Of Business And Affairs: For Occasions Have Their Revolutions, And What Has Once Been Advantageously Used May Be So Again, Either As An Old Thing Or A New One.

We Must See Whether The Same Clock With Weights Will Go Faster At The Top Of A Mountain Or At The Bottom Of A Mine; It Is Probable, If The Pull Of The Weights Decreases On The Mountain And Increases In The Mine, That The Earth Has Real Attraction.

Generally He Perceived In Men Of Devout Simplicity This Opinion: That The Secrets Of Nature Were The Secrets Of God, Part Of That Glory Into Which Man Is Not To Press Too Boldly.

Children Sweeten Labours. But They Make Misfortune More Bitter. They Increase The Care Of Life. But They Mitigate The Remembrance Of Death. The Perpetuity Of Generation Is Common To Beasts. But Memory, Merit And Noble Works Are Proper To Men. And Surely A Man Shall See 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.

Man Seeketh In Society Comfort, Use And Protection.

The Stage Is More Beholding To Love Than The Life Of Man. For As To The Stage, Love Is Ever Matter Of Comedies And Now And Then Of Tragedies; But In Life It Doth Much Mischief, Sometimes Like A Siren, Sometimes Like A Fury.

But The Best Demonstration By Far Is Experience, If It Go Not Beyond The Actual Experiment.

Base And Crafty Cowards Are Like The Arrow That Flieth In The Dark.

He That Will Not Apply New Remedies Must Expect New Evils; For Time Is The Greatest Innovator.

Believe Not Much Them That Seem To Despise Riches, For They Despise Them That Despair Of Them.

Friendship Increases In Visiting Friends, But In Visiting Them Seldom.

As You Work, The Mood Grows On You. There Are Certain Images Which Suddenly Get Hold Of Me And I Really Want To Do Them. But It's True To Say That The Excitement And Possibilities Are In The Working And Obviously Can Only Come In The Working.

I Will Never Be An Old Man. To Me, Old Age Is Always 15 Years Older Than I Am.

I Loathe My Own Face, And I've Done Self-portraits Because I've Had Nobody Else To Do.

It Is Natural To Die As To Be Born.

If Vices Were Profitable, The Virtuous Man Would Be The Sinner.

A King That Would Not Feel His Crown Too Heavy For Him, Must Wear It Every Day; But If He Think It Too Light, He Knoweth Not Of What Metal It Is Made.

The Human Understanding Is Like A False Mirror, Which, Receiving Rays Irregularly, Distorts And Discolors The Nature Of Things By Mingling Its Own Nature With It.

Truth ... Is The Sovereign Good Of Human Nature.

It's Not What We Profess But What We Practice That Gives Us Integrity.

The Idols Of Tribe Have Their Foundation In Human Nature Itself, And In The Tribe Or Race Of Men. For It Is A False Assertion That The Sense Of Man Is The Measure Of Things. On The Contrary, All Perceptions As Well Of The Sense As Of The Mind Are According To The Measure Of The Individual And Not According To The Measure Of The Universe. And The Human Understanding Is Like A False Mirror, Which, Receiving Rays Irregularly, Distorts And Discolors The Nature Of Things By Mingling Its Own Nature With It.

The Zeal Which Begins With Hypocrisy Must Conclude In Treachery At First It Deceives, At Last It Betrays

A Just Fear Of An Imminent Danger, Though Be No Blow Given, Is A Lawful Cause Of War.

The Breath Of Flowers Is Far Sweeter In The Air Than In The Hand.

The Surest Way To Prevent Seditions...is To Take Away The Matter Of Them.

He That Cannot Possibly Mend His Own Case Will Do What He Can To Impair Another's.

The Men Of Experiment Are Like The Ant, They Only Collect And Use; The Reasoners Resemble Spiders, Who Make Cobwebs Out Of Their Own Substance. But The Bee Takes The Middle Course, It Gathers Its Material From The Flowers Of The Garden And Field, But Transforms And Digests It By A Power Of Its Own.

Histories Make Men Wise; Poets, Witty; The Mathematics, Subtle; Natural Philosophy, Deep; Moral, Grave; Logic And Rhetoric, Able To Contend.

Painting Today Is Pure Intuition And Luck And Taking Advantage Of What Happens When You Splash The Stuff Down.

The Poets Did Well To Conjoin Music And Medicine, In Apollo, Because The Office Of Medicine Is But To Tune The Curious Harp Of Man's Body And Reduce It To Harmony.

Truth Emerges More Readily From Error Than From Confusion.

It Is Impossible To Love And To Be Wise.

Let No One Think Or Maintain That A Person Can Search Too Far Or Be Too Well Studied In Either The Book Of God's Word Or The Book Of God's Works.

If There Be Fuel Prepared, It Is Hard To Tell Whence The Spark Shall Come That Shall Set It On Fire.

Another Argument Of Hope May Be Drawn From This-that Some Of The Inventions Already Known Are Such As Before They Were Discovered It Could Hardly Have Entered Any Man's Head To Think Of; They Would Have Been Simply Set Aside As Impossible. For In Conjecturing What May Be Men Set Before Them The Example Of What Has Been, And Divine Of The New With An Imagination Preoccupied And Colored By The Old; Which Way Of Forming Opinions Is Very Fallacious, For Streams That Are Drawn From The Springheads Of Nature Do Not Always Run In The Old Channels.

Out Of Monuments, Names, Words Proverbs ...and The Like, We Do Save And Recover Somewhat From The Deluge Of Time.

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