A List of Famous Francis Bacon Quotes By Reference

A list of quotes from Francis Bacon. Here are the best Francis Bacon quotes on various subjects. The Francis Bacon quotations list is alphabetical but can be sorted by any column. Enjoy these sayings coined by Francis Bacon. You're able to copy this factual list to build your own just like it, re-rank it to fit your opinions, then publish it to share it with your Twitter followers, Facebook friends or with any other social networks you use on a regular basis.

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1

A good conscience is a continual feast.

Francis Bacon

Conscience
2

A graceful and pleasing figure is a perpetual letter of recommendation.

Francis Bacon

Grace
3

A man who contemplates revenge keeps his wounds green.

Francis Bacon

Revenge
4

A prudent question is one-half of wisdom.

Francis Bacon

Question
5

A sudden bold and unexpected question doth many times surprise a man and lay him open.

Francis Bacon

Question
6

A wise man will make more opportunities than he finds.

Francis Bacon

Opportunity
7

Acorns were good until bread was found.

Francis Bacon

Improvement
8

Age will not be defied.

Francis Bacon

Age and Aging
9

All colors will agree in the dark.

Francis Bacon

Prejudice
10

Anger makes dull men witty -- but it keeps them poor.

Francis Bacon

Anger
11

Antiquities are history defaced, or some remnants of history which have casually escaped the shipwreck of time.

Francis Bacon

Past
12

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

Francis Bacon

Innovation
13

Ask counsel of both timesof the ancient time what is best, and of the latter time what is fittest.

Francis Bacon

Uncategorised
14

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

Francis Bacon

Atheism
15

Be not penny-wise. Riches have wings. Sometimes they fly away of themselves, and sometimes they must be set flying to bring in more.

Francis Bacon

Money
16

Boldness is ever blind, for it sees not dangers and inconveniences whence it is bad in council though good in execution.

Francis Bacon

Boldness
17

By indignities men come to dignities.

Francis Bacon

Insults
18

Certainly the best works, and of greatest merit for the public, have proceeded from the unmarried, or childless men.

Francis Bacon

Bachelor
19

Choose the life that is most useful, and habit will make it the most agreeable.

Francis Bacon

Choice
20

Consistency is the foundation of virtue.

Francis Bacon

Consistency
21

Croesus said to Cambyses; That peace was better than war; because in peace the sons did bury their fathers, but in wars the fathers did bury their sons.

Francis Bacon

Uncategorised
22

Cure the disease and kill the patient.

Francis Bacon

Physician
23

Discern of the coming on of years, and think not to do the same things still; for age will not be defied.

Francis Bacon

Age and Aging
24

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.

Francis Bacon

Discretion
25

Fame is like a river, that beareth up things light and swollen, and drowns things weighty and solid.

Francis Bacon

Fame
26

For a crowd is not company; and faces are but a gallery of pictures; and talk but a tinkling cymbal, where there is no love.

Francis Bacon

Love
27

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.

Francis Bacon

Wisdom
28

For my name and memory I leave to men's charitable speeches, and to foreign nations and the next ages.

Francis Bacon

Heresy
29

Fortune is like the market, where, many times, if you can stay a little, the price will fall.

Francis Bacon

Fate
30

God almighty first planted a garden: and, indeed, it is the purest of human pleasure.

Francis Bacon

Gardening and Gardens
31

God hangs the greatest weights upon the smallest wires.

Francis Bacon

Providence
32

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

Francis Bacon

Intelligence and Intellectuals
33

God's first creature, which was light.

Francis Bacon

Creation
34

Good fame is like fire; when you have kindled you may easily preserve it; but if you extinguish it, you will not easily kindle it again.

Francis Bacon

Fame
35

He that gives good advice, builds with one hand; he that gives good counsel and example, builds with both; but he that gives good admonition and bad example, builds with one hand and pulls down with the other.

Francis Bacon

Advice
36

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

Francis Bacon

Family
37

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.

Francis Bacon

Uncategorised
38

He that will not apply new remedies, must expect new evils: for Time is the greatest innovator: and if Time, of course, alter things to the worse, and wisdom and counsel shall not alter them to the better, what shall be the end?.

Francis Bacon

Problem
39

Histories make men wise; poets, witty; the mathematics, subtle; natural philosophy, deep; moral, grave; logic and rhetoric, able to contend.

Francis Bacon

History and Historians
40

Hope is a good breakfast but a bad supper.

Francis Bacon

Hope
41

Houses are built to live in, and not to look on: therefore let use be preferred before uniformity.

Francis Bacon

Home
42

I do not believe that any man fears to be dead, but only the stroke of death.

Francis Bacon

Death and Dying
43

I had rather believe all the Fables in the Legend, and the Talmud, and the Alcoran, than that this universal frame is without a Mind.

Francis Bacon

Atheism
44

I hold every man a debtor to his profession.

Francis Bacon

Professions and Professionals
45

I would live to study, and not study to live.

Francis Bacon

Studying
46

If a man be gracious and courteous to strangers, it shows he is a citizen of the world.

Francis Bacon

Courtesy
47

If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts, but if he will be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.

Francis Bacon

Certainty
48

If money be not they servant, it will be thy master. The covetous man cannot so properly be said to possess wealth, as that may be said to possess him.

Francis Bacon

Money
49

If we begin with certainties, we shall end in doubts; but if we begin with doubts, and are patient in them, we shall end in certainties.

Francis Bacon

Certainty
50

Ill Fortune never crushed that man whom good fortune deceived not.

Francis Bacon

Fate
51

Imagination was given man to compensate for what he is not, and a sense of humor to console him for what he is.

Francis Bacon

Humour
52

In charity there is no excess.

Francis Bacon

Charity
53

In contemplation, if a man begins with certainties he shall end in doubts; but if he be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.

Francis Bacon

Doubt
54

In every great time there is some one idea at work which is more powerful than any other, and which shapes the events of the time and determines their ultimate issues.

Francis Bacon

Ideas
55

In thinking, if a person begins with certainties, they shall end in doubts, but if they can begin with doubts, they will end in certainties.

Francis Bacon

Thoughts and Thinking
56

It is a miserable state of mind to have few things to desire and many things to fear.

Francis Bacon

Fear
57

It is a pleasure to stand upon the shore, and to see ships tost upon the sea: a pleasure to stand in the window of a castle, and to see a battle and the adventures thereof below: but no pleasure is comparable to standing upon the vantage ground of truth... and to see the errors, and wanderings, and mists, and tempests, in the vale below.

Francis Bacon

Truth
58

It is a strange desire, to seek power, and to lose liberty; or to seek power over others, and to lose power over a man's self.

Francis Bacon

Power
59

It is as hard and severe a thing to be a true politician as to be truly moral.

Francis Bacon

Politicians and Politics
60

It is as natural to die as to be born; and to a little infant, perhaps, the one is as painful as the other.

Francis Bacon

Death and Dying
61

It is natural to die as to be born.

Francis Bacon

Death and Dying
62

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.

Francis Bacon

History and Historians
63

It is true, that a little philosophy inclineth man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion.

Francis Bacon

Atheism
64

It was prettily devised of Aesop, The fly sat on the axle tree of the chariot wheel and said, what dust do I raise!

Francis Bacon

Action
65

Judges ought to be more learned than witty, more reverent than plausible, and more advised than confident. Above all things, integrity is their portion and proper virtue.

Francis Bacon

Law and Lawyers
66

Knowledge and human power are synonymous.

Francis Bacon

Knowledge
67

Knowledge is Power

Francis Bacon
68

Knowledge is power.

Francis Bacon, Ed Murphy

Knowledge
69

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

Francis Bacon

Lies and Lying
70

Life, an age to the miserable, and a moment to the happy.

Francis Bacon

Life and Living
71

Look to make your course regular, that men may know beforehand what they may expect.

Francis Bacon

Consistency
72

Many a man's strength is in opposition, and when he faileth, he grows out of use.

Francis Bacon

Opposition
73

Men fear death as children fear to go in the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased with tales, so is the other.

Francis Bacon

Fear
74

Men of age object too much, consult too long, adventure too little, repent too soon, and seldom drive business home to the full period, but content themselves with a mediocrity of success.

Francis Bacon

Age and Aging
75

Men on their side must force themselves for a while to lay their notions by and begin to familiarize themselves with facts.

Francis Bacon

Fact
76

Money is like muck, not good except it be spread.

Francis Bacon

Money
77

Money makes a good servant, but a bad master.

Francis Bacon

Money
78

Mysteries are due to secrecy.

Francis Bacon

Mystery
79

Nakedness is uncomely, as well in mind as body, and it addeth no small reverence to men's manners and actions if they be not altogether open. Therefore set it down: That a habit of secrecy is both politic and moral.

Francis Bacon

Nudity
80

Natural abilities are like natural plants; they need pruning by study.

Francis Bacon

Ability
81

Nature is commanded by obeying her.

Francis Bacon

Nature
82

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.

Francis Bacon

Uncategorised
83

Next to religion, let your care be to promote justice.

Francis Bacon

Justice
84

No man's fortune can be an end worthy of his being.

Francis Bacon

Money
85

None of the affections have been noted to fascinate and bewitch but envy.

Francis Bacon

Envy
86

Nothing destroys authority more than the unequal and untimely interchange of power stretched too far and relaxed too much.

Francis Bacon

Power
87

Nothing is pleasant that is not spiced with variety.

Francis Bacon

Variety
88

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

Francis Bacon

Love
89

Of great wealth there is no real use, except in its distribution, the rest is just conceit.

Francis Bacon

Conceit
90

Old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read.

Francis Bacon

Age and Aging
91

Opportunity makes a thief.

Francis Bacon

Opportunity
92

Our humanity is a poor thing, except for the divinity that stirs within us.

Francis Bacon

Humankind
93

People of age object too much, consult too long, adventure too little, repent too soon and seldom drive business home to it's conclusion, but content themselves with a mediocrity of success.

Francis Bacon

Age and Aging
94

People of great position are servants times three, servants of their country, servants of fame, and servants of business.

Francis Bacon

Servants
95

People usually think according to their inclinations, speak according to their learning and ingrained opinions, but generally act according to custom.

Francis Bacon

Custom
96

Philosophy when superficially studied, excites doubt, when thoroughly explored, it dispels it.

Francis Bacon

Doubt
97

Pictures and shapes are but secondary objects and please or displease only in the memory.

Francis Bacon

Painters and Painting
98

Prosperity discovers vice, adversity discovers virtue.

Francis Bacon

Prosperity
99

Prosperity is not without many fears and distastes; adversity not without many comforts and hopes.

Francis Bacon

Adversity
100

Read not to contradict and confute; nor to believe and take for granted; nor to find talk and discourse; but to weigh and consider.

Francis Bacon

Books and Reading

Showing items 1 - 25 of 154

A List of Famous Francis Bacon Quotes you can use this list to help make your own ranked list about this topic

A good conscience is a continual feast.

A graceful and pleasing figure is a perpetual letter of recommendation.

A man who contemplates revenge keeps his wounds green.

A prudent question is one-half of wisdom.

A sudden bold and unexpected question doth many times surprise a man and lay him open.

A wise man will make more opportunities than he finds.

Acorns were good until bread was found.

Age will not be defied.

All colors will agree in the dark.

Anger makes dull men witty -- but it keeps them poor.

Antiquities are history defaced, or some remnants of history which have casually escaped the shipwreck of time.

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

Ask counsel of both timesof the ancient time what is best, and of the latter time what is fittest.

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

Be not penny-wise. Riches have wings. Sometimes they fly away of themselves, and sometimes they must be set flying to bring in more.

Boldness is ever blind, for it sees not dangers and inconveniences whence it is bad in council though good in execution.

By indignities men come to dignities.

Certainly the best works, and of greatest merit for the public, have proceeded from the unmarried, or childless men.

Choose the life that is most useful, and habit will make it the most agreeable.

Consistency is the foundation of virtue.

Croesus said to Cambyses; That peace was better than war; because in peace the sons did bury their fathers, but in wars the fathers did bury their sons.

Cure the disease and kill the patient.

Discern of the coming on of years, and think not to do the same things still; for age will not be defied.

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.

Fame is like a river, that beareth up things light and swollen, and drowns things weighty and solid.

For a crowd is not company; and faces are but a gallery of pictures; and talk but a tinkling cymbal, where there is no love.

For my name and memory I leave to men's charitable speeches, and to foreign nations and the next ages.

Fortune is like the market, where, many times, if you can stay a little, the price will fall.

God almighty first planted a garden: and, indeed, it is the purest of human pleasure.

God hangs the greatest weights upon the smallest wires.

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

God's first creature, which was light.

Good fame is like fire; when you have kindled you may easily preserve it; but if you extinguish it, you will not easily kindle it again.

He that gives good advice, builds with one hand; he that gives good counsel and example, builds with both; but he that gives good admonition and bad example, builds with one hand and pulls down with the other.

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

He that will not apply new remedies, must expect new evils: for Time is the greatest innovator: and if Time, of course, alter things to the worse, and wisdom and counsel shall not alter them to the better, what shall be the end?.

Histories make men wise; poets, witty; the mathematics, subtle; natural philosophy, deep; moral, grave; logic and rhetoric, able to contend.

Hope is a good breakfast but a bad supper.

Houses are built to live in, and not to look on: therefore let use be preferred before uniformity.

I do not believe that any man fears to be dead, but only the stroke of death.

I had rather believe all the Fables in the Legend, and the Talmud, and the Alcoran, than that this universal frame is without a Mind.

I hold every man a debtor to his profession.

I would live to study, and not study to live.

If a man be gracious and courteous to strangers, it shows he is a citizen of the world.

If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts, but if he will be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.

If money be not they servant, it will be thy master. The covetous man cannot so properly be said to possess wealth, as that may be said to possess him.

If we begin with certainties, we shall end in doubts; but if we begin with doubts, and are patient in them, we shall end in certainties.

Ill Fortune never crushed that man whom good fortune deceived not.

Imagination was given man to compensate for what he is not, and a sense of humor to console him for what he is.

In charity there is no excess.

In contemplation, if a man begins with certainties he shall end in doubts; but if he be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.

In every great time there is some one idea at work which is more powerful than any other, and which shapes the events of the time and determines their ultimate issues.

In thinking, if a person begins with certainties, they shall end in doubts, but if they can begin with doubts, they will end in certainties.

It is a miserable state of mind to have few things to desire and many things to fear.

It is a strange desire, to seek power, and to lose liberty; or to seek power over others, and to lose power over a man's self.

It is as hard and severe a thing to be a true politician as to be truly moral.

It is as natural to die as to be born; and to a little infant, perhaps, the one is as painful as the other.

It is natural to die as to be born.

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 true, that a little philosophy inclineth man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion.

It was prettily devised of Aesop, The fly sat on the axle tree of the chariot wheel and said, what dust do I raise!

Judges ought to be more learned than witty, more reverent than plausible, and more advised than confident. Above all things, integrity is their portion and proper virtue.

Knowledge and human power are synonymous.

Knowledge is Power

Knowledge is power.

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

Life, an age to the miserable, and a moment to the happy.

Look to make your course regular, that men may know beforehand what they may expect.

Many a man's strength is in opposition, and when he faileth, he grows out of use.

Men fear death as children fear to go in the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased with tales, so is the other.

Men of age object too much, consult too long, adventure too little, repent too soon, and seldom drive business home to the full period, but content themselves with a mediocrity of success.

Men on their side must force themselves for a while to lay their notions by and begin to familiarize themselves with facts.

Money is like muck, not good except it be spread.

Money makes a good servant, but a bad master.

Mysteries are due to secrecy.

Nakedness is uncomely, as well in mind as body, and it addeth no small reverence to men's manners and actions if they be not altogether open. Therefore set it down: That a habit of secrecy is both politic and moral.

Natural abilities are like natural plants; they need pruning by study.

Nature is commanded by obeying her.

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.

Next to religion, let your care be to promote justice.