Bacon: His Writings, and His Philosophy, Volume 1

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C. Knight & Company, 1846

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Page 78 - Reading maketh a full man ; conference a ready man ; and writing an exact man ; and, therefore, if a man write little, he had need have a great memory ; if he confer little, he had need have a present wit ; and if he read little, he need have much cunning, to seem to know that he doth not.
Page 49 - For the wit and mind of man, if it work upon matter, which is the contemplation of the creatures of God, worketh according to the stuff, and is limited thereby ; but if it work upon itself, as the spider worketh his web, then it is endless, and brings forth indeed cobwebs of learning, admirable for the fineness of thread and work, but of no substance or profit.
Page 81 - Judges ought to be more learned than witty ; more reverend than plausible ; and more advised ' than confident. Above all things, integrity is their portion and proper virtue.
Page 36 - 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.
Page 37 - Unmarried men are best friends, best masters, best servants; but not always best subjects; for they are light to run away; and almost all fugitives are of that condition. A single life doth well with churchmen; for charity will hardly water the ground where it must first fill a pool.
Page 37 - Wives are young men's mistresses, companions for middle age, and old men's nurses ; so as a man may have a quarrel 7 to marry when he will: but yet he was reputed one of the wise men that made answer to the question when a man should marry, "A young man not yet, an elder man not at all.
Page 60 - So that if the invention of the ship was thought so noble, which carrieth riches and commodities from place to place, and consociateth the most remote regions in participation of their fruits, how much more are letters to be magnified, which as ships pass through the vast seas of time, and make ages so distant to participate of the wisdom, illuminations, and inventions, the one of the other?
Page 47 - It destroys likewise magnanimity, and the raising of human nature ; for, take an example of a dog and mark what a generosity and courage he will put on when he finds himself maintained by a man, who to him is instead of a God or melior natura...
Page 34 - Certainly, if miracles be the command over nature, they appear most in adversity. It is yet a higher speech of his than the other, (much too high for a heathen,) " It is true greatness to have in one the frailty of a man, and the security of a God :" — " Vere magnum habere fragilitatem hominis, securitatem Dei.
Page 46 - But farther, it is an assured truth and a conclusion of experience, that a little or superficial knowledge of philosophy may incline the mind of man to atheism, but a farther proceeding therein doth bring the mind back again to religion...

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