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.
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.
But the best demonstration by far is experience, if it go not beyond the actual experiment.
The logic now in use serves rather to fix and give stability to the errors which have their foundation in commonly received notions than to help the search for truth. So it does more harm than good.
Let every student of nature take this as his rule, that whatever the mind seizes upon with particular satisfaction is to be held in suspicion.
It is not the lie that passeth through the mind, but the lie that sinketh in and settleth in it, that doth the hurt.
A graceful and pleasing figure is a perpetual letter of recommendation.
A good name is like precious ointment ; it filleth all round about, and will not easily away; for the odors of ointments are more durable than those of flowers.
Brutes by their natural instinct have produced many discoveries, whereas men by discussion and the conclusions of reason have given birth to few or none.
Again there is another great and powerful cause why the sciences have made but little progress; which is this. It is not possible to run a course aright when the goal itself has not been rightly placed.
When Christ came into the world, peace was sung; and when He went out of the world, peace was bequeathed.
It is idle to expect any great advancement in science from the superinducing and engrafting of new things upon old. We must begin anew from the very foundations, unless we would revolve for ever in a circle with mean and contemptible progress.
The folly of one man is the fortune of another.
A bad man is worse when he pretends to be a saint.
There are many wise men that have secret hearts and transparent countenances.
In nature things move violently to their place, and calmly in their place.
Deformed persons commonly take revenge on nature.
Certainly, it is heaven upon earth, to have a man’s mind move in charity, rest in providence, and turn upon the poles of truth.
Such philosophy as shall not vanish in the fume of subtile, sublime, or delectable speculation but shall be operative to the endowment and betterment of man’s life.
Never any knowledge was delivered in the same order it was invented.