Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Alban PC KCwas an English philosopher, statesman, scientist, jurist, orator, and author. He served both as Attorney General and as Lord Chancellor of England. After his death, he remained extremely influential through his works, especially as philosophical advocate and practitioner of the scientific method during the scientific revolution...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth21 January 1561
arises error readily truth
Truth arises more readily from error than from confusion.
truth sovereign human-nature
Truth ... is the sovereign good of human nature.
truth needs fiction
Truth is so hard to tell, it sometimes needs fiction to make it plausible.
truth daylight naked
Truth is a naked and open daylight
truth pleasure standing
No pleasure is comparable to the standing upon the vantage-ground of truth.
truth answers said
What is truth? said jesting Pilate; and would not stay for an answer.
fashion truth discovery
There are and can be only two ways of searching into and discovering truth. The one flies from the senses and particulars to the most general axioms, and from these principles, the truth of which it takes for settled and immovable, proceeds to judgment and to the discovery of middle axioms. And this way is now in fashion. The other derives axioms from the senses and particulars, rising by a gradual and unbroken ascent, so that it arrives at the most general axioms last of all. This is the true way, but as yet untried.
truth errors giving
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.
truth failure frustration
Truth emerges more readily from error than from confusion.
truth science scientist
Science is but an image of the truth.
dog truth errors
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.
friends-or-friendship sincere solitude worst
The worst solitude is to be destitute of sincere friendship.
faculties fortunate fortune giving light men number rather scarce seen smaller
The way of fortune is like the milky way in the sky; which is a number of smaller stars, not seen asunder, but giving light together; so it is a number of little and scarce discerned virtues, or rather faculties and customs, that make men fortunate
man wise
The wise man will make more opportunities than he finds.