A Harmony of the Essays, Etc. of Francis Bacon

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A. Murray, 1871 - English essays - 584 pages

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Page 336 - They that deny a God destroy man's nobility ; for certainly man is of kin to the beasts by his body ; and if he be not of kin to God by his spirit, he is a base and ignoble creature.
Page xii - Aristotle ; not for the worthlessness of the author, to whom he would ever ascribe all high attributes, but for the unfruitfulness of the way ; being a philosophy (as his lordship used to say) only strong for disputations and contentions, but barren of the production of works for the benefit of the life of man ; in which mind he continued to his dying day.
Page 519 - 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.
Page xviii - No man ever spoke more neatly, more pressly, more weightily, or suffered less emptiness, less idleness, in what he uttered. No member of his speech but consisted of [his] own graces. His hearers could not cough or look aside from him without loss.
Page 500 - Revenge is a kind of wild justice, which the more man's nature runs to, the more ought law to weed it out. For as for the first wrong, it doth but offend the law ; but the revenge of that wrong putteth the law out of office. Certainly, in taking revenge, a man is but even with his enemy ; but in passing it over he is superior : for it is a prince's part to pardon. And Solomon, I am sure, saith, It is the glory of a man to pass by an offence?
Page xxii - I confess that I have as vast contemplative ends, as I have moderate civil ends : for I have taken all knowledge to be my province ; and if I could purge it of two sorts of rovers, whereof the one with frivolous disputations, confutations, and verbosities; the other with blind experiments and auricular traditions and impostures, hath committed so many spoils ; I hope I should bring in industrious observations...
Page 267 - Nay, there are some other that account wife and children but as bills of charges. Nay more, there are some foolish rich covetous men that take a pride in having no children, because they may be thought so much the richer. For perhaps they have heard some talk, Such an one is a great rich man...
Page 574 - In the youth of a state, arms do flourish ; in the middle age of a state, learning ; and then both of them together for a time ; in the declining age of a state, mechanical arts and merchandise.
Page 499 - If it be well weighed, to say that a man lieth, is as much as to say that he is brave towards God and a coward towards men. For a lie faces God, and shrinks from man.
Page xii - Whilst he was commorant in the University, about 16 years of age (as his Lordship hath been pleased to impart unto myself;), he first fell into the dislike of the Philosophy of Aristotle. Not for the worthlessness of the Author, to whom he would ever ascribe all high attributes; but for the unfruitfulness of the way; being a Philosophy (as his Lordship used to say) only strong for disputations and contentions, but barren of the production of Works for the benefit of the Life of Man.

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