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

Some books should be tasted, some devoured, but only a few should be chewed and digested thoroughly.

All the crimes on earth do not destroy so many of the human race nor alienate so much property as drunkenness.

Books will speak plain when counselors blanch.

When a doubt is once received, men labour rather how to keep it a doubt still, than how to solve it; and accordingly bend their wits.

The French are wiser than they seem, and the Spaniards seem wiser than they are.

For what a man would like to be true, that he more readily believes.