Incredulity is not wisdom, but the worst kind of folly. It is folly, because it causes ignorance and mistake, with all the consequents of these; and it is very bad, as being accompanied with disingenuity, obstinacy, rudeness, uncharitableness, and the like bad dispositions; from which credulity itself, the other extreme sort of folly, is exempt.
Isaac BarrowSin is never at a stay; if we do not retreat from it, we shall advance in it; and the farther on we go, the more we have to come back.
Isaac BarrowChance never writ a legible book; chance never built a fair house; chance never drew a neat picture; it never did any of these things, nor ever will; nor can it be without absurdity supposed able to do them; which yet are works very gross and rude, very easy and feasible, as it were, in comparison to the production of a flower or a tree.
Isaac BarrowIf men are wont to play with swearing anywhere, can we expect they should be serious and strict therein at the bar or in the church.
Isaac BarrowMathematics - the unshaken Foundation of Sciences, and the plentiful Fountain of Advantage to human affairs.
Isaac BarrowIt is a fair adornment of a man and a great convenience both to himself and to all those with whom he converses and deals, to act uprightly, uniformly, and consistently. The practice of piety frees a man from interior distraction and from irresolution in his mind, from duplicity or inconstancy in his character, and from confusion in his proceedings, and consequently securing for others freedom from deception and disappointment in their transactions with him.
Isaac Barrow