It is fairer to tax people on what they extract from the economy, as roughly measured by their consumption, than to tax them on what they produce for the economy, as roughly measured by their income.

Appetite, with an opinion of attaining, is called hope; the same, without such opinion, despair.

Prophecy is many times the principal cause of the events foretold.

I put for the general inclination of all mankind, a perpetual and restless desire of power after power, that ceaseth only in death.

Humans are driven by a perpetual and restless desire of power.

Opinion of ghosts, ignorance of second causes, devotion to what men fear, and talking of things casual for prognostics, consisteth the natural seeds of religion

Seeing then that truth consisteth in the right ordering of names in our affirmations, a man that seeketh precise truth, had need to remember what every name he uses stands for; and to place it accordingly; or else he will find himself entangled in words, as a bird in lime-twigs; the more he struggles, the more belimed.