Desire of praise disposeth to laudable actions.

Unnecessary laws are not good laws, but traps for money.

The errors of definitions multiply themselves according as the reckoning proceeds; and lead men into absurdities, which at last they see but cannot avoid, without reckoning anew from the beginning.

Passions unguided are for the most part mere madness.

The original of all great and lasting societies consisted not in the mutual good will men had toward each other, but in the mutual fear they had of each other.

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.

Such is the nature of men, that howsoever they may acknowledge many others to be more witty, or more eloquent, or more learned; yet they will hardly believe there be many so wise as themselves.