“Covenants, without the sword, are but words and of no strength to secure a man at all.”

Life itself is but Motion, and can never be without Desire, nor without Feare, no more than without Sense.

Now I am about to take my last voyage, a great leap in the dark.

War consisteth not in battle only, or the act of fighting but in a tract of time,wherein the will to contend by battle is sufficiently known.

Knowledge is power.

Desire, to know why, and how, curiosity; such as is in no living creature but man

If I read as many books as most men do, I would be as dull-witted as they are.

Words are the counters of wise men, and the money of fools.

The secret thoughts of a man run over all things, holy, profane, clean, obscene, grave, and light, without shame or blame.

Fact be virtuous, or vicious, as Fortune pleaseth.

Eloquence, with flattery, disposeth men to confide in them that have it; because the former is seeming wisdom, the latter seeming kindness.

No arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear and danger of violent death; and the life of man solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.

The understanding is by the flame of the passions never enlightened, but dazzled.

Look not at the greatness of the evil past, but the greatness of the good to follow.

Men are moved by appetites and aversions.

True’ and ‘false’ are attributes of speech, not of things. And where speech is not, there is neither ‘truth’ nor ‘falsehood.

Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of war, where every man is enemy to every man, the same consequent to the time wherein men live without other security than what their own strength and their own invention shall furnish them withal.

If a man could have half of his wishes, he would double his troubles.

The heart of a fool is in his mouth, but the mouth of a wise man is in his heart.

Man is the cruelest animal.

Man must understand his universe in order to understand his destiny.

When a man is in love, jealous, and just whipped by the Inquisition, he is no longer himself.

A man who really fights for justice must lead a private, not a public, life if he is to survive for even a short time.

I wouldn’t be the man I am today without the woman who agreed to marry me 20 years ago

A hard man is good to find.