1620s

Chiefly, the mould of a man's fortune is in his own hands.

1625

★ 7.0

For what a man had rather were true he more readily believes.

Novum Organum · 1620

★ 7.0

The joys of parents are secret, and so are their griefs and fears.

Philosophy is written in this grand book-I mean the universe-which stands continually open to our gaze, but it cannot be understood unless one first learns to comprehend the language and interpret the characters in which it is written. It is written in the language of mathematics, and its characters are triangles, circles, and other geometrical figures, without which it is humanly impossible to understand a single word of it; without these, one is wandering about in a dark labyrinth.

1625

★ 7.0

Galileo Galilei

1623

★ 6.9

Men fear death as children fear to go in the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased with tales, so is the other.

1625

★ 6.9

God Almighty first planted a garden; and, indeed, it is the purest of human pleasures.

No man is an Island, entire of itself...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

1625

★ 6.9

John Donne

Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, and severall steps in my Sicknes · 1624

★ 6.9

Scientific literature

All we know is still infinitely less than all that still remains unknown.

William Harvey

1628

★ 6.1

Nature to be commanded must be obeyed.

Being thus arrived in a good harbor, and brought safe to land, they fell upon their knees and blessed the God of Heaven, who had brought them over the vast and furious ocean, and delivered them from all the perils and miseries thereof, again to set their feet on the firm and stable earth, their proper element.

Novum Organum · 1620

★ 5.5

Personal journal

William Bradford

Of Plymouth Plantation · 1620

★ 5.2

Poem

The way to bliss lies not on beds of down, And he that had no cross deserves no crown.

Francis Quarles

1621

★ 5.2

Sermon · Religious literature

It comes equally to us all, and makes us all equal.

John Donne

1621

★ 3.7

Poem

He was not of an age but for all time!

Ben Jonson

1623

★ 3.7

Hope is a good Break-fast, but it is a bad Supper.

Apophthegms New and Old · 1625

★ 3.7

Be so true to thyself as thou be not false to others.

1625

★ 3.7

There is nothing makes a man suspect much, more than to know little.

1625

★ 3.7

Nothing is more pleasant to the eye than green grass kept finely shorn.

1625

★ 3.7

Nothing doth more hurt in a state than that cunning men pass for wise.

1625

★ 3.7

Age will not be defied.

1625

★ 3.7

Why should man be in love with his fetters, though of gold?

But it pleased God to visit us then with death daily, and with so general a disease that the living were scarce able to bury the dead.

The Remains · 1626

★ 3.7

Personal journal

William Bradford

Of Plymouth Plantation · 1621

★ 3.6

The new philosophy proceeds from the world, the book of God.

Tommaso Campanella

1622

★ 3.6

Age, that Age appeared to be best in four things: Old Wood best to burn, Old Wine to drink, Old Friends to trust, and old Authors to read.

1625

★ 3.6

A little philosophy inclineth man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion.

1625

★ 3.6

Prosperity doth best discover Vice; But Adversity doth best discover Vertue.

1625

★ 3.6

He was reputed one of the wise men that made answer to the question when a man should marry, "A young man not yet, an elder man not at all."

1625

★ 3.6

Prosperity is the Blessing of the Old Testament; Adversity is the Blessing of the New.

All mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated.

1625

★ 3.6

John Donne

Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, and severall steps in my Sicknes · 1624

★ 3.5

They that deny a God destroy a man's nobility, for certainly man is of a kin to the beasts by his body; and if he be not of kin to God by his spirit, he is a base and ignoble creature.

1625

★ 3.5

Riches are for spending.

The Lord has more truth yet to break forth out of his holy word.

1625

★ 2.0

Sermon · Speech

John Robinson

1620

★ 1.9

A mere madness, to live like a wretch and die rich.

The Anatomy of Melancholy · 1621

★ 1.9

Why doth one man's yawning make another yawn?

The Anatomy of Melancholy · 1621

★ 1.9

All my joys to this are folly, Naught so sweet as melancholy.

The Anatomy of Melancholy · 1621

★ 1.9

The desire of power in excess caused the angels to fall; the desire of knowledge in excess caused man to fall.

Essays or Counsels, Civil and Moral · 1625

★ 1.9

If a man be gracious and courteous to strangers, it shows he is a citizen of the world.

When a traveller returneth home, let him not leave the countries where he hath travelled altogether behind him.

1625

★ 1.9

Essay · Travel writing

1625

★ 1.9

Reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man.

1625

★ 1.9

Revenge is a kind of wild justice, which the more man's nature runs to, the more ought law to weed it out.

Perfection is the child of Time.

Essays or Counsels, Civil and Moral · 1625

★ 1.9

Joseph Hall

1625

★ 1.9

Speech · Political speech

Magna Charta is such a fellow, that he will have no sovereign.

Edward Coke

1628

★ 1.9

Every man hath a good and bad angel attending on him in particular, all his life long.

The Anatomy of Melancholy · 1621

★ 1.9

One was never married, and that's his hell; another is, and that's his plague.

The Anatomy of Melancholy · 1621

★ 1.9

The commonwealth of Venice in their armory have this inscription: "Happy is that city which in time of peace thinks of war."

To desire to have many books, and never to use them, is like a childe that will have a candle burning by him all the while he is sleeping.

The Anatomy of Melancholy · 1621

★ 1.9

Henry Peacham

1622

★ 1.9

Essay · Sociology

He that hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune; for they are impediments to great enterprises, either of virtue or mischief. Certainly the best works, and of greatest merit for the public, have proceeded from the unmarried or childless men; which, both in affection and means, have married and endowed the public.

Travel, in the younger sort, is a part of education; in the elder, a part of experience. He that travelleth into a country before he hath some entrance into the language, goeth to school, and not to travel.

Essays or Counsels, Civil and Moral · 1625

★ 1.9

Essay · Travel writing

Reason is the life of the law, nay the common law itself is nothing else but reason.

1625

★ 1.9

Treatise · Legal writing

Edward Coke

1628

★ 1.9

Treatise · Legal writing

How long soever it hath continued, if it be against reason, it is of no force in law.

Edward Coke

1628

★ 1.9

Shall I wasting in despair Die because a woman's fair? Or make pale my cheeks with care 'Cause another's rosy are? Be she fairer than the day, Or the flow'ry meads in May, If she be not so to me, What care I how fair she be?

George Wither

Fair Virtue · 1622

★ 1.8

Treatise

In architecture as in all other operative arts, the end must direct the operation. The end is to build well. Well building hath three conditions. Commodity, firmness, and delight.

Henry Wotton

1624

★ 1.8

A wise man will make more opportunties than he finds.

I will govern according to the common weal, but not according to the common will.

1625

★ 1.2

Speech · Political speech

James I

1621

★ 1.1

Prosperity is not without many Feares and Distastes; and Adversity is not without Comforts and Hopes.