Revenge keeps wounds perpetually fresh
In taking revenge a man is but even with his enemy, but in passing it over he is superior. He that studieth revenge keeps his own wounds green, which otherwise would heal and do well.
Suspicions as bats among birds
Suspicions amongst thoughts are like bats amongst birds: they ever fly by twilight. They should be repressed or at least well guarded, because they cloud the mind, lose friends, and check business so that it cannot go on evenly and constantly.
Read, confer, and write proportions
Reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man. Therefore if a man write little he had need have a great memory, if he confer little a present wit, and if he read little he had need have much cunning to seem to know what he does not.
Pilate asking what is truth
Bacon opens the essay 'Of Truth' by citing Pilate, who asked 'What is truth?' and would not stay for an answer. He uses this as the emblem of men who delight in giddy, roving inconstancy of belief and will not fix themselves upon settled truth.
Studies abused when taken whole
Crafty men contemn studies, simple men admire them, and wise men use them, for studies teach not their own use. They serve for delight, ornament, and ability, but to spend too much time in them is sloth and to make judgments wholly by their rules is the humor of a scholar.