Thomas Browne
74 quotes
Biography
"Men live by intervals of reason under the sovereignty of humor and passion."
"All things are artificial, for nature is the art of God."
"We carry within us the wonders we seek without us."
"I am the happiest man alive. I have that in me that can convert poverty to riches, adversity to prosperity, and I am more invulnerable than Archilles; Fortune hath not one place to hit me."
"When we desire to confine our words, we commonly say they are spoken under the rose."
"Who will not commend the wit of astrology? Venus, born out of the sea, hath her exaltation in Pisces."
"I could never divide myself from any man upon the difference of an opinion, or be angry with his judgement for not agreeing with me in that, from which perhaps within a few days I should dissent myself."
"A man may be in as just possession of Truth as of a City, and yet be forced to surrender."
"Rich with the spoils of Nature."
"I love to lose myself in a mystery to pursue my reason to an O altitudo."
"I have often admired the mystical way of Pythagoras, and the secret Magic of numbers."
"The severe Schools shall never laugh me out of the Philosophy of Hermes, that this visible world is but a picture of the invisible."
"We carry with us the wonders, we seek without us: There is all Africa, and her prodigies in us; we are that bold and adventurous piece of nature, which he that studies, wisely learns in a compendium, what others labour at in a divided piece and endless volume."
"Art is the perfection of nature."
"Obstinacy in a bad cause, is but constancy in a good."
"Persecution is a bad and indirect way to plant Religion."
"Thus is man that great and true Amphibium, whose nature is disposed to live not only like other creatures in diverse elements, but in divided and distinguished worlds."
"This reasonable moderator, and equal piece of justice, Death."
"I am not so much afraid of death, as ashamed thereof; 'tis the very disgrace and ignominy of our natures, that in a moment can so disfigure us that our nearest friends, Wife, and Children stand afraid and start at us."
"Men that look no further than their outsides, think health an appurtenance unto life, and quarrel with their constitutions for being sick; but I that have examined the parts of man, and know upon what tender filaments that fabric hangs, do wonder that we are not always so; and considering the thousand doors that lead to death, do thank my God that we can die but once."
"We vainly accuse the fury of guns, and the new inventions of death; it is in the power of every hand to destroy us, and we are beholden unto every one we meet he doth not kill us."
"I believe the world grows near its end, yet is neither old nor decayed, nor will ever perish upon the ruins of its own principles."
"How shall the dead arise, is no question of my faith; to believe only possibilities, is not faith, but mere philosophy."
"The heart of man is the place the devil dwells in; I feel sometimes a hell within myself."
"There is no road or ready way to virtue."