Salomon saith, There is no new thing upon the earth. So that as Plato had an imagination, that all knowledge was but remembrance; so Salomon giveth his sentence, that all novelty is but oblivion.
Francis BaconRead
The subtlety of nature is greater many times over than the subtlety of the senses and understanding.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Nature's complexities surpass our ability to perceive and comprehend them.
Francis Bacon emphasizes the idea that the intricacies of nature are far more profound than what we, through our limited senses and understanding, can grasp. This quote encourages a sense of humility regarding our knowledge of the natural world and suggests that there are depths of complexity that remain beyond our reach and comprehension.
Themes
NatureSubtletyUnderstandingSensesComplexity
In practice
Example use cases
During a nature conservation talk, one might use this quote to highlight the complexities of ecosystems.
More from Francis Bacon
All quotes →Nothing doth more hurt in a state than that cunning men pass for wise.
Francis BaconRead
Truth emerges more readily from error than from confusion.
Francis BaconRead
Great art is always a way of concentrating, reinventing what is called fact, what we know of our existence- a reconcentration… tearing away the veils, the attitudes people acquire of their time and earlier time. Really good artists tear down those veils
Francis BaconRead
Wise men make more opportunities than they find.
Francis BaconRead
Knowledge and human power are synonymous.
Francis BaconRead
Similar quotes
The good life of any river may depend on the perception of its music; and the preservation of some music to perceive.
Aldo LeopoldRead
Soon as the evening shades prevail, The moon takes up the wondrous tale, And nightly to the listening earth Repeats the story of her birth.
Joseph AddisonRead
...Nature builds up her refined and invisible architecture, with a delicacy eluding our conception, yet with a symmetry and beauty which we are never weary of admiring.
John HerschelRead
Give me a Wildness whose glance no civilization can endure.
Henry David ThoreauRead
Momo listened to everyone and everything - even to the rain and the wind and the pine trees - and all of them spoke to her after their own fashion.
Michael EndeRead
Nature is a tropical swamp in sunshine, on whose purlieus we hear the song of summer birds, and see prismatic dewdrops, - but her interiors are terrific, full of hydras and crocodiles.
Ralph Waldo EmersonRead