Men fear death as children fear to go in the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased by tales, so is the other. The subtlety of nature is greater many times over than the subtlety of the senses and understanding. To suffering there is a limit; to fearing, none. There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion. It is impossible to love and to be wise. He that will not apply new remedies must expect new evils; for time is the greatest innovator. I hold every man a debtor to his profession; from the which as men of course do seek to receive countenance and profit, so ought they of duty to endeavour themselves by way of amends to be a help and ornament thereunto. Read not to contradict and confute, nor to believe and take for granted, but to weigh and consider . . . Histories make men wise. He that gives good advice, builds with one hand; he that gives good counsel and example, builds with both; but he that gives good admonition and bad example, builds with one hand and pulls down with the other. And because the breath of flowers is far sweeter in the air (where it comes and goes, like the warbling of music) than in the hand, therefore nothing is more fit for that delight than to know what be the flowers and plants that do best perfume the air. | 
