110+ Thomas Browne Quotes On Education, Dreams And Enigmatic

Thomas Browne was a British scientist and philosopher who lived in the 17th century. He is best known for his book Religio Medici, a work that explored the relationship between science and religion. He also wrote Pseudodoxia Epidemica, a book that sought to debunk popular misconceptions about the natural world. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Thomas Browne on education, leadership, life.

Top 10 Thomas Browne Quotes

1. It is the common wonder of all men, how among so many million faces, there should be none alike.
2. Life itself is but the shadow of death, and souls departed but the shadows of the living.
3. Light is but the shadow of God.
4. What song the Syrens sang, or what name Achilles assumed when he hid himself among women, though puzzling questions, are not beyond all conjecture.
5. All the wonders you seek are within yourself.
6. There are mystically in our faces certain characters which carry in them the motto of our souls, wherein he that cannot read may read our natures.
7. There is musick, even in the beauty and the silent note which Cupid strikes, far sweeter than the sound of an instrument.
8. We carry within us the wonders we seek without us.
9. By compassion we make others' misery our own, and so, by relieving them, we relieve ourselves also.
10. Rich with the spoils of nature.

Thomas Browne Short Quotes

• There is no man alone, because every man is a Microcosm, and carries the whole world about him.
• Think before you act; think twice before you speak.
• Be able to be alone. Lose not the advantage of solitude.
• The heart of man is the place the devil dwells in; I feel sometimes a hell within myself.
• Forcible ways make not an end of evil, but leave hatred and malice behind them.
• There is no royal road or ready way to virtue.
• Yet is every man his greatest enemy, and, as it were, his own executioner.
• Women do most delight in revenge.
• Obstinacy in a bad cause is but constancy in a good.
• How shall we expect charity towards others, when we are uncharitable to ourselves?

Thomas Browne Quotes About Life

I could be content that we might procreate like trees, without conjunction, or that we were any way to perpetuate the world without this trivial and vulgar way of coition; it is the foolishest act a wise man commits in all his life. — Thomas Browne

Life is a pure flame and we live by an invisible sun within us. — Thomas Browne

Where life is more terrible than death, it is then the truest valor to dare to live. — Thomas Browne

The long habit of living indisposeth us for dying. — Thomas Browne

Life itself is but the shadow of death, and souls departed but the shadows of the living: All things fall under this name. The Sun itself is but the dark simulacrum, and the light but the shadow of God. — Thomas Browne

Not to be content with Life is the unsatisfactory state of those which destroy themselves; who being afraid to live, run blindly upon their own Death, which no Man fears by Experience. — Thomas Browne

The man without a navel still lives in me. — Thomas Browne

For the world, I count it not an inn, but a hospital; and a place not to live, but to die in. — Thomas Browne

Though it be in the power of the weakest arm to take away life, it is not in the strongest to deprive us of death. — Thomas Browne

Death hath a thousand doors to let out life. I shall find one. — Thomas Browne

Thomas Browne Quotes About Love

I have loved my friends as I do virtue, my soul, my God. — Thomas Browne

Affection should not be too sharp eyed, and love is not made by magnifying glasses. — Thomas Browne

The discourses of the table among true loving friends are held in strict silence. — Thomas Browne

There are wonders in true affection. It is a body of enigmas, mysteries, and riddles, wherein two so become one, as they both become two. — Thomas Browne

I love to lose myself in a mystery to pursue my reason to an O altitudo. — Thomas Browne

Where I cannot satisfy my reason, I love to humour my fancy. — Thomas Browne

The service of love is the foolishest act a wise man commits in all his life, nor is there anything that will more deject his cool'd imagination, when he shall consider what an odd and unworthy piece of folly he hath committed. — Thomas Browne

Thomas Browne Quotes About Living

Be thou what thou singly art and personate only thyself. Swim smoothly in the stream of thy nature and live but one man. — Thomas Browne

Were the happiness of the next world is as closely apprehended as the felicities of this, it were a martyrdom to live. — Thomas Browne

Times before you, when even the living men were Antiquities; when the living might exceed the dead, and to depart this world, could not be properly said, to go unto the greater number. — Thomas Browne

But man is a Noble Animal, splendid in ashes, and pompous in the grave, solemnizing Nativities and Deaths with equal lustre, nor omitting Ceremonies of Bravery, in the infamy of his nature. Life is a pure flame, and we live by an invisible Sun within us. — Thomas Browne

Half our days we pass in the shadow of the earth; and the brother of death exacteth a third part of our lives. — Thomas Browne

Think it more satisfactory to live richly than die rich. — Thomas Browne

That miracles have been, I do believe; that they may yet be wrought by the living, I do not deny: but have no confidence in those which are fathered on the dead. — Thomas Browne

Let the fruition of things bless the possession of them, and take no satisfaction in dying but living rich. — Thomas Browne

I would not live over my hours past ... not unto Cicero's ground because I have lived them well, but for fear I should live them worse. — Thomas Browne

Thus is Man that great and true Amphibium, whose nature is disposed to live, not onely like other creatures in divers elements, but in divided and distinguished worlds: for though there be but one to sense, there are two to reason, the one visible, the other invisible. — Thomas Browne

Thomas Browne Quotes About Death

We all labour against our own cure, for death is the cure of all diseases. — Thomas Browne

To extend our memories by monuments, whose death we daily pray for, and whose duration we cannot hope, without injury to our expectations in the advent of the last day, were a contradiction to our belief. — Thomas Browne

We term sleep a death by which we may be literally said to die daily; in fine, so like death, I dare not trust it without my prayers. — Thomas Browne

With what shift and pains we come into the World we remember not; but 'tis commonly found no easy matter to get out of it. — Thomas Browne

(Death is) A leap into the dark. — Thomas Browne

Sleep is a death, O make me try By sleeping, what it is to die, And as gently lay my head On my grave, as now my bed. — Thomas Browne

To be content with death may be better than to desire it. — Thomas Browne

We term sleep a death, and yet it is waking that kills us, and destroys those spirits that are the house of life. — Thomas Browne

Sleep is death's younger brother, and so like him, that I never dare trust him without my prayers. — Thomas Browne

I am not so much afraid of death, as ashamed thereof, 'tis the very disgrace and ignominy of our natures. — Thomas Browne

Thomas Browne Famous Quotes And Sayings

To ruminate upon evils, to make critical notes upon injuries, and be too acute in their apprehensions, is to add unto our own tortures, to feather the arrows of our enemies, to lash ourselves with the scorpions of our foes, and to resolve to sleep no more. — Thomas Browne

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. — Thomas Browne

There is music wherever there is harmony, order and proportion; and thus far we may maintain the music of the spheres; for those well ordered motions, and regular paces, though they give no sound unto the ear, yet to the understanding they strike a note most full of harmony. — Thomas Browne

There is nothing strictly immortal, but immortality. Whatever hath no beginning may be confident of no end. — Thomas Browne

There is a rabble among the gentry as well as the commonalty; a sort of plebeian heads whose fancy moves with the same wheel as these men?in the same level with mechanics, though their fortunes do sometimes gild their infirmities and their purses compound for their follies. — Thomas Browne

The created World is but a small Parenthesis in Eternity. — Thomas Browne

I had rather stand the shock of a basilisk than the fury of a merciless pen. — Thomas Browne

Where we desire to be informed 'tis good to contest with men above ourselves; but to confirm and establish our opinions, 'tis best to argue with judgments below our own, that the frequent spoils and victories over their reasons may settle in ourselves an esteem and confirmed opinion of our own. — Thomas Browne

I cannot tell by what logic we call a toad, a bear, or an elephant ugly; they being created in those outward shapes and figures which best express the actions of their inward forms. — Thomas Browne

Natura nihil agit frustra [Nature does nothing in vain] is the only indisputible axiom in philosophy. There are no grotesques in nature; not any thing framed to fill up empty cantons, and unncecessary spaces. — Thomas Browne

Many-have too rashly charged the troops of error, and remain as trophies unto the enemies of truth. — Thomas Browne

No one should approach the temple of science with the soul of a money changer. — Thomas Browne

All things began in Order, so shall they end, and so shall they begin again, according to the Ordainer of Order, and the mystical mathematicks of the City of Heaven. — Thomas Browne

Festination may prove Precipitation; Deliberating delay may be wise cunctation. — Thomas Browne

Since women do most delight in revenge, it may seem but feminine manhood to be vindictive. — Thomas Browne

Quotation mistakes, inadvertency, expedition, and human lapses, may make not only moles but warts in learned authors. — Thomas Browne

Persecution is a bad and indirect way to plan religion. — Thomas Browne

Gold once out of the earth is no more due unto it; what was unreasonably committed to the ground, is reasonably resumed from it; let monuments and rich fabricks, not riches, adorn men's ashes. — Thomas Browne

I have often admired the mystical way of Pythagoras, and the secret magick of numbers. — Thomas Browne

Charity begins at home, is the voice of the world. — Thomas Browne

Think not thy time short in this world, since the world itself is not long. The created world is but a small parenthesis in eternity, and a short interposition, for a time, between such a state of duration as was before it and may be after it. — Thomas Browne

The severe schools shall never laugh me out of the philosophy of Hermes, that this visible world is but a picture of the invisible, wherein as in a portrait, things are not truly, but in equivocal shapes, and as they counterfeit some real substance in that invisible fabric. — Thomas Browne

Gravestones tell truth scarce forty years. — Thomas Browne

Be Charitable before wealth make thee covetous, and loose not the glory of the Mite. — Thomas Browne

But the iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her poppy, and deals with the memory of men without distinction to merit of perpetuity. — Thomas Browne

Now with my friend I desire not to share or participate, but to engross his sorrows, that, by making them mine own, I may more easily discuss them; for in mine own reason, and within myself, I can command that which I cannot entreat without myself, and within the circle of another. — Thomas Browne

No man can justly censure or condemn another, because indeed no man truly knows another. — Thomas Browne

To be nameless in worthy deeds exceeds an infamous history. — Thomas Browne

The vices we scoff at in others laugh at us within ourselves. — Thomas Browne

Be deaf unto the suggestions of tale-bearers, calumniators, pick-thank or malevolent detractors, who, while quiet men sleep, sowing the tares of discord and division, distract the tranquillity of charity and all friendly society. These are the tongues that set the world on fire--cankerers of reputation, and, like that of Jonah's gourd, wither a good name in a single night. — Thomas Browne

Think not silence the wisdom of fools; but, if rightly timed, the honor of wise men, who have not the infirmity, but the virtue of taciturnity. — Thomas Browne

I have tried if I could reach that great resolution . . . to be honest without a thought of Heaven or Hell. — Thomas Browne

We do but learn to-day what our better advanced judgements will unteach us tomorrow. — Thomas Browne

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. — Thomas Browne

Let him have the key of thy heart, who hath the lock of his own. — Thomas Browne

A man may be in as just possession of the truth as of a city, and yet be forced to surrender. — Thomas Browne

They do most by Books, who could do much without them, and he that chiefly owes himself unto himself, is the substantial Man. — Thomas Browne

To me avarice seems not so much a vice as a deplorable piece of madness. — Thomas Browne

Be substantially great in thyself, and more than thou appearest unto others. — Thomas Browne

Yes, even amongst wiser militants, how many wounds have been given, and credits slain, for the poor victory of an opinion, or beggarly conquest of a distinction. — Thomas Browne

To make an end of all things on Earth, and our Planetical System of the World, he (God) need but put out the Sun. — Thomas Browne

I could never divide myself from any man upon the difference of an opinion, or be angry with his judgment for not agreeing with me in that from which perhaps within a few days I should dissent myself. — Thomas Browne

Let any stranger find mee so pleasant a county, such good way, large heath, three such places as Norwich, Yar. and Lin. in any county of England, and I'll bee once again a vagabond to visit them. — Thomas Browne

Tis hard to find a whole age to imitate, or what century to propose for example. — Thomas Browne

Men have lost their reason in nothing so much as their religion, wherein stones and clouts make martyrs. — Thomas Browne

That some have never dreamed is as improbable as that some have never laughed. — Thomas Browne

Whosoever enjoys not this life, I count him but an apparition, though he wear about him the sensible affections of flesh. In these moral acceptions, the way to be immortal is to die daily. — Thomas Browne

We censure others but as they disagree from that humor which we fancy laudable in ourselves, and commend others but for that wherein they seem to quadrate and consent with us. — Thomas Browne

A little water makes a sea, a small puff of wind a Tempest. — Thomas Browne

God hath varied the inclinations of men according to the variety of actions to be performed. — Thomas Browne

Age doth not rectify, but incurvate our natures, turning bad dispositions into worser habits. — Thomas Browne

Content may dwell in all stations. To be low but above contempt may be high enough to be happy. — Thomas Browne

I can hardly thinke there was any scared into Heaven; they go the surest way to Heaven who would serve God without a Hell; other Mercenaries, that crouch unto Him in feare of Hell, though they terme themselves servants, are indeed but the slaves of the Almighty. — Thomas Browne

A wise man is out of the reach of fortune. — Thomas Browne

Should your riches increase, let your mind keep pace with them. — Thomas Browne

Thus there are two books from whence I collect my Divinity; besides that written one of God, another of his servant Nature, that universal and public Manuscript, that lies expans'd unto the eyes of all; those that never saw him in the one, have discovered him in the other. — Thomas Browne

As for those wingy mysteries in divinity, and airy subtleties in religion, which have unhinged the brains of better heads, they never stretched the pia mater of mine; methinks there be not impossibilities enough in Religion for an active faith. — Thomas Browne

As reason is a rebel to faith, so passion is a rebel to reason. — Thomas Browne

For God is like a skilfull Geometrician. — Thomas Browne

Oblivion is not to be hired: The greater part must be content to be as though they had not been, to be found in the Register of God, not in the record of man. — Thomas Browne

It is we that are blind, not fortune. — Thomas Browne

He who discommendeth others obliquely commendeth himself (Christian morals). — Thomas Browne

There are no grotesques in nature; not anything framed to fill up empty cantons, and unnecessary spaces. — Thomas Browne

The religion of one seems madness unto another. — Thomas Browne

Life Lessons by Thomas Browne

1. Thomas Browne's work demonstrates the importance of careful observation and experimentation in scientific inquiry.
2. He also showed the value of considering all possible explanations for a phenomenon before reaching a conclusion.
3. His writings also emphasize the importance of humility in the face of the unknown, and the need to remain open to new ideas and evidence.