...Young men embrace more than they can hold; stir more than they can quiet; fly to the end, without consideration of the means and degrees; care not to innovate; use extreme remedies at first; and will not acknowledge or retract them like an unready horse that will neither stop nor turn. Men of age object too much, consult too long, adventure too little, repent too soon, and seldom drive business home to the full period, but content themselves with a mediocrity of success. Certainly it is good to compound employments of both....

English civil servant, politician, statesman, scientist, and philosopher. Trained as a lawyer, Bacon served as a member of Parliament during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. After her death, he found favor with King James I and advanced in government ser vice to the position of lord chancellor. His career was cut short in 1621 when he was convicted of accepting bribes. Retired, he married and devoted the rest of his life to study and to writing philosophical works; in his Novum Organum (1620) he describes a systematic procedure for investigating natural phenomena that is considered the basis of the modern scientific method. Bacon's other books include The Advancement of Learning (1605) and Essays (1597, rev. 1612 and 1625). See also plato.stanford.edu/entries/francis-bacon.