Quotes by Franklin, Benjamin




Benjamin Franklin (January 17, 1706 April 17, 1790) was one of the most prominent of Founders and early political figures and statesmen of the United States. Considered the earliest of the Founders, Franklin was noted for his curiosity, ingenuity and diversity of interests. His wit and wisdom is proverbial to this day. More than anyone he shaped the American Revolution despite never holding national elective office. As a leader of the Enlightenment he had the attention of scientists and intellectuals all across Europe. As agent in London before the Revolution, and Minister to France during, he more than anyone defined the new nation in the minds of Europe. His success in securing French military and financial aid was decisive for American victory over Britain. He invented the lightning rod; he invented the notion of colonial unity; he invented the idea of America; historians hail him as the "First American". The city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania will mark Franklin's 300th Birthday in January 2006, with a wide array of exhibitions, and events citing Franklin's extraordinary accomplishments throughout his illustrious career..

"I am lord of myself, accountable to none."

Franklin, Benjamin on independence    Share


"Write your injuries in dust, your benefits in marble."

Franklin, Benjamin on insults
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"Don't judge men's wealth or godliness by their Sunday appearance."

Franklin, Benjamin on judgment and judges
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"He that has done you a kindness will be more ready to do you another, than he whom you yourself have obliged."

Franklin, Benjamin on kindness
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"God grant that not only the love of liberty but a thorough knowledge of the rights of man may pervade all the nations of the earth, so that a philosopher may set his foot anywhere on its surface and say: This is my country!"

Franklin, Benjamin on knowledge    Share

"Proclaim not all thou knowest, all thou knowest, all thou hast, nor all thou cans't."

Franklin, Benjamin on knowledge    Share

"He that hath a trade hath an estate; he that hath a calling hath an office of profit and honor."

Franklin, Benjamin on labor    Share

"The learned fool writes his nonsense in better language than the unlearned, but it is still nonsense."

Franklin, Benjamin on language
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"She laughs at everything you say. Why? Because she has fine teeth."

Franklin, Benjamin on laughter
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"God works wonders now and then; Behold a lawyer, an honest man."

Franklin, Benjamin on law and lawyers
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"Laws too gentle, are seldom obeyed; too severe, seldom executed."

Franklin, Benjamin on law and lawyers
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"A life of leisure and a life of laziness are two things. There will be sleeping enough in the grave."

Franklin, Benjamin on laziness
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"Laziness travels so slowly that poverty soon overtakes him."

Franklin, Benjamin on laziness
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"The things which hurt, instruct."

Franklin, Benjamin on learning
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"He that won't be counseled can't be helped."

Franklin, Benjamin on learning
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"Learn of the skillful; he that teaches himself, has a fool for his master."

Franklin, Benjamin on learning
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"Employ thy time well, if thou meanest to gain leisure."

Franklin, Benjamin on leisure    Share

"Leisure is the time for doing something useful. This leisure the diligent person will obtain the lazy one never."

Franklin, Benjamin on leisure
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"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

Franklin, Benjamin on liberty
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"They who give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."

Franklin, Benjamin on liberty
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"Where liberty is, there is my country."

Franklin, Benjamin on liberty
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"Lying rides upon debt's back."

Franklin, Benjamin on lies and lying    Share

"I should have no objection to go over the same life from its beginning to the end: requesting only the advantage authors have, of correcting in a second edition the faults of the first."

Franklin, Benjamin on life
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"Life's tragedy is that we get old too soon and wise too late"

Franklin, Benjamin on life
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"Were it offered to my choice, I should have no objection to a repetition of the same life from its beginning, only asking the advantages authors have in a second edition to correct some faults in the first."

Franklin, Benjamin on life    Share

"Whatever is begun in anger, ends in shame."

Franklin, Benjamin on anger
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"Do not anticipate trouble, or worry about what may never happen. Keep in the sunlight."

Franklin, Benjamin on anxiety
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"Those disputing, contradicting, and confuting people are generally unfortunate in their affairs. They get victory, sometimes, but they never get good will, which would be of more use to them."

Franklin, Benjamin on argument
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"He that blows the coals in quarrels that he has nothing to do with, has no right to complain if the sparks fly in his face."

Franklin, Benjamin on argument
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"He that falls in love with himself will have no rivals."

Franklin, Benjamin on love
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"Savages we call them because their manners differ from ours."

Franklin, Benjamin on manners
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"Teach your child to hold his tongue; he'll learn fast enough to speak."

Franklin, Benjamin on manners    Share

"Keep your eyes wide open before marriage, and half-shut afterwards."

Franklin, Benjamin on marriage
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"One good husband is worth two good wives, for the scarcer things are, the more they are valued."

Franklin, Benjamin on marriage
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"Where there is marriage without love, there will be love without marriage."

Franklin, Benjamin on marriage
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"An undutiful daughter will prove an unmanageable wife."

Franklin, Benjamin on marriage
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"Creditors have better memories than debtors."

Franklin, Benjamin on memory
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"When men and woman die, as poets sung, his heart's the last part moves, her last, the tongue."

Franklin, Benjamin on women
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"When I reflect, as I frequently do, upon the felicity I have enjoyed, I sometimes say to myself, that were the offer made me, I would engage to run again, from beginning to end, the same career of life. All I would ask, should be the privilege of an author, to correct in a second edition, certain errors of the first."

Franklin, Benjamin on mistakes    Share

"To be humble to superiors is duty, to equals courtesy, to inferiors nobleness."

Franklin, Benjamin on modesty
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