Politician · American · 1706 – 1790 · 199 quotes
If a man empties his purse into his head, no one can take it from him.
Benjamin Franklin
Politician · American · 1706 – 1790
If a man could have half of his wishes, he would double his troubles.
Never take a wife till thou hast a house (and a fire) to put her in.
Many a man thinks he is buying pleasure, when he is really selling himself to it.
The absent are never without fault, nor the present without excuse.
Wine is constant proof that God loves us and loves to see us happy.
The way to see by Faith is to shut the Eye of Reason.
Do good to your friends to keep them, to your enemies to win them.
Speak ill of no man, but speak all the good you know of everybody.
Genius without education is like silver in the mine.
Remember not only to say the right thing in the right place, but far more difficult still, to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.
Certainty? In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes.
An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.
Hide not your talents. They for use were made. What's a sundial in the shade?
Many people die at twenty five and aren't buried until they are seventy five.
If you know how to spend less than you get, you have the philosopher's stone.
It is the eye of other people that ruin us. If I were blind I would want, neither fine clothes, fine houses or fine furniture.
He that composes himself is wiser than he that composes a book.
You can bear your own faults, and why not a fault in your wife?
Be slow in choosing a friend, slower in changing.
If you would have a faithful servant, and one that you like, serve yourself.
Buy what thou hast no need of and ere long thou shalt sell thy necessities.
I didn't fail the test, I just found 100 ways to do it wrong.
A great empire, like a great cake, is most easily diminished at the edges.
Anger is never without a reason, but seldom with a good one.
The strictest law sometimes becomes the severest injustice.
When befriended, remember it; when you befriend, forget it.
If all printers were determined not to print anything till they were sure it would offend nobody, there would be very little printed.
Having been poor is no shame, but being ashamed of it, is.
Human felicity is produced not as much by great pieces of good fortune that seldom happen as by little advantages that occur every day.
There was never a good war, or a bad peace.
I conceive that the great part of the miseries of mankind are brought upon them by false estimates they have made of the value of things.
Tomorrow, every Fault is to be amended; but that Tomorrow never comes.
Energy and persistence conquer all things.
Trouble springs from idleness, and grievous toil from needless ease.
He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else.
A man wrapped up in himself makes a very small bundle.
Wealth is not his that has it, but his that enjoys it.
He who falls in love with himself will have no rivals.
Being ignorant is not so much a shame, as being unwilling to learn.
If you desire many things, many things will seem few.
Write your injuries in dust, your benefits in marble.
Who is rich? He that is content. Who is that? Nobody.
She laughs at everything you say. Why? Because she has fine teeth.
A countryman between two lawyers is like a fish between two cats.
Words may show a man's wit but actions his meaning.
A learned blockhead is a greater blockhead than an ignorant one.
Beware of little expenses. A small leak will sink a great ship.
