Benjamin Franklin Quotes
Benjamin Franklin was born into a Boston family of modest means on the 17th of January, 1706 in Milk Street, Boston, Massachusetts, United States. He was a statesman, author, publisher, scientist, inventor and diplomat.
Benjamin Franklin was an American polymath and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. Franklin earned the title of “The First American” for his early and indefatigable campaigning for colonial unity.
Read through our collection of famous Benjamin Franklin quotes and sayings.
80 Popular Benjamin Franklin Quotes
“If a man empties his purse into his head, no man can take it away from him. An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.”__Benjamin Franklin
“I would advise you to read with a pen in hand, and enter in a little book short hints of what you find that is curious, or that may be useful; for this will be the best method of imprinting such particulars in your memory.”__Benjamin Franklin
“If you would not be forgotten, as soon as you are dead and rotten, either write things worth reading, or do things worth the writing.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Some, to make themselves considerable, pursue learning; others grasp at wealth; some aim at being thought witty; and others are only careful to make the most of a handsome person; but what is wit, or wealth, or form, or learning, when compared with virtue? It is true we love the handsome, we applaud the learned, and we fear the rich and powerful; but we even worship and adore the virtuous.”__Benjamin Franklin
“The best thing to give to your enemy is forgiveness; to an opponent, tolerance; to a friend, your heart; to your child, a good example; to a father, deference; to your mother, conduct that will make her proud of you; to yourself, respect; to all others, charity.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Each year one vicious habit rooted out, in time might make the worst man good throughout.” __Benjamin Franklin
“The way to secure peace is to be prepared for war. They that are on their guard, and appear ready to receive their adversaries, are in much less danger of being attacked, than the supine, secure, and negligent.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Don’t go to the doctor with every distemper, nor to the lawyer with every quarrel, nor to the pot for every thirst. ”__Benjamin Franklin
“The worship of God is a duty; the hearing and reading of sermons may be useful; but if men rest in hearing and praying, as too many do, it is as if a tree should value itself in being watered and putting forth leaves, tho’ it never produced any fruit.”__Benjamin Franklin
“When there is so much to be done for yourself, your family, and your country, be up by peep of day! Let not the sun look down and say, ‘Inglorious here he lies!’”__Benjamin Franklin
“He’s the best physician that knows the worthlessness of the most medicines.”__Benjamin Franklin
“He that is known to pay punctually and exactly to the time he promises, may at any time, and on any occasion, raise all the money his friends can spare.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Life, like a dramatic piece, should not only be conducted with regularity, but it should finish handsomely.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Our opinions are not in our own power; they are formed and governed much by circumstances that are often as inexplicable as they are irresistible.”__Benjamin Franklin
“After all, wedlock is the natural state of man. A bachelor is not a complete human being. He is like the odd half of a pair of scissors, which has not yet found its fellow, and therefore is not even half so useful as they might be together.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Hope and faith may be more firmly built upon charity, than charity upon faith and hope.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Life’s tragedy is that we get old too soon and wise too late.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.”__Benjamin Franklin
“I never knew a man who was good at making excuses who was good at anything else.”__Benjamin Franklin
“The ancients tell us what is best; but we must learn of the moderns what is fittest.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Do not anticipate trouble, or worry about what may never happen. Keep in the sunlight.”__Benjamin Franklin
“If you would know the value of money, go try to borrow some; for he that goes a-borrowing goes a-sorrowing.”__Benjamin Franklin
“The eye of the master will do more work than both his hands.”__Benjamin Franklin
“A brother may not be a friend, but a friend will always be a brother.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Words may show a man’s wit but actions his meaning.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Educate your children to self-control, to the habit of holding passion and prejudice and evil tendencies subject to an upright and reasoning will, and you have done much to abolish misery from their future and crimes from society.”__Benjamin Franklin
“We are all born ignorant, but one must work hard to remain stupid.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Wink at small faults; remember thou hast great ones.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Beware of little expenses. A small leak will sink a great ship.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Those that won’t be counseled can’t be helped.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Three may keep a secret if two of them are dead.”__Benjamin Franklin
“The Constitution only gives people the right to pursue happiness. You have to catch it yourself.”__Benjamin Franklin
“In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.”__Benjamin Franklin
“To be content, look backward on those who possess less than yourself, not forward on those who possess more. If this does not make you content, you don’t deserve to be happy.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Speak ill of no man, but speak all the good you know of everybody.”__Benjamin Franklin
“If you know how to spend less than you get, you have the philosopher’s stone.”__Benjamin Franklin
“When the well’s dry, we know the worth of water.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Content makes poor men rich; discontentment makes rich men poor.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Common sense is something that everyone needs, few have, and none think they lack.”__Benjamin Franklin
“The most trifling actions of a man, in my opinion, as well as the smallest features and lineaments of the face give a nice observer some notion of his mind.”__Benjamin Franklin
“We need a revolution every 200 years, because all governments become stale and corrupt after 200 years.”__Benjamin Franklin
“By the collision of different sentiments, sparks of truth are struck out, and political light is obtained. The different factions, which at present divide us, aim all at the public good; the differences are only about the various modes of promoting it.”__Benjamin Franklin
“If a sound body and a sound mind, which is as much as to say health and virtue, are to be preferred before all other considerations, ought not men, in choosing a business either for themselves or children, to refuse such as are unwholesome for the body, and such as make a man too dependent, too much obliged to please others, and too much subjected to their humors in order to be recommended and get a livelihood?”__Benjamin Franklin
“Men are subject to various inconveniences merely through lack of a small share of courage, which is a quality very necessary in the common occurrences of life, as well as in a battle. How many impertinences do we daily suffer with great uneasiness, because we have not courage enough to discover our dislike.”__Benjamin Franklin
“When I am employed in serving others, I do not look upon myself as conferring favors, but as paying debts. I have received much kindness from men to whom I shall never have an opportunity of making the least direct returns; and numberless mercies from God, who is infinitely above being benefited by our services. Those kindnesses from men I can, therefore, only return on their fellow-men, and I can only show my gratitude for those mercies from God by a readiness to help His other children.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Would you live with ease, do what you ought and not what you please.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged by better information or fuller consideration to change opinions, even on important subjects, which I once thought right, but found to be otherwise.”__Benjamin Franklin
“The wit of conversation consists more in finding it in others, than showing a great deal yourself. He who goes out of your company pleased with his own facetiousness and ingenuity, will the sooner come into it again.”__Benjamin Franklin
“It is a common error in friends, when they would extol their friends, to make comparisons, and to depreciate the merits of others.”__Benjamin Franklin
“I never saw an oft-removed tree,
nor yet an oft-removed family,
that throve so well as those that settled be.”__Benjamin Franklin
“When you incline to have new clothes, look first well over the old ones, and see if you cannot shift with them another year, either by scouring, mending, or even patching if necessary. Remember, a patch on your coat, and money in your pocket, is better and more creditable, than a writ on your back, and no money to take it off.”__Benjamin Franklin
“To expect people to be good, to be just, to be temperate, etc., without showing them how they should become so, seems like the ineffectual charity mentioned by the apostle, which consisted in saying to the hungry, the cold and the naked, be ye fed, be ye warmed, be ye clothed, without showing them how they should get food, fire or clothing.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Man and woman have each of them qualities and tempers in which the other is deficient, and which in union contribute to the common felicity.”__Benjamin Franklin
“The art of getting riches consists very much in thrift. All men are not equally qualified for getting money, but it is in the power of every one alike to practice this virtue.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Tricks and treachery are the practice of fools, that don’t have brains enough to be honest.”__Benjamin Franklin
“There are in life real evils enough, and it is folly to afflict ourselves with imaginary ones; it is time enough when the real ones arrive.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Security without liberty is called prison.”__Benjamin Franklin
“It seems to me, that if statesmen had a little more arithmetic, or were accustomed to calculation, wars would be much less frequent.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Most men die from the neck up at age twenty-five because they stop dreaming.”__Benjamin Franklin
“I don’t believe in stereotypes. I prefer to hate people on a more personal basis.”__Benjamin Franklin
“He that is of the opinion money will do everything may well be suspected of doing everything for money.”__Benjamin Franklin
“If you would persuade, you must appeal to interest rather than intellect.”__Benjamin Franklin
“To the generous mind the heaviest debt is that of gratitude, when it is not in our power to repay it.”__Benjamin Franklin
“There is much difference between imitating a man and counterfeiting him.”__Benjamin Franklin
“There are three things extremely hard: steel, a diamond, and to know one’s self.”__Benjamin Franklin
“He that falls in love with himself, will have no Rivals.”__Benjamin Franklin
“To succeed, jump as quickly at opportunities as you do at conclusions.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man.”__Benjamin Franklin
“When you are finished changing, you’re finished.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Be studious in your profession, and you will be learned. Be industrious and frugal and you will be rich. Be sober and temperate and you will be healthy. Be in general virtuous and you will be happy.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.”__Benjamin Franklin
“By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Happiness consists more in small conveniences or pleasures that occur every day, than in great pieces of good fortune that happen but seldom to a man in the course of his life.”__Benjamin Franklin
“It is the working man who is the happy man. It is the idle man who is the miserable man.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Hide not your talents, they for use were made. What’s a sun-dial in the shade?”__Benjamin Franklin
“Employ your time well, if you mean to get leisure.”__Benjamin Franklin
“He who sacrifices freedom for security deserves neither.”__Benjamin Franklin
“I look upon death to be as necessary to our constitution as sleep.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Work as if you were to live a hundred years. Pray as if you were to die tomorrow.”__Benjamin Franklin
“There are two ways of being happy — we may either diminish our wants or augment our means — either will do, the result is the same; and it is for each man to decide for himself, and do that which happens to be the easiest. If you are idle or sick or poor, however hard it may be to diminish your wants, it will be harder to augment your means.”__Benjamin Franklin
20 Short Benjamin Franklin Quotes
“God helps them who help themselves.”__Benjamin Franklin
“A man of words and not of deeds, is like a garden full of weeds.”__Benjamin Franklin
“A learned blockhead is a greater blockhead than an ignorant one.”__Benjamin Franklin
“A new truth is a truth, an old error is an error. ”__Benjamin Franklin
“An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Eat to live, and not live to eat.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Lost time is never found again. “__Benjamin Franklin
“Eat to please yourself, but dress to please others.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise. “__Benjamin Franklin
“Having been poor is no shame, being ashamed of it is.”__Benjamin Franklin
“A penny saved is a penny earned.”__Benjamin Franklin
“One today is worth two tomorrows.”__Benjamin Franklin
‘You may delay, but time will not.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Rather go to bed without dinner than to rise in debt.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Don’t misinform your Doctor nor your Lawyer.”__Benjamin Franklin
“A great talker may be no fool, but he is one that relies on him.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Glass, china, and reputation are easily cracked and never well mended.”__Benjamin Franklin
“A fat kitchen makes a lean will.”__Benjamin Franklin
“An old young man will be a young old man.”__Benjamin Franklin
“Fear to do ill, and you need fear naught else.”__Benjamin Franklin