Benjamin Franklin quotes

Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.

In general, mankind, since the improvement of cookery, eats twice as much as nature requires.

Some people die at 25 and aren't buried until 75.

Wars are not paid for in wartime, the bill comes later.

A house is not a home unless it contains food and fire for the mind as well as the body.

The doors of wisdom are never shut.

Wise men don't need advice. Fools won't take it.

Where there's marriage without love, there will be love without marriage.

A good conscience is a continual Christmas.

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.'

Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man.

Those who govern, having much business on their hands, do not generally like to take the trouble of considering and carrying into execution new projects. The best public measures are therefore seldom adopted from previous wisdom, but forced by the occasion.

Whatever is begun in anger ends in shame.

He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else.

There is no kind of dishonesty into which otherwise good people more easily and frequently fall than that of defrauding the government.

Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man.

Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of.

To Follow by faith alone is to follow blindly.

Hunger is the best pickle.

I saw few die of hunger; of eating, a hundred thousand.

Do good to your friends to keep them, to your enemies to win them.

Half a truth is often a great lie.

The art of acting consists in keeping people from coughing.

There are three faithful friends - an old wife, an old dog, and ready money.

I have never entered into any controversy in defense of my philosophical opinions; I leave them to take their chance in the world. If they are right, truth and experience will support them; if wrong, they ought to be refuted and rejected. Disputes are apt to sour one's temper and disturb one's quiet.

He that raises a large family does, indeed, while he lives to observe them, stand a broader mark for sorrow; but then he stands a broader mark for pleasure too.

He that would live in peace and at ease must not speak all he knows or all he sees.

Marriage is the most natural state of man, and... the state in which you will find solid happiness.

He that is of the opinion money will do everything may well be suspected of doing everything for money.

Life's tragedy is that we get old too soon and wise too late.

If time be of all things the most precious, wasting time must be the greatest prodigality.

Beauty and folly are old companions.

If you would know the value of money, go and try to borrow some.

Those have a short Lent who owe money to be paid at Easter.

Being ignorant is not so much a shame, as being unwilling to learn.

Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man.

The doorstep to the temple of wisdom is a knowledge of our own ignorance.

The eye of the master will do more work than both his hands.

Rebellion against tyrants is obedience to God.

Anger is never without a reason, but seldom with a good one.

Beware the hobby that eats.

The Constitution only gives people the right to pursue happiness. You have to catch it yourself.

Wine is constant proof that God loves us and loves to see us happy.

All wars are follies, very expensive and very mischievous ones.

Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.

By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.

Time is money.

I look upon death to be as necessary to our constitution as sleep. We shall rise refreshed in the morning.

He who falls in love with himself will have no rivals.

God helps those who help themselves.

All wars are follies, very expensive and very mischievous ones.

Do not fear mistakes. You will know failure. Continue to reach out.

The use of money is all the advantage there is in having it.

Your net worth to the world is usually determined by what remains after your bad habits are subtracted from your good ones.

I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion about the means. I think the best way of doing good to the poor is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it.

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

An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.

He that lives upon hope will die fasting.

Wars are not paid for in wartime, the bill comes later.

There was never a good war, or a bad peace.

Fatigue is the best pillow.

A place for everything, everything in its place.

Laws too gentle are seldom obeyed; too severe, seldom executed.

A house is not a home unless it contains food and fire for the mind as well as the body.

Do not fear mistakes. You will know failure. Continue to reach out.

Without freedom of thought, there can be no such thing as wisdom - and no such thing as public liberty without freedom of speech.

Without freedom of thought, there can be no such thing as wisdom - and no such thing as public liberty without freedom of speech.

Diligence is the mother of good luck.

How few there are who have courage enough to own their faults, or resolution enough to mend them.

Remember that credit is money.

Time is money.

Those have a short Lent who owe money to be paid at Easter.

Work as if you were to live a hundred years. Pray as if you were to die tomorrow.

The doorstep to the temple of wisdom is a knowledge of our own ignorance.

Beware of little expenses. A small leak will sink a great ship.

Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man.

From a child I was fond of reading, and all the little money that came into my hands was ever laid out in books. Pleased with the 'Pilgrim's Progress,' my first collection was of John Bunyan's works in separate little volumes.

Take time for all things: great haste makes great waste.

Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of.

Honesty is the best policy.

One today is worth two tomorrows.

Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time.

Where there is a free government, and the people make their own laws by their representatives, I see no injustice in their obliging one another to take their own paper money.

Nine men in ten are would be suicides.

We are more thoroughly an enlightened people, with respect to our political interests, than perhaps any other under heaven. Every man among us reads, and is so easy in his circumstances as to have leisure for conversations of improvement and for acquiring information.

There was never a good war, or a bad peace.

My elder brothers were all put apprentices to different trades. I was put to the grammar-school at eight years of age, my father intending to devote me, as the tithe of his sons, to the service of the Church.

Experience keeps a dear school, but fools will learn in no other.

A penny saved is a penny earned.

I have never entered into any controversy in defense of my philosophical opinions; I leave them to take their chance in the world. If they are right, truth and experience will support them; if wrong, they ought to be refuted and rejected. Disputes are apt to sour one's temper and disturb one's quiet.

In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.

An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.

There was never a good war, or a bad peace.

Money has never made man happy, nor will it, there is nothing in its nature to produce happiness. The more of it one has the more one wants.

Anger is never without a reason, but seldom with a good one.

I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion about the means. I think the best way of doing good to the poor is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it.

Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that is the stuff life is made of.

Marriage is the most natural state of man, and... the state in which you will find solid happiness.

In general, mankind, since the improvement of cookery, eats twice as much as nature requires.

God works wonders now and then; Behold a lawyer, an honest man.

Wine is constant proof that God loves us and loves to see us happy.

Take time for all things: great haste makes great waste.

I have never entered into any controversy in defense of my philosophical opinions; I leave them to take their chance in the world. If they are right, truth and experience will support them; if wrong, they ought to be refuted and rejected. Disputes are apt to sour one's temper and disturb one's quiet.

Marriage is the most natural state of man, and... the state in which you will find solid happiness.

A good conscience is a continual Christmas.

Applause waits on success.

Beware of little expenses. A small leak will sink a great ship.

In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.

Content makes poor men rich; discontent makes rich men poor.

When in doubt, don't.

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.

If you would be loved, love, and be loveable.

Honesty is the best policy.

Be slow in choosing a friend, slower in changing.

Genius without education is like silver in the mine.

Those who govern, having much business on their hands, do not generally like to take the trouble of considering and carrying into execution new projects. The best public measures are therefore seldom adopted from previous wisdom, but forced by the occasion.

The U. S. Constitution doesn't guarantee happiness, only the pursuit of it. You have to catch up with it yourself.

An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.

For 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.

There are three faithful friends - an old wife, an old dog, and ready money.

All who think cannot but see there is a sanction like that of religion which binds us in partnership in the serious work of the world.

Even peace may be purchased at too high a price.

You may delay, but time will not.

At twenty years of age the will reigns; at thirty, the wit; and at forty, the judgment.

In the affairs of this world, men are saved not by faith, but by the want of it.

Money has never made man happy, nor will it, there is nothing in its nature to produce happiness. The more of it one has the more one wants.

Where there is a free government, and the people make their own laws by their representatives, I see no injustice in their obliging one another to take their own paper money.

To Follow by faith alone is to follow blindly.

As we enjoy great advantages from the inventions of others, we should be glad of an opportunity to serve others by any invention of ours, and this we should do freely and generously.

The first mistake in public business is the going into it.

There was never a good war, or a bad peace.

The way to see by Faith is to shut the Eye of Reason.

Speak ill of no man, but speak all the good you know of everybody.