Top 1425 Quotes & Sayings by Benjamin Franklin - Page 24

And we daily in our experiments electrise bodies plus or minus, as we think proper. [These terms we may use till your Philosophers give us better.] To electrise plus or minus, no more needs to be known than this, that the parts of the Tube or Sphere, that are rubb'd, do, in the Instant of Friction, attract the Electrical Fire, and therefore take it from the Thin rubbing; the same parts immediately, as the Friction upon them ceases, are disposed to give the fire they have received, to any Body that has less.

Let every one ascertain his special business and calling, and then stick to it if he wants to be successful.

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?

If Pride leads the Van, Beggary brings up the Rear.

Certainlie these things agree, The Priest, the Lawyer, & Death all three: Death takes both the weak and the strong. The lawyer takes from both right and wrong, And the priest from living and dead has his Fee.

Many estates are spent in the getting, since women for tea forsake spinning and knitting, and men for punch forsake hewing and splitting.

Getting into debt, is getting into a tanglesome net.

The most exquisite folly is made of wisdom spun too fine.

God bless the King, and grant him long to Reign.

Idleness is the Dead Sea that swallows all virtues. Be active in business, that temptation may miss her aim; the bird that sits is easily shot.

Men differ daily about things which are subject to sense, is it likely then they should agree about things invisible.

Write with the learned, pronounce with the vulgar.

The only things of certainty are Death and Taxes.

My refusing to eat flesh occasioned an inconveniency, and I was frequently chid for my singularity.

Hope and faith may be more firmly built upon charity, than charity upon faith and hope.

What science can there be more noble, more excellent, more useful for men, more admirably high and demonstrative, than this of mathematics?

As to the kindness you mention, I wish I could have been of more service to you than I have been, but if I had, the only thanks that I should desire are that you would always be ready to serve any other person that may need your assistance, and so let good offices go around, for humankind are all of a family. As for my own part, when I am employed in serving others I do not look upon myself as conferring favors but paying debts.

We are a kind of posterity in respect to them.

[It was] the poverty caused by the bad influence of the English bankers on the Parliament which has caused in the colonies hatred of the English and . . . the Revolutionary War.

The Golden Age was never the present age.

Furnished as all Europe now is with Academies of Science, with nice instruments and the spirit of experiment, the progress of human knowledge will be rapid and discoveries made of which we have at present no conception. I begin to be almost sorry I was born so soon, since I cannot have the happiness of knowing what will be known a hundred years hence.

A wicked Hero will turn his back to an innocent coward.

He that speaks ill of the mare will buy her.

What you would seem to be, be really.

None are deceived but they that confide.

Man is a tool-making animal

That which resembles most living one's life over again, seems to be to recall all the circumstances of it; and, to render this remembrance more durable, to record them in writing.

Beer is God's way of telling us that he loves us and wants us to be happy.

By diligence and patience, the mouse bit in two the cable.

The generous Mind least regards money, and yet most feels the Want of it.

He that's content hath enough.

An iron rod being placed on the outside of a building from the highest part continued down into the moist earth, in any direction strait or crooked, following the form of the roof or other parts of the building, will receive the lightning at its upper end, attracting it so as to prevent it's striking any other part; and, affording it a good conveyance into the earth, will prevent its damaging any part of the building.

There is no gains without pain.

If principle is good for anything, it is worth living up to.

"We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable" in a draft of the Declaration of Independence changes it instead into an assertion of rationality. The scientific mind of Franklin drew on the scientific determinism of Isaac Newton and the analytic empiricism of David Hume and Gottfried Leibniz. In what became known as "Hume's Fork" the latters' theory distinguished between synthetic truths that describe matters of fact, and analytic truths that are self-evident by virtue of reason and definition.

Keep out of the Sight of Feasts and Banquets as much as may be; for 'tis more difficult to refrain good Cheer, when it's present, than from the Desire of it when it is away; the like you may observe in the Objects of all the other Senses.

A child thinks 20 shillings and 20 years can never be spent.

What maintains one vice would bring up two children.

Our friend and we were invited aboard on a party of pleasure, which is to last forever. His chair was ready first, and he has gone before us. We could not all conveniently start together; and why should you and I be grieved at this, since we are soon to follow, and know where to find him.

In Truth I found myself incorrigible with respect to Order; and now I am grown old, and my Memory bad, I feel very sensibly the want of it.

He that riseth late, must trot all day, and shall scarce overtake his business at night.

Ben Franklin was a little stout later in life and it was said that in Paris a young woman, tapping him on his protruding abdomen, said,"Dr. Franklin, if this were on a woman, we'd know what to think." And Franklin replied,"Half an hour ago, Mademoiselle, it was on a woman, and now what do you think?"

If this lady is pleased to spend her days with Franklin, he would be just as pleased to spend his nights with her.

Those who are content have enough; those that complain, have too much.

Remember this Saying, 'That the good Paymaster is Lord of another Man's Purse.' 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.