Here are a selection of Benjamin Franklin’s quotes. Which is your favourite? Let me know in the comments!
“Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing.”
“Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn.”
“Love your Enemies, for they tell you your Faults.”
“It is the first responsibility of every citizen to question authority.”
“Lost Time is never found again.”
“Instead of cursing the darkness, light a candle.”
“If all printers were determined not to print anything till they were sure it would offend nobody, there would be very little printed.”
“Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man.”
“Tis a great confidence in a friend to tell him your faults; greater to tell him his.”
“The person who deserves most pity is a lonesome one on a rainy day who doesn’t know how to read.”
“Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.”
“To find out a girl’s faults, praise her to her girlfriends.”
“For the want of a nail the shoe was lost,
For the want of a shoe the horse was lost,
For the want of a horse the rider was lost,
For the want of a rider the battle was lost,
For the want of a battle the kingdom was lost,
And all for the want of a horseshoe-nail.”
“If Jack’s in love, he’s no judge of Jill’s beauty.”
If you would know the value of money, go try to borrow some; for he that goes a-borrowing goes a-sorrowing.
“He that falls in love with himself will have no rivals.”
“There never was a good war or a bad peace.”
“Don’t throw stones at your neighbors, if your own windows are glass.”
“He that would live in peace & at ease, Must not speak all he knows or judge all he sees.”
“Well done is better than well said.”
“A right Heart exceeds all.”
“A true Friend is the best Possession.”
“No gains without pains.”
“Dost thou love life? Then do not squander Time; for that’s the Stuff Life is made of.”
“When you’re good to others, you’re best to yourself.”
“Pardoning the Bad, is injuring the Good.”
“Hide not your Talents, they for Use were made. What’s a Sun-Dial in the shade!”
“Glass, China, and Reputation, are easily crack’d, and never well mended.”
“What more valuable than Gold? Diamonds. Than Diamonds? Virtue.”
“Haste makes Waste.”
“Search others for their virtues, thy self for thy vices.”
“It is better to take many Injuries than to give one.”
“Wish not so much to live long as to live well.”
An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.
Guests, like fish, begin to smell after three days.
Some people die at 25 and aren’t buried until 75.
Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.
Energy and persistence conquer all things.
He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else.
Life’s tragedy is that we get old too soon and wise too late.
Without freedom of thought, there can be no such thing as wisdom – and no such thing as public liberty without freedom of speech.
Whatever is begun in anger ends in shame.
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.
Half a truth is often a great lie.
Diligence is the mother of good luck.
Wise men don’t need advice. Fools won’t take it.
He that can have patience can have what he will.
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.
When you’re finished changing, you’re finished.
When in doubt, don’t.
Keep your eyes wide open before marriage, half shut afterwards.
It is easier to prevent bad habits than to break them.
Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain – and most fools do.
Being ignorant is not so much a shame, as being unwilling to learn.
To succeed, jump as quickly at opportunities as you do at conclusions.
He that would live in peace and at ease must not speak all he knows or all he sees.
Well done is better than well said.
