2,150 Quotes by Benjamin Franklin

A man who would sacrifice freedom for security deserves neither.

Chess teaches foresight, by having to plan ahead; vigilance, by having to keep watch over the whole chess board; caution, by having to restrain ourselves from making hasty moves; and finally, we learn from chess the greatest maxim in life - that even when everything seems to be going badly for us we should not lose heart, but always hoping for a change for the better, steadfastly continue searching for the solutions to our problems.

I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion of 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. In my youth I travelled much, and I observed in different countries, that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer.

What Comfort can the Vortices of Descartes give to a Man who has Whirlwinds in his bowels!

Human felicity is produc’d not so much by great pieces of good fortune that seldom happen, as by little advantages that occur every day.

We are all born ignorant, but one must work hard to remain stupid.

He that spits against the wind, spits in his own face.

There seem to be but three ways for a nation to acquire wealth. The first is by war...This is robbery. The second by commerce, which is generally cheating. The third by agriculture, the only honest way, wherein man receives a real increase of the seed thrown into the ground, in a kind of continual miracle, wrought by the hand of God in his favor, as a reward for his innocent life and his virtuous industry.

Here in France, you must practice the art of accomplishing much while appearing to accomplish little. (in the John Adams miniseries on HBO)