Benjamin Franklin's Bastard
In the Words of Benjamin Franklin
- Silence is not always a sign of wisdom, but babbling is ever a folly.
- What you would seem to be, be really.
- Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fools do.
- He that lieth down with dogs shall rise up with fleas.
- The Constitution only gives people the right to pursue happiness. You have to catch it yourself.
- Three may keep a secret, if two of them are dead.
- We are all born ignorant, but one must work hard to remain stupid.
- Never ruin an apology with an excuse.
- Many people die at twenty five and aren't buried until they are seventy five.
- If everyone is thinking alike, then no one is thinking.
- There was never a bad peace or a good war.
- The person who deserves most pity is a lonesome one on a rainy day who doesn't know how to read.
- Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but usually manages to pick himself up, walk over or around it, and carry on.
- When you are finished changing, you're finished.
- When you're testing to see how deep water is, never use two feet.
- Do not anticipate trouble, or worry about what may never happen. Keep in the sunlight.
- If you’re going through hell, keep going.
- Keep your eyes wide open before marriage, half shut afterwards.
- Work as if you were to live a thousand years, play as if you were to die tomorrow.
- The problem with doing nothing is not knowing when your finished.
- Anger is never without a reason, but seldom with a good one.
- The only thing that is more expensive than education is ignorance.
- He that falls in love with himself will have no rivals.
- He that speaks much, is much mistaken.
- The person who knows HOW will always have a job, but the person who knows WHY will always be the boss.
- Thinking aloud is a habit which is responsible for most of mankind's misery.
- Where there’s marriage without love, there will be love without marriage.
- Write to Please Yourself. When You write to Please Others You end up Pleasing No one.
- A man wrapped up in himself makes a very small bundle.
- In reality, there is, perhaps, no one of our natural passions so hard to subdue as pride. . . Even if I could conceive that I had compleatly overcome it, I should probably be proud of my humility.
- Many a long dispute among divines may be thus abridged: It is so; It is not so. It is so; it is not so.
Benjamin Franklin's Bastard - Read an Excerpt
Benjamin Franklin's Bastard - The Story Behind the Story
Benjamin Franklin's Bastard - Reading Guide