Benjamin Franklin - Man Quotes

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I believe that Man is not the most perfect Being but One, rather that as there are many Degrees of Beings his Inferiors, so there are many Degrees of Beings superior to him.

Benjamin Franklin
Reading makes a full man, meditation a profound man, discourse a clear man.

Benjamin Franklin
I grew convinced that truth, sincerity and integrity in dealings between man and man were of the utmost importance to the felicity of life, and I formed written resolutions... to practice them ever while I lived.

Benjamin Franklin
One Man may be more cunning than another, but not more cunning than every body else.

Benjamin Franklin
Let all Men know thee, but no man know thee thoroughly: Men freely ford that see the shallows.

Benjamin Franklin
Whether a Commonwealth suffers more by hypocritical pretenders to religion or by the openly profane? The most dangerous hypocrite in a Commonwealth is one who leaves the gospel for the sake of the law. A man compounded of law and gospel is able to cheat a whole country with his religion and then destroy them under color of law.

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

Benjamin Franklin
Poor man, said I, you pay too much for your whistle.

Benjamin Franklin
In going on with these Experiments, how many pretty systems do we build, which we soon find ourselves oblig'd to destroy! If there is no other Use discover'd of Electricity, this, however, is something considerable, that it may help to make a vain Man humble.

Benjamin Franklin
It is a grand mistake to think of being great without goodness and I pronounce it as certain that there was never a truly great man that was not at the same time truly virtuous.

Benjamin Franklin
So much for industry, my friends, and attention to one's own business; but to these we must add frugality if we would make our industry more certainly successful. A man may, if he knows not how to save as he gets, keep his nose all his life to the grindstone, and die not worth a grout at last.

Benjamin Franklin
Strive to be the greatest man in your country, and you may be disappointed. Strive to be the best and you may succeed: he may well win the race that runs by himself.

Benjamin Franklin
Slavery is such an atrocious debasement of human nature, that its very extirpation, if not performed with solicitious care, may sometimes open a source of serious evils. The unhappy man who has been treated as a brute animal, too frequently sinks beneath the common standard of the human species. The galling chains, that bind his body, do also fetter his intellectual faculties, and impair the social affections of his heart… To instruct, to advise, to qualify those, who have been restored to freedom, for the exercise and enjoyment of civil liberty… and to procure for their children an education calculated for their future situation in life; these are the great outlines of the annexed plan, which we have adopted.

Benjamin Franklin
There is much difference between imitating a good man and counterfeiting him.

Benjamin Franklin
Don't think so much of your own Cunning, as to forget other Men's; a Cunning Man is overmatched by a cunning Man and a Half.

Benjamin Franklin
The poor man must walk to get meat for his stomach,
the rich man to get a stomach to his meat.

Benjamin Franklin
An honest Man will receive neither Money nor Praise that is not his due.

Benjamin Franklin
A wise man will desire no more than what he may get justly, use soberly, distribute cheerfully, and leave contently.

Benjamin Franklin
I believe there is one Supreme most perfect being. … I believe He is pleased and delights in the happiness of those He has created; and since without virtue man can have no happiness in this world, I firmly believe He delights to see me virtuous.

Benjamin Franklin
That man alone loves himself rightly who procures the greatest possible good to himself through the whole of his existence and so pursues pleasure as not to give for it more than it is worth.

Benjamin Franklin
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.'

Benjamin Franklin
I have never seen the Philosopher's Stone that turns lead into Gold, but I have known the pursuit of it turn a Man's Gold into Lead.

Benjamin Franklin
Life with Fools consists in Drinking; with the wise Man, living's Thinking.

Benjamin Franklin
If any man flatters me, I'll flatter him again; tho' he were my best Friend.

Benjamin Franklin
Poverty often deprives a man of all spirit and virtue; it is hard for an empty bag to stand upright.

Benjamin Franklin