Top 500 Benjamin Franklin Quotes (2025 Update)
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201. “Lend money to an enemy, and thou will gain him, to a friend and thou will lose him.”

— Benjamin Franklin

202. “A word to the wise is enough, and many words won’t fill a bushel.”

— Benjamin Franklin

203. “Nothing brings more pain than too much pleasure; nothing more bondage than too much liberty.”

— Benjamin Franklin

204. “The best doctor gives the least medicines.”

— Benjamin Franklin

205. “I would rather have it said, ‘He lived usefully,’ than, ‘He died rich.’”

— Benjamin Franklin

206. “If you would persuade, you must appeal to interest rather than intellect.”

— Benjamin Franklin

207. “Hope of gain lessens pain.”

— Benjamin Franklin

208. “The worst wheel of the cart makes the most noise.”

— Benjamin Franklin

209. “Creditors have better memories than debtors.”

— Benjamin Franklin

210. “Rebellion against tyrants is obedience to God.”

— Benjamin Franklin

211. “Moderation in all things – including moderation.”

— Benjamin Franklin

212. “When the people find that they can vote themselves money that will herald the end of the republic.”

— Benjamin Franklin

213. “At twenty years of age the will reigns; at thirty, the wit; and at forty, the judgment.”

— Benjamin Franklin

214. “The way to be safe is never to be secure.”

— Benjamin Franklin

215. “The longer I live the more convinced I become that God governs in the affairs of men. And have we now forgotten that powerful friend? Or do we imagine we no longer need His assistance.”

— Benjamin Franklin

216. “Man will ultimately be governed by God or by tyrants.”

— Benjamin Franklin

217. “Laziness travels so slowly that poverty soon overtakes it.”

— Benjamin Franklin

218. “To be humble to superiors is a duty, to equals courtesy, to inferiors nobleness.”

— Benjamin Franklin

219. “Words may show a man’s wit but actions his meaning.”

— Benjamin Franklin

220. “The doors of wisdom are never shut.”

— Benjamin Franklin

221. “Your net worth to the world is usually determined by what remains after your bad habits are subtracted from your good ones.”

— Benjamin Franklin

222. “He that cannot obey, cannot command.”

— Benjamin Franklin

223. “A virtuous heretic shall be saved before a wicked Christian.”

— Benjamin Franklin

224. “If time be of all things most precious, wasting time must be the greatest prodigality, since lost time is never found again; and what we call time enough always proves little enough. Let us then be up and doing, and doing to a purpose; so by diligence shall we do more with less perplexity.”

— Benjamin Franklin

225. “The handshake of the host affects the taste of the roast.”

— Benjamin Franklin

226. “A lie stands on one leg, truth on two.”

— Benjamin Franklin

227. “Those who beat their swords into plowshares usually end up plowing for those who kept their swords.”

— Benjamin Franklin

228. “Where there’s no law, there’s no bread.”

— Benjamin Franklin

229. “It is a strange anomaly that men could be careful to insure their houses, their ships, their merchandise, and yet neglect to insure their lives – surely the most important of all to their families, and more subject to loss.”

— Benjamin Franklin

230. “Critics are our friends, they show us our faults.”

— Benjamin Franklin

231. “Great talkers, little doers.”

— Benjamin Franklin

232. “The sleeping fox catches no poultry.”

— Benjamin Franklin

233. “A Man of Knowledge like a rich Soil, feeds If not a world of Corn, a world of Weeds.”

— Benjamin Franklin

234. “Sell not virtue to purchase wealth, nor liberty to purchase power.”

— Benjamin Franklin

235. “To err is human, to repent divine; to persist devilish.”

— Benjamin Franklin

236. “I was surprised to find myself so much fuller of Faults than I had imagined, but I had the Satisfaction of seeing them diminish.”

— Benjamin Franklin

237. “Hunger never saw bad bread.”

— Benjamin Franklin

238. “A little neglect may breed great mischief.”

— Benjamin Franklin

239. “Would you persuade, speak of interest, not of reason.”

— Benjamin Franklin

240. “Women and wine, game and deceit, make the wealth small, and the want great.”

— Benjamin Franklin

241. “And where is the Prince who can afford to so cover his country with troops for its defense, as that ten thousand men descending from the clouds, might not in many places do an infinite deal of mischief, before a force could be brought together to repel them?”

— Benjamin Franklin

242. “That it is better 100 guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer, is a Maxim that has been long and generally approved.”

— Benjamin Franklin

243. “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.”

— Benjamin Franklin

244. “I fully agree with General Washington, that we must protect this young nation from an insidious influence and impenetration. The menace, gentlemen, is the Jews.”

— Benjamin Franklin

245. “The man who does things makes mistakes, but he doesn’t make the biggest mistake of all-doing nothing.”

— Benjamin Franklin

246. “Get what you can, and what you get hold; ’tis the Stone that will turn all your Lead into Gold.”

— Benjamin Franklin

247. “Keep conscience clear, then never fear.”

— Benjamin Franklin

248. “That which hurts, also instructs.”

— Benjamin Franklin

249. “He was so learned that he could name a horse in nine languages; so ignorant that he bought a cow to ride on.”

— Benjamin Franklin

250. “Many a man thinks he is buying pleasure, when he is really selling himself to it.”

— Benjamin Franklin