Top 500 Benjamin Franklin Quotes (2025 Update)
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401. “Wouldst thou enjoy a long Life, a healthy Body, and a vigorous Mind, and be acquainted also with the wonderful Works of God? labour in the first place to bring thy Appetite into Subjection to Reason.”

— Benjamin Franklin

402. “The art of acting consists in keeping people from coughing.”

— Benjamin Franklin

403. “Let no pleasure tempt thee, no profit allure thee, no persuasion move thee, to do anything which thou knowest to be evil; so shalt thou always live jollity; for a good conscience is a continual Christmas.”

— Benjamin Franklin

404. “Tolerate no Uncleanliness in Body, Clothes, or Habitation.”

— Benjamin Franklin

405. “Educate your children to self-control, to the habit of holding passion and prejudice and evil tendencies subject to an upright and reasoning will, and you have done much to abolish misery from their future and crimes from society.”

— Benjamin Franklin

406. “Anger is never without a reason, but seldom with a good one.”

— Benjamin Franklin

407. “Did not strong connections draw me elsewhere, I believe Scotland would be the country I would choose to end my days in.”

— Benjamin Franklin

408. “The game of Chess is not merely an idle amusement; several very valuable qualities of the mind are to be acquired and strengthened by it, so as to become habits ready on all occasions, for life is a kind of chess.”

— Benjamin Franklin

409. “Be cheerful – the problems that worry us most are those that never arrive.”

— Benjamin Franklin

410. “Applause waits on success.”

— Benjamin Franklin

411. “What one relishes, nourishes.”

— Benjamin Franklin

412. “Silence – Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.”

— Benjamin Franklin

413. “Love and toothache have many cures, but none infallible, except possession and dispossession.”

— Benjamin Franklin

414. “Let honesty and industry be thy constant companions, and spend one penny less than thy clear gains; then shall thy pocket begin to thrive; creditors will not insult, nor want oppress, nor hungerness bite, nor nakedness freeze thee.”

— Benjamin Franklin

415. “Poverty, Poetry, and new Titles of Honor, make Men ridiculous.”

— Benjamin Franklin

416. “Ambition has its disappointments to sour us, but never the good fortune to satisfy us. Its appetite grows keener by indulgence and all we can gratify it with at present serves but the more to inflame its insatiable desires.”

— Benjamin Franklin

417. “You cannot always run from a weakness. You must sometime fight it out or perish.”

— Benjamin Franklin

418. “Laws too gentle are seldom obeyed; too severe, seldom executed.”

— Benjamin Franklin

419. “The purpose of money was to purchase one’s freedom to pursue that which is useful and interesting.”

— Benjamin Franklin

420. “The first mistake in public business is the going into it.”

— Benjamin Franklin

421. “The only time a question should be asked is when all other possibilities of finding the answer for yourself have been eliminated.”

— Benjamin Franklin

422. “Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.”

— Benjamin Franklin

423. “Joy doesn’t exist in the world, it exists in us.”

— Benjamin Franklin

424. “In short, the way to wealth, if you desire it, is as plain as the way to market. It depends chiefly on two works, industry and frugality.”

— Benjamin Franklin

425. “Electrical matter differs from common matter in this, that the parts of the latter mutually attract, those of the former mutually repel each other.”

— Benjamin Franklin

426. “All human situations have their inconveniences. We feel those of the present but neither see nor feel those of the future; and hence we often make troublesome changes without amendment, and frequently for the worse.”

— Benjamin Franklin

427. “No nation was ever ruined by trade.”

— Benjamin Franklin

428. “Be studious in your profession, and you will be learned. Be industrious and frugal, and you will be rich. Be sober and temperate, and you will be healthy. Be in general virtuous, and you will be happy. At least you will, by such conduct, stand the be.”

— Benjamin Franklin

429. “Nature performs the cure, the physician takes the fee.”

— Benjamin Franklin

430. “If you wish information and improvement from the knowledge of others, and yet at the same time express yourself as firmly fix’d in your present opinions, modest, sensible men, who do not love disputation, will probably leave you undisturbed in the possession of your error.”

— Benjamin Franklin

431. “Strange secrets are let out by Death Who blabs so oft the follies of this world.”

— Benjamin Franklin

432. “A full Belly brings forth every Evil.”

— Benjamin Franklin

433. “People want to catch a buzz. That is why drugs are illegal, yet people still try to get their hands on them no matter what the consequence. Drugs make us happy, they may not be healthy.”

— Benjamin Franklin

434. “A people who chose security over liberty will receive neither nor deserve either.”

— Benjamin Franklin

435. “Content and Riches seldom meet together, Riches take thou, contentment I had rather.”

— Benjamin Franklin

436. “No longer virtuous no longer free; is a Maxim as true with regard to a private Person as a Common-wealth.”

— Benjamin Franklin

437. “Pen, wax and parchment govern the world.”

— Benjamin Franklin

438. “Great talkers should be cropt, for they’ve no need of ears.”

— Benjamin Franklin

439. “Make the best use of both time and money. Add industry and frugal dealings if they pay very well and if you’re free to it.”

— Benjamin Franklin

440. “Let thy discontents be thy secrets; if the world knows them ’twill despise thee and increase them.”

— Benjamin Franklin

441. “Neither a Fortress nor a Maidenhead will hold out long after they begin to parley.”

— Benjamin Franklin

442. “Traveling is one way of lengthening life, at least in appearance.”

— Benjamin Franklin

443. “Pride is as loud a beggar as want, and a great deal more saucy. When you have bought one fine thing, you must buy ten more, that your appearance may be all of a piece; but it is easier to suppress the first desire than to satisfy all that follow it.”

— Benjamin Franklin

444. “The Sting of a reproach, is the Truth of it.”

— Benjamin Franklin

445. “If you have no Honey in your Pot, have some in your Mouth.”

— Benjamin Franklin

446. “Much Virtue in Herbs, little in Men.”

— Benjamin Franklin

447. “Pardoning the Bad, is injuring the Good.”

— Benjamin Franklin

448. “Bad gains are true losses.”

— Benjamin Franklin

449. “A little House well fill’d, a little Field well till’d, and a little Wife well will’d, are great Riches.”

— Benjamin Franklin

450. “The English love an insult. It’s their only test of a man’s sincerity.”

— Benjamin Franklin