The Essays, Humourous, Moral and Literary: Of the Late Benjamin Franklin |
Other editions - View all
The Essays, Humourous, Moral and Literary; of the Late Benjamin Franklin Benjamin Franklin No preview available - 2013 |
Common terms and phrases
accused acquainted advantage Algiers America become better Busy-Body character chess civil clothes common constitution continue emies employed encourage English eral esteem Europe exer expense favour February 25 flax fortune friends give groat habit happy hope hundred industry judge kind labour land late learning less liberty live Madeira wine mankind manner marriages master means ment merchants Methusalem mind Moses nation nature necessary neighbour never obliged observed occasion opinion pain paper parliament of England Pennsylvania persons perspirable matter piece pieces of eight Pilgrim's Progress pleasure pounds present priva profit punish quantity readers receive rise seamen shew shillings slavery slaves sleep spect subsistence suffer taining thee things thou thought tion trade Tuesday February virtue whistle whole words writing youth
Popular passages
Page 134 - It therefore astonishes me, sir, to find this system approaching so near to perfection as it does ; and I think it will astonish our enemies, who are waiting with confidence to hear that our councils are confounded, like those of the builders of Babel ; and that our states are on the point of separation, only to meet hereafter for the purpose of cutting one another's throats. Thus I consent, sir, to this Constitution, because I expect no better, and because I am not sure, that it is not the best.
Page 98 - We are, however, not the less obliged by your kind offer, though we decline accepting it; and to show our grateful sense of it, if the gentlemen of Virginia will send us a dozen of their sons, we will take great care of their education, instruct them in all we know, and make men of them.
Page 133 - I doubt, too, whether any other convention we can obtain, may be able to make a better constitution ; for, when you assemble a number of men, to have the advantage of their joint wisdom, you inevitably assemble with those men all their prejudices, their passions, their errors of opinion, their local interests, and their selfish views.
Page 32 - The most trifling actions that affect a man's credit, are to be regarded. The sound of your hammer at five in the morning, or nine at night, heard by a creditor, makes him easy six months longer ; but if he sees you at a billiard table, or hears your voice at a tavern, -when you should be at work, he sends for his money the next day : demands it before he can receive it in a lump.
Page 98 - ... he intended to say, or has any thing to add, he may rise again and deliver it. ,To interrupt another, even in common conversation, is reckoned highly indecent.
Page 10 - I then came home, and went whistling all over the house, much pleased with my whistle, but disturbing all the family. My brothers and sisters and cousins, understanding the bargain I had made, told me I had given four times as much for it as it was worth. This put me in mind what good things I might have bought with the rest of the money; and they laughed at me so much for my folly that I cried with vexation; and the reflection gave me more chagrin than the whistle gave me pleasure.
Page 32 - Remember this saying, The good paymaster is lord of another man's purse. He that is known to pay punctually and exactly to the time he promises, may at any time, and on any occasion, raise all the money his friends can spare. This is sometimes of great use.
Page 126 - Tolerably good workmen in any of those mechanic arts are sure to find employ, and to be well paid for their work, there being no restraints preventing strangers from exercising any art they understand, nor any permission necessary. If they are poor, they begin first as servants or journeymen ; and if they are sober, industrious, and frugal, they soon become masters, establish themselves in business, marry, raise families, and become respectable citizens.
Page 133 - But, though many private persons think almost as highly of their own infallibility as of that of their own sect, few express it so naturally as a certain French lady, who, in a little dispute with her sister, said, I dont know how it happens, sister, but I meet with nobody but myself that is always in the right.
Page 17 - the opinion of learned philosophers of our race, who lived and flourished long before my time, that this vast world, the Moulin Joly, could not itself subsist more than eighteen hours ; and I think there was some foundation for that opinion, since, by the apparent motion of the great luminary that gives life to all nature, and which in my time has evidently declined considerably...