The Life of Benjamin Franklin: With Many Choice Anecdotes and Admirable Sayings of this Great Man, Never Before Published by Any of His Biographers

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H. C. Carey & I. Lea, 1822 - 264 pages

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Page 152 - You call them goods; but if you do not take care they will prove evils to some of you. You expect they will be sold cheap, and perhaps they may for less than they cost; but if you have no occasion for them they must be dear to you. Remember what Poor Richard says: Buy what thou hast no need of, and ere long thou shalt sell thy necessaries.
Page 149 - Sloth, like rust, consumes faster than labor wears ; while the used key is always bright, as Poor Richard says. But dost thou love life, then do not squander time, for that is the stuff" life is made of, as Poor Richard says. How much more than is necessary do we spend in sleep ! forgetting, that The sleeping fox catches no poultry, and that there will be sleeping etwugh in the grave, as Poor Richard says.
Page 150 - Industry all easy, as Poor Richard says; and He that riseth late must trot all Day, and shall scarce overtake his Business at Night; while Laziness travels so slowly, that Poverty soon overtakes him...
Page 151 - Methinks I hear some of you say, Must a Man afford himself no Leisure ? I will tell thee, my friend, what Poor Richard says, Employ thy Time well, if thou meanest to gain Leisure; and, since thou art not sure of a Minute, throw not away an hour.
Page 152 - 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 groat at last. A fat kitchen makes a lean will;' and " ' Many estates are spent in the getting, Since women for tea forsook spinning and knitting. And men for punch forsook hewing and splitting/ 'If you would be wealthy,...
Page 152 - What maintains one vice would bring up two children. You may think, perhaps, that a little tea, or a little punch now and then, diet a little more costly, clothes a little finer, and a little entertainment now and then, can be no great matter; but remember, Many a little makes a mickle.
Page 152 - A little neglect may breed great mischief; for want of a nail the shoe was lost ; for want of a shoe the horse was lost ; for want of a horse the rider was lost, being overtaken and slain by the enemy ; all for want of a little care about a horse-shoe nail.
Page 150 - Richard likewise observes, he that hath a trade hath an estate, and he that hath a calling hath an office of profit and honor; but then the trade must be worked at, and the calling well followed, or neither the estate nor the office will enable us to pay our taxes. If we are industrious we shall never starve; for as Poor Richard says, at the working man's house hunger looks in, but dares not enter.
Page 149 - ... commissioners cannot ease or deliver us by allowing an abatement. However, let us hearken to good advice, and something may be done for us ; God helps them that help themselves, as Poor Richard says.
Page 241 - 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 pas,sions, their errors of opinion, their local interests and their selfish views.

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