The Essays, Humourous, Moral and Literary: Of the Late Benjamin Franklin

Front Cover
J. West, 1811 - American essays - 182 pages
 

Contents

I
3
II
5
III
7
IV
9
VI
11
VII
13
VIII
16
IX
19
XXII
64
XXIII
71
XXIV
77
XXV
82
XXVI
84
XXVII
89
XXVIII
98
XXIX
107

X
24
XI
31
XII
33
XIII
35
XIV
36
XV
43
XVI
50
XVIII
55
XIX
56
XX
60
XXI
62
XXX
108
XXXI
114
XXXII
122
XXXIII
134
XXXIV
137
XXXV
146
XXXVI
149
XXXVII
152
XXXVIII
157
XXXIX
164
XL
175

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

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...

Bibliographic information