Happy 300th Birthday, Benjamin Franklin!

Benjamin Frankin

January 6, 1706 O.S. - April 17, 1790

American printer — he published the first book in the colonies, the Masonic Anderson's Constitutions of 1723 — author, postmaster, statesman, scientist and philosopher, Franklin was instrumental in the formation of the United States. He invented the Franklin stove, the medical catheter, the lightning rod, swimfins, a glass harmonica, and bifocals.

His Masonic resume' includes:

• Initiated: February 1730-1


• Secretary: 1735-38


• St. John's Lodge, Philadelphia


• Junior Grand Warden: June 24, 1732


• Grand Master: June 24, 1734


• Provincial Grand Master, Boston: June 10, 1749


• Provincial Grand Master, Philadelphia: June 1760


• Deputy Grand Master: March 13, 1750


• Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania Venerable Master: 1779-80, 1782


• Loge des Neuf Soeurs, Paris

Franklin wrote his own epitaph for his gravestone:

The body
of BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
(Like the cover of an old book,
Its contents torn out,
And stript of its lettering and guilding.)
Lies here, food for worms.
Yet the word itself shall not be lost.
For it will, as he believed, appear once more,
In a new
And more beautiful edition,
Corrected and amended
By
The Author

Quotations from Benjamin Franklin:

• He that waits upon fortune, is never sure of a dinner.


• He that lives upon hope will die fasting.


• Laws too gentle are seldom obeyed; too severe, seldom executed.


• There is a difference between imitating a good man and counterfeiting him.


• Happiness consists more in small conveniences or pleasures that occur every day, than in great pieces of good fortune that happen but seldom to a man in the course of his life.


• If a man empties his purse into his head, no man can take it away from him. An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.


• Money never made a man happy yet, nor will it. There is nothing in its nature to produce happiness. The more a man has, the more he wants. Instead of filling a vacuum, it makes one.


• To succeed, jump as quickly at opportunities as you do at conclusions.


• If you would be loved, love and be lovable.


• Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote!


• Fear not death, for the sooner we die the longer we shall be immortal.


• A man is not completely born until he is dead.


• A penny saved is a penny earned.


• I will speak ill of no man, and speak all the good I know of everybody.


• Joy is not in things! It is in us!


• Anger warms the Invention, but overheats the oven.


• They that can give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty or safety.


• While we may not be able to control all that happens to us, we can control what happens inside us.


• Whatever is begun in anger ends in shame.


• God heals and the Doctor takes the fee.


• Keep your eyes wide open before marriage, half shut afterwards.


• Hide not your talents, they for use were made. What's a sundial in the shade?


• Be civil to all, sociable to many, familiar with few, friend to one, enemy to none.


• Remember that time is money.


• Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote!


• They that can give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty or safety.


• I will speak ill of no man, and speak all the good I know of everybody.


• Nothing in life is certain except death and taxes.

Ben Franklin | Quotations | Anderson's Constitutions