"We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable" in a draft of the Declaration of Independence changes it instead into an assertion of rationality. The scientific mind of Franklin drew on the scientific determinism of Isaac Newton and the analytic empiricism of David Hume and Gottfried Leibniz. In what became known as "Hume's Fork" the latters' theory distinguished between synthetic truths that describe matters of fact, and analytic truths that are self-evident by virtue of reason and definition.

I fear the man who drinks water and so remembers this morning what the rest of us said last night

The problem with doing nothing is not knowing when you're finished.

He that drinks fast, pays slow.

Ill customs and bad advice are seldom forgotten.

Carelessness does more harm than a want of knowledge.

A lighthouse is more useful than a church.