Source identified
“America is the Land of Labour”
Franklin rejects European fantasies of effortless prosperity in eighteenth-century North America, emphasizing that newcomers should expect productive labor rather than automatic wealth or patronage.
Source note: Information to Those Who Would Remove to America, before March 1784; Founders Online. This is historical emigration advice written for Europeans and is not a claim about present-day U.S. labor or immigration conditions.
Source identified
“Well done is better than well said.”
Franklin gives execution priority over impressive promises or intentions.
Source note: Poor Richard’s Almanack.
Source identified
“He that hath a trade hath an estate.”
Voice: Authorial persona / framed maxim · Poor Richard maxim, repeated through Father Abraham
A useful skill or trade is treated as a durable asset because it can keep producing value even when stored wealth is limited.
Source note: The Way to Wealth, where Father Abraham repeats maxims associated with Poor Richard.
Source identified
“he must work and be industrious to live.”
Franklin tells prospective emigrants without inherited wealth that livelihood would depend on work and industry, directly countering expectations of effortless advancement after arrival.
Source note: Information to Those Who Would Remove to America, before March 1784; Founders Online. The lowercase opening is retained because this is a clause from Franklin’s longer sentence about strangers, law, liberty and industry.
Source identified
“Drive thy business, or it will drive thee.”
Work becomes harder to control when it is left unmanaged; the maxim favors deliberate direction, priorities, and active stewardship over reactive pressure.
Source note: Poor Richard’s Almanack; a compact maxim about managing work before accumulated demands begin managing you.
Source identified
“Employ thy time well, if thou meanest to gain leisure.”
Leisure is easier to protect when working time is used deliberately, linking time management with freedom rather than treating organization as an end in itself.
Source note: Poor Richard’s Almanack; the maxim connects disciplined use of working time with the ability to gain leisure.