"Human Felicity is produc'd not so much by great Pieces of good Fortune that seldom happen, as by little Advantages that occur every Day." 

- Benjamin Franklin, as quoted at http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Benjamin_Franklin, accessed  8 Oct 2013, from The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin [Part III, p. 108]

Find or make a Reason for everything

"So convenient a thing it is to be a reasonable Creature, since it enables one to find or make a Reason for everything one has a mind to do." 

- Benjamin Franklin, as quoted at http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Benjamin_Franklin , accessed 8 Oct 2013, from The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin [Part I, p. 28]

"For something, that pretended to be reason, was every now and then suggesting to me that such extreme nicety as I exacted of myself might be a kind of foppery in morals which, if it were known, would make me ridiculous; that a perfect character might be attended with the inconvenience of being envied and hated; and that a benevolent man should allow a few faults in himself to keep his friends in countenance.

- Ben Franklin, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, p. 82