Death and taxes (idiom)

For other uses, see Death & Taxes.

Death and taxes is a common reference to the famous quotation:[1]

Our new Constitution is now established, and has an appearance that promises permanency; but in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.
— Benjamin Franklin, in a letter to Jean-Baptiste Leroy, 1789

However, Franklin's letter is not the origin of the phrase, which appeared earlier in Daniel Defoe's The Political History of the Devil.[2]

Things as certain as death and taxes, can be more firmly believ’d.
— Daniel Defoe, The Political History of the Devil, 1726.


References

  1. ↑ Smyth, Albert Henry (1907). The Writings of Benjamin Franklin, Vol. X (1789-1790). New York: MacMillian. p. 69.
  2. ↑ DeFoe, Daniel (1726). The Political History of the Devil, As Well Ancient as Modern: In Two Parts. London: Black Boy in Pater-noster Row. p. 269.


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