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It was published at the re- quest of the Boston School Committee for the use of the eiachth-grade pupils of Boston. After a painting by Duplessis in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts 2Dte Kti3er0iDe ^literature g>erie0 THE AUTOBIOGKAPHY '/ BENJAMIN FRANKLIN AND A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE FROM THE POINT WHERE THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY ENDS DRAWN CHIEFLY FROM HIS LETTERS WITH NOTES AND A CHRONOLOGICAL HISTORICAL TABLE Uctd'^^'^ ^-( HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY Boston : 4 Park Street ; New York : ll East Seventeentli Street Chicago : 158 Adams Street ! Copyright, 1886 and 1896, By HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO. All rights reserved. The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U. S. A. Electrotyped and Printed by H. 0. Houghton & Company. CONTENTS. Intkoductoey Note . . . . I. Parentage and Boyhood . II. Seeking his Fortune . III. Adventures in London . IV. Return to Philadelphia . V. In Business for Himself VI. Self-Education . . . . VII. George Whitefield . VIII. Beginning of Public Life . IX. A Public-Spirited Gentleman X. A Philadelphia Citizen In the Service of the King . Common-Sense in War Matters Franklin the Pecilosopher Departure for England XL XII. XIII. XIV. XV. The Affair with the Proprietaries PAGE V 7 31 55 70 85 115 131 137 149 159 172 187 199 206 217 Sketch of Franklin's Life from the Point at which his Autobiography ends . . . . . • . . . 223 Appendix 245 Index . 249 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin lias prob- ably been more extensively^ read than any other American historical work, and no other book of its kind has had such up§ and downs of fortune. Franklin lived for many yaers in England, where he was agent for Pennsylvania and other American colonies. He was separated from his family, and it was during one of his long absences, in 1771, that he determined to write an account of his life, which had been an event- ful one, for his son William Franklin, then about forty years old. William Franklin had been with his father in England, as the first paragraph of the Auto- biography shows, and had been admitted to the bar there, but finding favor at court had been appointed Governor of New Jersey, and was in that position when Franklin was writing. He held to the royal cause and was thereby estranged from his father, though before Benjamin Franklin's death they were partially reconciled. In 1771 Franklin was spending a v^eek at Twyford, England, at the country seat of his friend Dr. Jona- than Shipley, Bishop of St. Asaph, and there began the writing of his autobiography. The room in which it was written long bore and perhaps still bears the name of " Dr. Franklin's Room." He began his work, as he says, for the pleasure of his own family, but there is little doubt that as he went on he anticipated vi INTRODUCTORY NOTE. publication. At this time lie wrote so much of the autobiography as is included in the first ninety-five pages of this edition, covering, that is, the first twenty- five years of l^is life. / The years that folio ved were very busy ones, and it was not until 1784 thai^ he again took up the narrative, being especially urged. to this by his friend Benjamin Vaughn, to whom as to" others he had shown mean- while what he had alre^tdy written. He was living at this time at Passy, then ^r^uburb of Paris, where he was Minister of the United States, to Prance, and Wil- liam Franklin's son, William Tehi^Je Franklin, was secretary to his grandfather. He carried forward the narrative to page 114 of this edition, when he was again interrupted, and could not find another ojipor- tunity to work upon his book until 1788, when he brought the account up to the 27th of July, 1757, being page 216. Finally, in the last year of his life he wrote the few j^ages which leave the narrative still very incomplete. In consequence of these several beginnings, the autobiography is somewhat fragment- ary, and the writer repeats once or twice what he has before said ; but the publication of the work had even stranger vicissitudes. Immediately after Franklin's death in 1790, the first portion of the autobiography, that written in England, was published in French at Paris, and it is conjec- tured that the translator had become possessed of a manuscript copy surreptitiously and had published his translation without authority. Curiously enough, this French version was made the basis of the earliest English editions, for in 1793 two separate and dis- tinct translations back from the French were published in London, and one of these translations continued to INTRODUCTORY NOTE. vii be published in England and America for a quarter of a century. It was not till 1818 that the autobiogra- phy as written in English was published, forming a part of an edition of Franklin's writings prepared for a London publisher by William Temple Franklin. Where had the original manuscript been all this time ? After the death of Franklin, all his papers and manuscripts, including the autobiography, came into the hands of William Temple Franklin, then living in Philadelphia. But there was also a copy of the autobi- ography made by another grandson of Franklin, Ben- jamin Bache Franklin. It was made in 1789 for one of Franklin's intimate friends, M. Le Veillard, and re- mained for some years in the family of that gentleman, who lost his life during the French Revolution ; then William Temple Franklin asked for it, as he thought it would make a cleaner copy for the printer, and in return sent the original manuscript by Franklin to the Yeillard family. In this way the autograph copy, at the death of a daughter of M. Le Veillard in 1834, came into the possession of her cousin M. de Senar- ment, whose grandson delivered it, in 1867, to Mr. John Bigelow, who had been one of the great Frank- lin's successors as Minister of the United States to France. Mr. Bigelow compared this manuscript with the printed book as it left William Temple Franklin's hands, and found a great many petty differences, as well as a wholly unprinted section, that which now closes the work. Mr. Bigelow accordingly reissued the Aiitohiograjyhy and for the first time, in 1868, the book appeared as written by Franklin himself, nearly a hundred years after the first portion was written. Mr. Bigelow kindly permits the reprinting in this form of the text of his carefully prepared edition. viii INTRODUCTORY NOTE. We have omitted the prefaces which separate the several parts of the work, and also one or two brief passages not adapted to school use. The original work is not divided into chapters, hut we have inserted chapter headings at natural breaks in the narrative, for the convenience of readers. Occasional footnotes have been added where the text seemed to call for explanation or illustration, but no words have been explained which could be understood by reference to a good dictionary. At the close of the autobiography will be found a sketch of Franklin's life, from the point at which he leaves off, to his death; and the Chronological Table which follows this Introductory Note will furnish further material for an historical study of this most interesting career. There have been several lives of Franklin written, besides a large number of books and magazine articles upon his career, both as a statesman and as a man of science. So many-sided w^as he that he appears in the series of American Statesmen in a volume written by John T. Morse, Jr. (Houghton, Mifflin & Co.), and in the series of American Men of Letters in a volume written by John Bach McMaster (Houghton, Mifflin & Co.), and if there were a series of American Men of Science he certainly would have a place there. A volume entitled Franhlin in France., by E. E. Hale (Roberts Brothers), is based upon recently collected Franklin papers, but the fullest life is that by James Parton, in two volumes (Houghton, Mifflin & Co.). In the Riverside Literature Series there is a num- ber containing Poor Ricliard's Almanac and Other Papers (Houghton, Mifflin & Co.). CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. IX 5 2 ■*^ o a m =^ S a -i C Ph^+h o S ^ ^ ^. f^ oj a S c> o ^ ::3 f^-i '-' ^ "-"t 1 a :tj 4» o O «fH o o "^ O o ^ f-i . s ^ ^ifi o^ sirs ^•^ ^ o o "iJ 22 «! O) s o — o o "^^ 0) ^ >^ P^ O) CO ^ Ph::^ opHi3 3, 5:! o p:^ OJ O M O ■— J CO r" a pR I— I .11 Ph (M t- CO w JO ^ P "* CO CO rH CO t- Oi CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. (M (M ,Q * -iS Tjl CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. xi O (D w "5 m ■r- v^ I-H CS t^ -4 P^O O^H JH c^ B ^5 .s a ^-5 -t^f^.S '^ s t> ^ ^ -U' ^ '^ c 4j CS Tl «+-( s o rd flr^ i:^ o fsH ■73 Tj o rr ^ t^ Hpq P.-^g<^^ |p^ opq gp^^g o JO 00 Oi O CO »0 LO l-O -co CO '3^ o >^^'^- a J:! -5 2 S a tr ^ tH CO CO t^ 00 o.S « § ,Ph % JO JO 10 lO lO CO CO CO Xll CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. S O tH I I 31 1° a d. a S o = ^ ^ •-s 3 -^ c3 ^ a a eS r3 o o 02 O 0) S^coW Bunl on ta July n of ,13 -s = f>l %^ Battle Washi Arn Evacu 17 bJO c3 p:; bo ^ o 2 c3 f^'::' -H :5o fl § s § ^ ^ p. 'T3 s •^ ca flr^ 02 o a -S Cl, cj ;h Ph^ <1 ^ '^ S ^ S s t^ ^ I ^ « (U ts g o S '« ^ t^ .^ ^ t^ (D O a tH _g t» ^ , «+H > ■+^ S 5 fcc ^ s ai a a CO P-l o CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. xui o ;3 I iH g CO OJ if CO CO 2^ is -^ o .-2 >> o fl ^ 22 f-t o ^ o M O Q, o o o .S ^ -^ -^ .o,-§ I !=l So 02 =1::! S 2 o .10 1 W a a s a I— I -(-3 3 5L0 a aw s C) tr ^2 i^ «4-l Ph^ tH C/J P-l 'TJ £ !>- i % u a a O) rt^ cS FT^ -2 ■TS -2 .«^ i .2 bX3 Ph a ci Ph •^ a a.2 . 2 a g^ -^ «. ^ a ^ § ° aO '^ 2 t^ a P^W 00 C5 00 00 XIV CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. ^.S .2 ■s.s U W ■713 00 S .2 iH o is rS o -43 13 r^ .!i O . M 1— I ^ O c3 05 a. 5h c o ^ P^ .2 '-^S '^ _, 43 CO «) rt t|_, ■S s =^!§ ^ O 5^ ■^ 1 3 h5 o ]§D05 S§ - &. ^ g s =? O 43 GO g •S o -^ a S 5 ^ .'2"^ ^^ o -+^ ^ O " s a a be ^ bo o ^ 2 t- O tH CO CO O tH CO t^ CO CO THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY BElNJAMIN FRANKLIN, I. PAEENTAGE AND BOYHOOD. Deae Son : I have ever had pleasure in obtaining any little anecdotes of my ancestors. You may re- member the inquiries I made among the remains of my relations when you were with me in England, and the journey I undertook for that purpose. Imagining it may be equally agreeable to you to know the cir- cumstances of my life, many of which you are yet un- acquainted with, and expecting the enjoyment of a week's uninterrupted leisure in my present country retirement, I sit down to write them for you. To which I have besides some other inducements. Hav- ing emerged from the poverty and obscurity in which I was born and bred to a state of affluence and some degree of reputation in the world, and having gone so far through life with a considerable share of felicity, the conducing means I made use of, which with the blessing of God so well succeeded, my posterity may like to know, as they may find some of them suitable to their own situations, and therefore fit to be imi* tated. 8 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF That felicity, when I reflected on it, has induced me sometimes to say, that were it offered to my choice, I should have no objection to a repetition of the same life from its beginning, only asking the advantages authors have in a second edition to correct some faults of the first. So I might, besides correcting the faults, change some sinister accidents and events of it for others more favorable. But though this were denied, I should still accept the offer. Since such a repetition is not to be expected, the next thing most like living one's life over again seems to be a recollection of that life, and to make that recollection as durable as possi- ble by putting it down in writing. Hereby, too, I shall indulge the inclination so nat- ural in old men, to be talking of themselves and their own past actions ; and I shall indulge it without being tiresome to others, who, through respect to age, might conceive themselves obliged to give me a hearing, since this may be read or not as any one pleases. And, lastly (I may as well confess it, since my de- nial of it will be believed by nobody), perhaps I shall a good deal gratify my own vanity. Indeed, I scarce ever heard or saw the introductory words, " Without vanity I may say,^^ etc., but some vain thing immedi- ately followed. Most people dislike vanity in others, whatever share they have of it themselves ; but I give it fair quarter wherever I meet with it, being per- suaded that it is often productive of good to the pos- sessor, and to others that are within his sphere of ac- tion ; and therefore, in many cases, it would not be altogether absurd if a man were to thank God for his vanity among the other comforts of life. And now I speak of thanking God, I desire with all humility to acknowledge that I owe the mentioned BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 9 bappiness of my past life to his kind providence, which led me to the means I used and gave them suc- cess. My belief of this induces me to hope^ though I must not presume^ that the same goodness will still be exercised toward me, in continuing that happiness, or enabling me to bear a fatal reverse, which I may ex- perience as others have done ; the complexion of my future fortune being known to Him only in whose power it is to bless to us even our afflictions. The notes one of my uncles (who had the same kind of curiosity in collecting family anecdotes) once put into my hands furnished me with several particulars relating to our ancestors. From these notes I learned that the family had lived in the same village, Ecton, in Northamptonshire, for three hundred years, and how much longer he knew not (perhaps from the time when the name of Franklin, that before was the name of an order of people, was assumed by them as a sur- name when others took surnames all over the king- dom), on a freehold of about thirty acres, aided by the smith's business, which had continued in the fam- ily till his time, the eldest son being always bred to that business ; a custom which he and my father fol- lowed as to their eldest sons. When I searched the registers at Ecton, I found an account of their births, marriages, and burials from the year 1555 only, there being no registers kept in that parish at any time pre- ceding. By that register I perceived that I was the youngest son of the youngest son for ^yq generations back. My grandfather, Thomas, who was born in 1598, lived at Ecton till he grew too old to follow business longer, when he went to live with his son John, a dyer at Banbury, in Oxfordshire, with whom my father served an apprenticeship. There my grand. 10 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF father died and lies buried. We saw his gravestone in 1758. His eldest son Thomas lived in the house at Ecton, and left it with the land to his only child, a daughter, who, with her husband, one Fisher, of Wel- lingborough, sold it to Mr. Isted, now lord of the manor there. My grandfather had four sons that grew up, viz. : Thomas, John, Benjamin, and Josiah. I will give you what account I can of them, at tliis distance from my papers, and if these are not lost in my absence, you will among them find many more particulars. Thomas was bred a smith under his father; but, be- ing ingenious, and encouraged in learning (as all my brothers were) by an Esquire Palmer, then the prin- cipal gentleman in that parish, he qualified himself for the business of scrivener ; became a considerable man in the county ; was a chief mover of all public- spirited undertakings for the county or town of North- amj)ton, and his own village, of which many instances were related of him ; and much taken notice of and patronized by the then Lord Halifax. He died in 1702, January 6, old style, just four years to a day before I was born. The account we received of his life and character from some old people at Ecton, I remember, struck you as something extraordinary, from its similarity to what you knew of mine. " Had he died on the same day," you said, " one might have supposed a transmigration." John was bred a dyer, I believe of woolens. Ben- jamin was bred a silk dyer, serving an api3renticeship at London. He was an ingenious man. I remember him well, for when I was a boy he came over to my father in Boston, and lived in the house with us some years. He lived to a great age. His grandson, Sam* BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 11 uel Franklin, now lives in Boston. He left behind him two quarto volumes, MS., of his own poetry, con- sisting of little occasional pieces addressed to his friends and relations, of which the following, sent to me, is a specimen.^ He had formed a short-hand of his own, which he taught me, but, never practicing it, I have now forgot it. I was named after this uncle, there being a particular affection between him and my father. He was very pious, a great attender of sermons of the best preachers, which he took down in his short-hand, and had with him many volumes of them. He was also much of a politician ; too much, perhaps, for his station. There fell lately into my hands, in London, a collection he had made of all the principal pamphlets relating to public affairs, from 1641 to 1717 ; many of the volumes are wanting as appears by the numbering, but there still remain eight volumes in folio, and twenty-four in quarto and in oc- tavo. A dealer in old books met with them, and knowing me by my sometimes buying of him, he brought them to me. It seems my uncle must have left them here when he went to America, which was above fifty years since. There are many of his notes in the margins. This obscure family of ours was early in the Refor- mation, and continued Protestants through the reign of Queen Mary, when they were sometimes in danger of trouble on account of their zeal against popery. They had got an English Bible, and to conceal and secure it, it was fastened open with tapes under and within the cover of a joint-stool. When my great- great-grandfather read it to his family, he turned up the joint-stool upon his knees, turning over the leaves ^ Franklin failed to copy the specimen into his autobiography. 12 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF then under the tapes. One of the children stood at the door to give notice if he saw the apparitor coming, who was an officer of the spiritual court. In that case the stool was turned down again upon its feet, when the Bible remained concealed under it as before. This anecdote I had from my uncle Benjamin. The fam- ily continued all of the Church of England till about the end of Charles the Second's reign, when some of the ministers that had been ousted for non-conformity holding conventicles in Northamptonshire, Benjamin and Josiah adhered to them, and so continued all their lives : the rest of the family remained with the Epis- copal Church. Josiah, my father, married young, and carried his wife with three children into New England, about 1682. The conventicles having been forbidden by law, and frequently disturbed, induced some consider* able men of his acquaintance to remove to that coun- try, and he was prevailed with to accompany them thither, where they expected to enjoy their mode of religion with freedom. By the same wife he had four children more born there, and by a second wife ten more, in all seventeen ; of which I remember thirteen sitting at one time at his table, who all grew up to be men and women, and married ; I was the youngest son, and the youngest child but two, and was born in Boston, New England.^ My mother, the second wife, was Abiah Folger, daughter of Peter Folger, one of the first settlers of New England, of whom honorable mention is made by Cotton Mather, in his church his- 1 Franklin was born January 6, 1706, old style, corresponding to January 17tli, as we now reckon. The house in which he was bora stood in Milk Street, opposite to the Old South meeting-house, but was destroyed by fire in 1810. Birthplace of Franklin BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 13 fcory of that country, entitled Magnolia Christi Amer* ica7ia^ as " a godly ^ learned Englishman^^ if I re- member the words rightly. I have heard that he wrote sundry small occasional pieces, but only one of them was printed, which I saw now many years since. It was written in 1675, in the homespun verse of that time and peoj)le, and addressed to those then con- cerned in the government there. It was in favor of liberty of conscience, and in behalf of the Baptists, Quakers, and other sectaries that had been under persecution, ascribing the Indian wars, and other distresses that had befallen the country, to that per- secution, as so many judgments of God to punish so heinous an offense, and exhorting a repeal of those un- charitable laws. The whole appeared to me as written with a good deal of decent plainness and manly free- dom. The six concluding lines I remember, though I have forgotten the two first of the stanza ; but the pur- port of them was, that his censures proceeded from good- will, and therefore he would be known to be the author. " Because to be a libeller (says he) I hate it with my heart ; From Sherburne ^ town, where now I dwell My name I do put here ; Without offense your real friend, It is Peter Folgier." My elder brothers were all put apprentices to differ- ent trades. I was put to the grammar-school at eight years of age, my father intending to devote me, as the tithe of his sons, to the service of the Church. My early readiness in learning to read (which must have been very early, as 1 do not remember when I could not read), and the opinion of all his friends that I 1 On the island of Nantucket. 14 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF should certainly make a good scholar, encouraged him in this purpose of his. My uncle Benjamin, too, ap. proved of it, and proposed to give me all his short- hand volumes of sermons, I suppose as a stock to set up with, if I would learn his character. I continued, however, at the grammar-school ^ not quite one year, though in that time I had risen gradually from the middle of the class of that year to be the head of it, and farther was removed into the next class above it, in order to go with that into the tliird at the end of the year. But my father, in the mean time, from a view of the expense of a college education, which hav- ing so large a family he coidd not well afford, and the mean living many so educated were afterwards able to obtain, — reasons that he gave to his friends in my hearing, — altered his first intention, took me from the grammar-school, and sent me to a school for writing and arithmetic, kept by a then famous man, Mr. George Brownell, very successful in his profession generally, and that by mild, encouraging methods. Under him I acquired fair writing pretty soon, but I failed in the arithmetic, and made no progress in it. At ten years old I was taken home to assist my father in his business, which was that of a tallow-chandler and soap-boiler ; a business he was not bred to, but had assumed on his arrival in New England, and on finding his dyeing trade would not maintain his fam- ily, being in little request. Accordingly, I was em- ployed in cutting wick for the candles, filling the dip- ping mould and the moulds for cast candles, attend- ing the shop, going of errands, etc. I disliked the trade, and had a strong inclination ^ A grammar-school in Franklin's time meant one where Latin was taught. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, l5 for the aea, but my father declared against it ; how- ever, living near the water, I was much in and about it, learnt early to swim well, and to manage boats ; and when in a boat or canoe with other boys, I was commonly allowed to govern, especially in any case of difficulty ; and upon other occasions I was generally a leader among the boys, and sometimes led them into scrapes, of which I will mention one instance, as it shows an early projecting public spirit, though not then justly conducted. There was a salt marsh that bounded part of the mill pond,^ on the edge of which, at high water, we used to stand to fish for minnows. By much tram- pling, we had made it a mere quagmire. My proposal was to build a wharf there fit for us to stand upon, and I showed my comrades a large heap of stones, which were intended for a new house near the marsh, and which would very well suit our purpose. Accord- ingly, in the evening, when the workmen were gone, I assembled a number of my playfellows, and working with them diligently, lil^e so many emmets, sometimes two or three to a stone, we brought them all away and built our little wharf. The next morning the work- men were surprised at missing the stones, which were found in our wharf. Inquiry was made after the re- movers ; we were discovered and complained of ; sev- eral of us were corrected by our fathers ; and, though I pleaded the usefulness of the work, mine convinced me that nothing was useful which was not honest. I think you may like to know something of his per- 1 The mill-pond in Boston occupied a large tract between Hay- market Square and Causeway Street, so named from a causeway whicli separated the pond or cove from the outer water. 16 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF son and character. He had an excellent constitution of body, was of middle stature, but well set, and very strong ; he vfas ingenious, could draw prettily, was skilled a little in music, and had a clear, pleasing voice, so that when he played psalm tunes on his vio- lin and sung withal, as he sometimes did in an even- ing after the business of the day was over, it was ex- tremely agreeable to hear. He had a mechanical genius, too, and, on occasion, was very handy in the use of other tradesmen's tools ; but his great excellence lay in a sound understanding and solid judgment in prudential matters, both in private and public affairs. In the latter, indeed, he was never emjjloyed, the nu- merous family he had to educate and the straitness of his circumstances keeping him close to his trade ; but I remember well his being frequently visited by lead- ing 23eoi3le, who consulted him for his opinion in af- fairs of the town or of the church he belonged to, and showed a good deal of respect for his judgment and advice ; he was also much consulted by private per- sons about their affairs when any difficulty occurred, and frequently chosen an arbitrator batween contend- ing parties. At his table he liked to have, as often as he could, some sensible friend or neighbor to con- verse with, and always took care to start some ingen- ious or useful topic for discourse, which might tend to improve the minds of his children. By this means he turned our attention to what was good, just, and pru- dent in the conduct of life ; and little or no notice was ever taken of what related to the victuals on the table, whether it was well or ill dressed, in or out of season, of good or bad flavor, preferable or inferior to this or that other thing of the kind, so that I was brought up m such a perfect inattention to those matters as to be BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 17 quite indifferent what kind of food was set before me, and so unobservant of it, that to this day if I am asked I can scarce tell a few hours after dinner what I dined upon. This has been a convenience to me in traveling, where my companions have been sometimes very unhappy for want of a suitable gratification of their more delicate, because better instructed, tastes and appetites. My mother had likewise an excellent constitution ; she suckled all her ten children. I never knew either my father or mother to have any sickness but that of which they died, he at 89, and she at 85 years of age. They lie buried together at Boston,^ where I some years since placed a marble over their grave, with this inscription : — JOSIAH FkANKUK, and Abiah his wife, lie liere interred. They lived lovingly together in wedlock fifty-five years. Without an estate, or any gainful employment, By constant labor and industry, with God's blessing, They maintained a large family comfortably, and brought up thirteen children and seven grandchildren reputably. From this instance, reader, Be encouraged to diligence in thy calling. And distrust not Providence. He was a pious and prudent man ; She, a discreet and virtuous woman. Their youngest son, ^ The grave of Franklin's parents is in the Granary burying-ground In Boston. The marble stone with its inscription having crumbled, a new and larger monument was raised over the grave in 1827 and the original inscription was repeated on it. 18 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF In filial regard to their memory, Places ttis stone. J. F. born 1655, died 1744, ^tat 89. A. F. born 1667, died 1752, — ^85. By my rambling digressions I perceive myself to be grown old. I used to write more methodically. But one does not dress for private company as for a public ball. 'T is perhaps only negligence. To return : I continued thus employed in my fa- ther's business for two years, that is, till I was twelve years old ; and my brother John, who was bred to that business, having left my father, married, and set up for himself at Rhode Island, there was all appear- ance that I was destined to supply his place, and be- come a tallow-chandler. But my dislike to the trade continuing, my father was under apprehensions that if he did not find one for me more agreeable, I should break away and get to sea, as his son Josiah had done, to his great vexation. He therefore sometimes took me to walk with him, and see joiners, bricklayers, turners, braziers, etc., at their work, that he might ob- serve my inclination, and endeavor to fix it on some trade or other on land. It has ever since been a pleasure to me to see good workmen handle their tools, and it has been useful to me, having learned so much by it as to be able to do little jobs myself in my house when a workman could not readily be got, and to construct little machines for my experiments, while the intention of making the experiment was fresh and warm in my mind. My father at last fixed upon the cutler's trade, and my uncle Benjamin's son Samuel, who was bred to that business in London, being about that time established in Boston, I was sent to be with him some time on liking. But his expectations of a BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 19 fee with me displeasing my father, I was taken home again. From a child I was fond of reading, and all the lit- tle money that came into my hands was ever laid out in books. Pleased with the Pilgrim's Progress, my first collection was of John Bimyan's works in sepa- rate little volumes. I afterward sold them to enable me to buy R. Burton's Historical Collections ; they were small chapmen's books, and cheap, forty or fifty in all. My father's little library consisted chiefly of books in polemic divinity, most of which I read, and have since often regretted that, at a time when I had such a thirst for knowledge, more proper books had not fallen in my way, since it was now resolved I should not be a clergyman. Plutarch's Lives there was in which I read abundantly, and I still think that time spent to great advantage. There was also a book of De Foe's, called an Essay on Projects^ and another of Dr. Mather's, called Essays to do Good^ which per- haps gave me a turn of thinking that had an influ- ence on some of the principal future events of my life. This bookish inclination at length determined my father to make me a printer, though he had already one son (James) of that profession. In 1717 my brother James returned from England with a press and letters ^ to set up his business in Boston. I liked it much better than that of my father, but still had a hankering for the sea. To prevent the apprehended effect of such an inclination, my father was impatient to have me bound to my brother. I stood out some time, but at last was persuaded, and signed the in- dentures when I was yet but twelve years old. I was 1 That is, type. 20 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF to serve as an apprentice till I was twenty-one years of age, only I was to be allowed journeyman's wao-es during the last year. In a little time I made great proficiency in the business, and became a useful hand to my brother. I now had access to better books. An acquaintance with the apprentices of booksellers enabled me sometimes to borrow a small one, which I was careful to return soon and clean. Often I sat up in my room reading the greatest part of the night, when the book was borrowed in the evening and to be returned early in the morning, lest it should be missed or wanted. And after some time an ingenious tradesman, Mr. Matthew Adams, who had a pretty collection of books, and who frequented our printing-house, took notice of me, invited me to his library, and very kindly lent me such books as I chose to read. I now took a fancy to poetry, and made some little pieces ; my brother, thinking it might turn to account, encouraged me, and put me on composing occasional ballads. One was called The Lighthouse Tragedy^ and contained an ac- count of the drowning of Captain Worthilake, with ^is two daughters ; the other was a sailor's song, on the taking of Teach (or Blackbeard), the pirate. They were wretched stuff, in the Grub Street ballad style ; and when they were printed he sent me about the town to sell them. The first sold wonderfully, the event being recent, having made a great noise. This flattered my vanity ; but my father discouraged me by ridiculing my performances, and telling me verse- makers were generally beggars. So I escaped being a poet, most probably a very bad one ; but as prose writing has been of great use to me in the course of my life, and was a principal means of my advance- BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 21 ment, I shall tell you how, in such a situation, I ac- quired what little ability I have in that way. There was another bookish lad in the town, John Collins by name, with whom I was intimately ac- quainted. We sometimes disputed, and very fond we were of argument, and very desirous of confuting one another, which disputatious turn, by the way, is apt to become a very bad habit, making people often ex- tremely disagreeable in company by the contradiction that is necessary to bring it into ]3ractice ; and thence, besides souring and spoiling the conversation, is pro- ductive of disgusts and perhaps enmities where you may have occasion for friendship. I had caught it by reading my father's books of dispute about religion. Persons of good sense, I have since observed, seldom fall into it, except lawyers, university men, and men of all sorts that have been bred at Edinburgh. A question was once, somehow or other, started be- tween Collins and me, of the propriety of educating the female sex in learning, and their abilities for study. He was of opinion that it was improper, and that they were naturally unequal to it. I took the contrary side, perhaps a little for dispute's sake. He was naturally more eloquent, had a ready plenty of words ; and sometimes, as I thought, bore me down more by his fluency than by the strength of his rea- sons. As we parted without settling the point, and were not to see one another again for some time, I sat down to put my arguments in writing, which I coj)ied fair and sent to him. He answered, and I replied. Three or four letters of a side had passed, when my father happened to find my papers and read them. Without entering into the discussion, he took occasion to talk to me about the manner of my writing ; ob- 22 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF served that, though I had the advantage of my antag- onist in correct spelling and pointing (which I owed to the printing-house), I fell far short in elegance of expression, in method, and in perspicuity, of which he convinced me by several instances. I saw the justice of his remarks, and thence grew more attentive to the manner in writing, and determined to endeavor at im- provement. About this time I met with an odd volume of the Spectator.^ It was the third. I had never before seen any of them. I bought it, read it over and over, and was much delighted with it. I thought the writ- ing excellent, and wished, if possible, to imitate it. With this view I took some of the papers, and mak- ing short hints of the sentiment in each sentence, laid them by a few days, and then, without looking at the book, tried to complete the papers again, by expressing each hinted sentiment at length, and as fully as it had been expressed before, in any suitable words that should come to hand. Then I compared my Spectator with the original, discovered some of my faults, and corrected them. But I found I wanted a stock of words, or a readiness in recollecting and using them, which I thought I should have acquired before that time if I had gone on making verses ; since the continual occa- sion for words of the same import, but of different length, to suit the measure, or of different sound for the rhyme, would have laid me under a constant neces- sity of searching for variety, and also have tended to fix that variety in my mind, and make me master of 1 The Spectator was a weekly journal published in London and de- voted not to news, but to comments on manners and morals. It some- times also had short tales. The best English writing of the day, by Addison, Steele, and others, was found in The Spectator and similat periodicals. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 23 it. Therefore I took some of the tales and turned them into verse ; and, after a time, when I had pretty well forgotten the prose, turned them back again. I also sometimes jumbled my collections of hints into confusion, and after some weeks endeavored to reduce them into the best order, before I began to form the full sentences and complete the paper. This was to teach me method in the arrangement of thoughts. By comparing my work afterwards with the original, I discovered many faults and amended them ; but I sometimes had the pleasure of fancying that, in cer- tain particulars of small import, I had been lucky enough to improve the method or the language, and this encouraged me to think I might possibly in time come to be a tolerable English writer, of which I was extremely ambitious. My time for these exercises and for reading was at night, after work, or before it began in the morning, or on Sundays, when I contrived to be in the printing-house alone, evading as much as I could the common attendance on public worship which my father used to exact of me when I was under his care, and which indeed I still thought a duty, though I could not, as it seemed to me, afford time to prac- tice it. When about sixteen years of age I happened to meet with a book, written by one Tryon, recommend- ing a vegetable diet. I determined to go into it. My brother, being yet unmarried, did not keep house, but boarded himself and his apprentices in another fam- ily. My refusing to eat flesh occasioned an inconven- iency, and I was frequently chid for my singularity. I made myself acquainted with Tryon' s manner of pre- paring some of his dishes, such as boiling potatoes or rice, making hasty pudding, and a few others, and 24 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF fclien proposed to my brother that if he would give me, weekly, half the money he paid for my board, I would board myself. He instantly agreed to it and I j)res- ently found that I could save half what he paid me. This was an additional fund for buying books. But I had another advantage in it. My brother and the rest going from the printing-house to their meals, I remained there alone, and dispatching presently my light repast, which often was no more than a biscuit or a slice of bread, a handful of raisins or a tart from the pastry-cook's, and a glass of water, had the rest of the time till their return for study, in which I made the greater progress, from that greater clearness of head and quicker apprehension which usually attend tem- perance in eating and drinking. And now it was that, being on some occasion made ashamed of my ignorance in figures, which I had twice failed in learning when at school, I took Cocker's book of Arithmetic, and went through the whole by myself with great ease. I also read Seller's and Shermy's books of Navigation, and became acquainted with the little geometry they contain ; but never pro- ceeded far in that science. And I read about this time Locke On Human Understanding^ and the Art of Thinhing^ by Messrs. du Port Royal.^ While I was intent on improving my language, I met with an English Grammar (I think it was Green- wood's), at the end of which there were two little sketches of the arts of rhetoric and logic, the latter finishing with a specimen of a dispute in the Socratic 1 Early in the seventeenth century a company of learned and relig- ious men were associated at the abbey of Port Royal near Versailles in France. Here they studied and worshipped and gave out to the world many valuable books. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 25 metliod ; and soon after I procured Xenophon's Mem- orable Thirties of Socrates, wherein there are many instances of the same method. I was charmed with it, adopted it, dropped my abrupt contradiction and positive argumentation, and j)ut on the humble inquirer and doubter. And being then, from reading Shaftes- bury and Collins, become a real doubter in many points of our religious doctrine, I found this method safest for myself and very embarrassing to those against whom I used it ; therefore I took a delight in it, prac- ticed it continually, and grew very artful and expert in drawing people, even of superior knowledge, into concessions, the consequences of which they did not foresee, entangling them in difficulties out of which they could not extricate themselves, and so obtaining victories that neither myself nor my cause always de- served. I continued this method some few years, but gradually left it, retaining only the habit of expressing' myself in terms of modest diffidence ; never using, when I advanced anything that may possibly be dis- puted, the words certainly, undoubtedly, or any oth- ers that give the air of positiveness to an opinion ; but rather say, I conceive or apprehend a thing to be so and so ; it appears to me, or / should thinh it so or so, for such and such reasons ; or / imagine it to be so ; or it is so if I am not mistaken. This habit, I believe, has-been of great advantage to me when I have had occasion to inculcate my opinions, and per- suade men into measures that I have been from time to time engaged in promoting ; and as the chief ends of conversation are to inform or to be informed, to •please or to persuade, I wish well-meaning, sensible men would not lessen their power of doing good by a positive, assuming manner, that seldom fails to dis- 26 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF gust, tends to create opposition, and to defeat every one of those purposes for which speech was given to us, to wit, giving or receiving information or pleasure. For if you would inform, a positive and dogmatical manner in advancing your sentiments may provoke contradiction and prevent a candid attention. If you wish information and improvement from the knowl- edge of others, and yet at the same time express your= self as firmly fixed in your present opinions, modest, sensible men who do not love disputation will proba- bly leave you undisturbed in the possession of your error. And by such a manner you can seldom hope to recommend yourself in ^:)/e«si??^ your hearers, or to persuade those whose concurrence you desire. Pope says, judiciously : — ' ' Men should be taught as if you taus^ht them not, And things unknown propos'd as things forgot; " farther recommending to us "To speak, tho' sure, with seeming diffidence." And he might have coupled with this line that which he has coupled with another, I think less properly, ' ' For want of modesty is want of sense. ' ' If you ask, Why less properly? I must repeat the lines, — " Immodest words admit of no defense, For want of modesty is want of sense." Now, is not luant of sense (where a man is so unf ortu- uate as to want it) some apology for his wajit of mod- esty f and would not the lines stand more justly thus 1 *' Immodest words admit hut this defense, That want of modesty is want of sense." This, however, I should submit to better judgments. My brother had, in 1720 or 1721, begun to print a BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 27 newspaper, It was the second that appeared in Amer> ica, and was called the Neic England Courant} The only one before it was the Boston News-Letter. I re- member his being dissuaded by some of his friends from the undertaking, as not likely to succeed, one newsj)aper being, in their judgment, enough for Amer- ica. At this time (1771) there are not less than five- and-twenty. He went on, however, with the under- taking, and after having worked in composing the types and printing off the sheets, I was employed to carry the papers through the streets to the customers. He had some ingenious men among his friends, who amused themselves by writing little pieces for this paper, which gained it credit and made it more in de- mand, and these gentlemen often visited us. Hearing their conversations, and their accounts of the approba- tion their papers were received with, I was excited to try my hand among them ; but being still a boy, and suspecting that my brother would object to printing anything of mine in his paper if he knew it to be mine, I contrived to disguise my hand, and writing an^ anony- mous paper, I 23ut it in at night under the door of the printing-house. It was found in the morning, and communicated to his writing friends when they called in as usual. They read it, commented on it in my hearing, and I had the exquisite pleasure of finding it met with their approbation, and that in their different guesses at the author, none were named but men of some character among us for learning and ingenuity. I suppose now that I was rather lucky in my judges, ^ Franklin's memory was a little at fault here. The Courant was the third newspaper established in New Eng-land, the fourth in Amer- ica. The Boston Gazette and the American Weekly Mercury of Phila- delphia were published in 1719, the Courant in 1721. The Boston N ews-Letter diSitQd. from 1704 28 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF and that perhaps they were not really so very good ones as I then esteemed them. Encouraged, hovvever,.by this, I wrote and conveyed in the same way to the press several more papers which were equally approved ; and I kept my secret till my small fund of sense for such performances was pretty well exhausted, and then I discovered it, when I began to be considered a little more by my brother's acquaintance, and in a manner that did not quite please him, as he thought, probably with reason, that it tended to make me too vain. And, perhaps, this might be one occasion of the differences that we began to have about this time. Though a brother, he con- sidered himself as my master, and me as his appren- tice, and, accordingly, expected the same services from me as he would from another, while I thought he de- meaned me too much in some he required of me, who from a brother expected more indulgence. Our dis- putes were often brought before our father, and 1 fancy I was either generally in the right, or else a bet- ter pleader, because the judgment was generally in my favor. But my brother was passionate, and had often beaten me, which I took extreme^ amiss ; and, thinking my apprenticeship very tedious, I was con- tinually wishing for some opportunity of shortening it, which at length offered in a manner unexpected.^ One of the pieces in our news23a23er on some politi- cal point, which I have now forgotten, gave offence to the Assembly. He was taken up, censured, and im- prisoned for a month, by the speaker's warrant, I sup- pose, because he would not discover his author. I too ^ I fancy his harsh and tyrannical treatment of me might be a means of impressing me with that aversion to arbitrary power thai has stuck to me through my whole life. B. F. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 29 f\ras taken up and examined before the council ; but, though I did not give them any satisfaction, they con- tented themselves with admonishing me, and dismissed me, considering me, perhaps, as an apprentice, who was bound to keep his master's secrets. During my brother's confinement, which I resented a good deal, notwithstanding our private differences, I had the management of the paper ; and I made bold to give our rulers some rubs in it, which my brother took very kindly, wdiile others began to consider me in an unfavorable light, as a young genius that had a turn for libelling and satire. My brother's discharge was accompanied with an order of the House (a very odd one), that " James Franklin should no longer lorint the 'pwper called the Neio England Courant^ There was a consultation held in our printing-house among his friends, what he should do in this case. Some proposed to evade the order by changing the name of the paper ; but my brother, seeing, inconven- iences in that, it was finally concluded on as a better way, to let it be printedrfor the future under the name of Benjamin Franklin ; and to avoid the censure of the Assembly, that might fall on him as still printing it by his apprentice, the contrivance was that my old indenture should be returned to me, with a full dis- charge on the back of it, to be shown on occasion, but to secure to him the benefit of my service, I was to sign new indentures for the remainder of the term, which were to be kept private. A very flimsy scheme it was ; however, it was immediately executed, and the paper went on accordingly, under my name for several \nonths. At length, a fresh difference arising between my brother and me, I took upon me to assert my freedom, presuming that he would not venture to produce the 30 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF new indentures. It was not fair in me to take this advantage, and this I therefore reckon one of the first errata of my life ; but the unfairness of it weighed little with me, when under the impressions of resent- ment for the blows his j^assion too often urged him to bestow upon me, though he was otherwise not an ill- natured man: perhaps I was too saucy and provok= ing. When he found I would leave him, he took care to prevent my getting employment in any other printing- house of the town, by going round and speaking to every master, who acc6rdingiy refused to give me work. I then thought of going to New York, as the nearest place where there was a printer ; and I was rather inclined to leave Boston when I reflected that I had already made myself a little obnoxious to the gov- erning party, and from the arbitrary proceedings of the Assembly in my brother's case, it was likely I might, if I stayed, soon bring myself into scrapes ; and further, that my indiscreet disputations about re- ligion began to make me pointed at with horror by good people as an infidel or atheist. I determined on the point, but my father now siding with my brother, I was sensible that if I attempted to go openly, means would be used to prevent me. My friend Collins, there- fore, undertook to manage a little for me. He agreed with the caj^tain of a New York sloop for my passage, under the notion of my being a young acquaintance of his [that had gotten himself into trouble]. So I sold some of my books to raise a little money, was taken on board privately, and as we had a fair wind, in three days I found myself in New York, near 300 miles from home, a boy of but 17, without the least recommendation to, or knowledge of, any person in the place, and with very little money in my pocket. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 31 n. SEEKING HIS FORTUNE. My inclinations for the sea were by ttds time worn out, or I might now have gratified them. But, having a trade, and supposing myself a pretty good workman, I offered my service to the printer in the place, old Mr. William Bradford, who had been the first printer in Pennsylvania, but removed from thence upon the quarrel of George Keith. He could give me no em- ployment, having little to do, and help enough already ; but says he, " My son at Philadelphia has lately lost his principal hand, Aquila Rose, by death ; if you go thither, I believe he may employ you." Philadelphia was a hundred miles further ; I set out, however, in a boat for Amboy, leaving my chest and things to fol- low me round by sea. In crossing the bay, we met with a squall that tore our rotten sails to pieces, prevented our getting into the Kill, and drove us upon Long Island. In our way, a drunken Dutchman, who was a passenger too, fell overboard ; when he was sinking, I reached through the water to his shock pate, and drew him up, so that we got him in again. His ducking sobered him a lit- tle, and he went to sleep, taking first out of his pocket a book, which he desired I would dry for him. It proved to be my old favorite author, Bunyan's PiU grimes Progress^ in Dutch, finely printed on good paper, with copper cuts, a dress better than I had ever 32 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF seen it wear in its own language. I have since found tliat it lias been translated into most of the languages of Europe, and supj^ose it has been more generally read than any other book, except perhaps the Bible. Honest John was the first that I know of who mixed narration and dialogue ; a method of writing very en- gaging to the reader, who in the most interesting parts finds himself, as it were, brought into the com- pany and present at the discourse. De Foe in his Crusoe^ his 3Ioll Flanders^ Religious Courtship^ Family Instructor^ and other pieces, has imitated it with success, and Richardson has done the same in his Pamela^ etc. When we drew near the island, we found it was at a place where there could be no landing, there being a great surf on the stony beach. So we dropped anchor, and swung round towards the shore. Some people came down to the water edge and hallooed to us, as we did to them ; but the wind was so high, and the surf so loud, that we could not hear so as to under- stand each other. There were canoes on the shore, and we made signs, and hallooed that they should fetch us ; but they either did not understand us, or thought it impracticable, so they went away, and night coming on, we had no remedy but to wait till the wind should abate ; and, in the mean time, the boatman and I concluded to sleep, if we could ; and so crowded into the scuttle, with the Dutchman, who was still wet ; and the spray beating over the head of our boat, leaked through to us, so that we were soon almost as wet as he. In this manner we lay all night, with very little rest ; but the wind abating the next day, we made a shift to reach Amboy before night, having been thirty hours on the water, without victuals, or any drink but BENJAMIN fRANKLlN. 33 a bottle of filthy rum, the water we sailed on being salt. In the evening I found myself very feverish, and went in to bed ; but having read somewhere that cold water drank plentifully was good for a fever, I fol- lowed the prescription, sweat plentifully most of the night, my fever left me, and in the morning, crossing the ferry, I proceeded on my journey on foot, having fifty miles to Burlington,^ where I was told I should find boats that would carry me the rest of the way to Philadelphia. It rained very hard all the day ; I was thoroughly soaked, and by noon a good deal tired ; so I stopped at a poor inn, where I stayed all night, beginning now to wish that I had never left home. I cut so miserable a figure, too, that I found, by the questions asked me, I was suspected to be some runaway servant, and in danger of being taken up on that suspicion. However, I proceeded the next day, and got in the evening to an inn, within eight or ten miles of Burlington, kept by one Dr. Brown. He entered into conversation with me while I took some refreshment, and, finding I had read a little, became very sociable and friendly. Our acquaintance continued as long as he lived. He had been, I imagine, an itinerant doctor, for there was no town in England, or country in Europe, of which he could not give a very particular account. He had some letters, and was ingenious, but much of an un- believer, and wickedly undertook, some years after, to travesty the Bible in doggerel verse, as Cotton had done Yirgil. By this means he set many of the facts in a very ridiculous light, and might have hurt weak ^ In New Jersey. 34 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF minds if his work had been published ; but it never was. At his house I lay that night, and the next morning reached Burlington, but had the mortification to find that the regular boats were gone a little before my coming, and no other expected to go before Tuesday, this being Saturday ; wherefore I returned to an old woman in the town, of whom I had bought ginger- bread to eat on the water, and asked her advice. She invited me to lodge at her house till a passage by water should offer; and being tired with my foot traveling, I accepted the invitation. She, understand- ing I was a printer, would have had me stay at that town and follow my business, being ignorant of the stock necessary to begin with. She was very hospita- ble, gave me a dinner of ox-cheek with great good- will, accepting only of a pot of ale in return ; and I thought myself fixed till Tuesday should come. How- ever, walking in the evening by the side of the river, a boat came by, which I found was going towards Philadelphia, with several people in her. They took me in, and, as there was no wind, we rowed all the way ; and about midnight, not having yet seen the city, some of the company were confident we must have passed it, and would row no farther ; the others knew not where we were ; so we put toward the shore, got into a creek, landed near an old fence, with the rails of which we made a fire, the night being cold, in October, and there we remained till daylight. Then one of the company knew the place to be Cooper's Creek, a little above Philadelphia, which we saw as soon as we got out of the creek, and arrived there about eight or nine o'clock on the Sunday morning, and landed at the Market Street wharf. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 35 I have been the more particular in this description of my journey, and shall be so of my first entry into that city, that you may in your mind compare such unlikely beginnings with the figure I have since made there. I was in my working-dress, my best clothes being to come round by sea. I was dirty from my journey ; my pockets were stuffed out with shirts and stockings, and I knew no soul nor where to look for lodging. I was fatigued with traveling, rowing, and want of rest, I was very hungry ; and my whole stock of cash consisted of a Dutch dollar,^ and about a shil- ling in copper. The latter I gave the people of the boat for my passage, who at first refused it on account of my rowing ; but I insisted on their taking it. A man being sometimes more generous when he has but a little money than when he has plenty, perhaps through fear of being thought to have but little. Then I walked up the street, gazing about till near the market-house I met a boy with bread. I had made many a meal on bread, and Inquiring where he got it, I went immediately to the baker's he directed me to, in Second Street, and asked for biscuit, intend- ing such as we had in Boston ; but they, it seems, were not made in Philadelphia. Then I asked for a three- penny loaf, and was told they had none such. So not considering or knowing the difference of money, and the greater cheapness nor the names of his bread, I bade him give me three-j)enny worth of any sort. He gave me, accordingly, three great puffy rolls. I was surprised at the quantity, but took it, and having no room in my pockets, walked off with a roll under each arm, and eating the other. Thus I went up Market Street as far as Fourth Street, passing by the door of 1 The metal currency at that time was of foreign coinag-e. 36 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF Mr. Read, my future wife's father ; when she, stand- ing at the door, saw me, and thought I made, as I cer- tainly did, a most awkward, ridiculous appearance. Then I turned and went down Chestnut Street and part of Walnut Street, eating my roll all the way, and coming round, found myself again at Market Street w4iarf, near the boat I came in, to which I went for a draught of the river water ; and being filled with one of my rolls, gave the other two to a woman and her child that came down the river in the boat with us, and were waiting to go farther. Thus refreshed, I walked again up the street, which by this time had" many clean-dressed people in it, who were all walking the same way. I joined them, and thereby was led into the great meeting-house ^ of the Quakers near the market. I sat down among them, and after looking round a while and hearing nothing said, being very drowsy through labor and want of rest the preceding night, I fell fast asleep, and contin- ued so till the meeting broke up, when one was kind enough to rouse me. This was, therefore, the first house I was in or slept in, in Philadelphia. Walking down again toward the river, and looking in the faces of people, I met a young Quaker man, whose countenance I liked, and, accosting him, re- quested he would tell me where a stranger could get lodging. We were then near the sign of the Three Mariners. " Here," says he, " is one place that enter- tains strangers, but it is not a reputable house ; if thee wilt walk with me, I '11 show thee a better." He brought me to the Crooked Billet in Water Street. Here I got a dinner ; and while I was eating it, sev- eral sly questions were asked me, as it seemed to be ^ Tliis stood on the southwest corner of Second and Market streets. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 37 suspected from my youth and appearance that I might be some runaway. After dinner, my sleepiness returned, and being shown to a bed, I lay down without undressing, and slept till six in the evening, was called to supper, went to bed again very early, and slept soundly till next morning. Then I made myself as tidy as I could, and went to Andrew Bradford the printer's. I found in the shop the old man his father, whom I had seen at New York, and who, traveling on horseback, had got to Philadelphia before me. He introduced me to his son, who received me civilly, gave me a breakfast, but told me he did not at present want a hand, being lately supplied with one ; but there was another printer in town, lately set up, one Keimer, who, perhaps, might employ me ; if not, I should be welcome to lodge at his house, and he would give me a little work to do now and then till fuller business should offer. The old gentleman said he would go with me to the new printer ; and when we found him, " Neighbor," says Bradford, " I have brought to see you a young man of your business ; perhaps you may want such a one." He asked me a few questions, put a composing stick in my hand to see how I worked, and then said he would employ me soon, though he had just then nothing for me to do ; and taking old Bradford, whom he had never seen before, to be one of the town's peo- ple that had a good will for him, entered into a con- versation on his present undertaking and prospects ; while Bradford, not discovering that he was the other printer's father, on Keimer's saying he expected soon to- get the greatest part of the business into his own hands, drew him on by artful questions, and starting little doubts, to explain all his vrews, what interests 38 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF he relied on, and in what manner he intended to pro- ceed. I, who stood by and heard all, saw immedi- ately that one of them was a crafty old sophister, and the other a mere novice. Bradford left me with Kei- mer, who was greatly surprised when I told him who the old man was. Keimer's printing-house, I found, consisted of an old shattered press, and one small, worn-out font of English,^ which he was then using himself, composing an Elegy on Aquila Rose, before mentioned, an in- genious young man, of excellent character, much re- spected in the town, clerk of the Assembly, and a pretty poet. Keimer made verses too, but very indif- ferently. He could not be said to write them, for his manner was to compose them in the types directly out of his head. So there being no copy, but one pair of cases, and the Elegy likely to require all the letter, no one could help him. I endeavored to put his press (which he had not yet used, and of which he under- stood nothing) into order fit to be worked with ; and promising to come and print off his Elegy as soon as he should have got it ready, I returned to Bradford's, who gave me a little job to do for the present, and there I lodged and dieted. A few days after, Keimer sent for me to print off the Elegy. And now he had got another pair of cases, and a pamphlet to reprint, on which he set me to work. These two printers I found poorly qualified for their business. Bradford had not been bred to it, and was very illiterate ; and Keimer, though something of a scholar, was a mere compositor knowing nothing of presswork. He had been one of the French prophets,^ ^ The name of a certain size of type. 2 Sujiposed to be a sect of French Pi'otestants, called Camisards. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 39 and could act their enthusiastic agitations. At this time he did not profess any particular religion, but something of all on occasion ; was very ignorant of the v/orld, and had, as I afterward found, a good deal of the knave in his composition. He did not like my lodging at Bradford's while I worked with him. He had a house indeed, but without furniture, so he could not lodge me ; but he got me a lodging at Mr. Read's before mentioned, who was the owner of his house ; and my chest and clothes being come by this time, I made rather a more respectable appearance in the eyes of Miss Read than I had done when she first happened to see me eating my roll in the street. I began now to have some acquaintance among the young people of the town that were lovers of reading, with whom I spent my evenings very pleasantly ; and gaining money by my industry and frugality, I lived very agreeably, forgetting Boston as much as I could, and not desiring that any there should know where I resided except my friend Collins, who was in my se- cret, and kept it when I wrote to him. At length, an incident happened that sent me back again much sooner than I had intended. I had a brother-in-law, Robert Holmes, master of a sloop that traded between Boston and Delaware. He being at Newcastle, forty miles below Philadelphia, heard there of me, and wrote me a letter mentioning the concern of my friends in Boston at my abrupt departure, assuring me of their good-will to me, and that everything would be accommodated to my mind if I would return, to which he exhorted me very earnestly. I wrote an answer to his letter, thanked him for his advice, but stated my reasons for quitting Boston fully and in such a light as to convince him I was not so wrong as he had ap- prehended. 40 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF Sir William Keith, governor of the province, was then at Newcastle, and Captain Holmes, happening to be in company with him when my letter came to hand, spoke to him of me, and showed him the letter. The governor read it, and seemed surj)rised when he was told my age; He said I appeared a young man of promising parts, and therefore should be encouraged ; the printers at Philadelphia were wretched ones ; and, if I would set up there, he made no doubt I should succeed ; for his part, he would procure me the public business, and do me every other service in his power. This my brother-in-law afterwards told me in Boston, but I knew as yet nothing of it ; when, one day, Keimer and I being at work together near the window, we saw the governor and another gentleman (which proved to be Colonel French of Newcastle), finely dressed, come directly across the street to our house, and heard them at the door. Keimer ran down immediately, thinking it a visit to him ; but the governor inquired for me, came up, and with a condescension and politeness I had been quite unused to made me many compliments, desired to be acquainted with me, blamed me kindly for not having made myself known to him when I first came to the place, and would have me away with him to the tavern, where he was going wdth Colonel French to taste, as he said, some excellent Madeira. I was not a little surprised, and Keimer stared like a pig poi- soned. I went, however, with the governor and Colo= nel French to a tavern, at the corner of Third Street, and over the Madeira he proposed my setting up my business, laid before me the probabilities of success, and both he and Colonel French assured me I should have their interest and influence in procuring the pub BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 41 lie business of both governments. On my doubting whether my father would assist me in it, Sir William said he would give me a letter to him, in which he would state the advantages, and he did not doubt of prevailing with him. So it was concluded I should return to Boston in the first vessel, with the gov- ernor's letter recommending me to my father. In the mean time the intention was to be kept a secret, and I went on working with Keimer as usual, the gov- ernor sending for me now and then to dine with him, a very great honor I thought it, and conversing with me in the most affable, familiar, and friendly manner imaginable. About the end of April, 1724, a little vessel offered for Boston. I took leave of Keimer as going to see my friends. The governor gave me an ample letter, saying many flattering things of me to my father, and strongly recommending the project of my setting up at Philadelphia as a thing that must make my fortune. We struck on a shoal in going down the bay, and sprung a leak ; we had a blustering time at sea, and were obliged to pump almost continually, at w^hich I took my turn. We arrived safe, however, at Boston in about a fortnight. I had been absent seven months, and my friends had heard nothing of me ; for my brother Holmes was not yet returned, and had not written about me. My unexpected appearance sur- prised the family ; all were, however, very glad to see me, and made me welcome, except my brother. I went to see him at his printing-house. I was better dressed than ever while in his service, having a genteel new suit from head to foot, a watch, and my pockets lined with near five pounds sterling in silver. He re- ceived me not very frankly, looked me all over, and turned to his work again. 42 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF The journeymen were inquisitive where I had been, what sort of a country it was, and how I liked it. I praised it much, and the happy life I led in it ; ex- pressing strongly my intention of returning to it ; and one of them asking what kind of money we had there, I produced a handful of silver, and spread it before them, which was a kind of rare show they had not been used to, paper being the money of Boston. Then I took an opportunity of letting them see my watch ; and, lastly (my brother still grum and sullen), I gave them a piece of eight ^ to drink, and took my leave. This visit of mine offended him extremely ; for, when my mother some time after spoke to him of a recon- ciliation, and of her wishes to see us on good terms to- gether, and that we might live for the future as broth- ers, he said I had insulted him in such a manner before his people that he could never forget or forgive it. In this, however, he was mistaken. My father received the governor's letter with some apparent surprise, but said little of it to me for some days, when Captain Holmes returning he showed it to him, asked him if he knew Keith, and what kind of man he was ; adding his opinion that he must be of small discretion to think of setting a boy up in busi- ness who wanted yet three years of being at man's estate. Holmes said what he could in favor of the project, but my father was clear in the impropriety of it, and at last gave a flat denial to it. Then he wrote a civil letter to Sir William, thanking him for the patronage he had so kindly offered me, but declin- ing to assist me as yet in setting up, I being, in his opinion, too young to be trusted with the management of a business so important, and for which the prepa^ ration must be so expensive. ^ That is, a Spanish dollar or piaster. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 43 My friend and companion Collins, who was a clerk in the post-office, pleased with the account I gave him of my new country, determined to go thither also; and, while I waited for my father's determination, he set out before me by land to Khode Island, leaving his books, which were a pretty collection of mathemat- ics and natural philosophy, to come with mine and me to New York, where he proposed to wait for me. My father, though he did not approve Sir William's proposition, was yet pleased that I had been able to obtain so advantageous a character from a person of such note where I had resided, and that I had been so industrious and careful as to equip myself so hand- somely in so short a time ; therefore, seeing no pros- pect of an accommodation between my .brother and me, he gave his consent to my returning again to Phil- adelphia, advised me to behave respectfully to the peo- ple there, endeavor to obtain the general esteem, and avoid lampooning and libelling, to which he thought I had too much inclination ; telling me, that by steady industry and a prudent parsimony I might save enough by the time I was one-and-twenty to set me up ; and that, if I came near the matter, he would help me out with the rest. This was all I could obtain, exce'pt some small gifts as tokens of his and my mother's love, when I embarked again for New York, now with their approbation and their blessing. The sloop putting in at Newport, Rhode Island, I visited my brother John, who had been married and settled there some years. He received me very affec- tionately, for he always loved me. A friend of his, one Vernon, having some money due to him in Penn- sylvania, about thirty-five pounds currency, desired I would receive it for him, and keep it till I had his 44 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF directions what to remit it in. Accordingly, he gave me an order. This afterwards occasioned me a good deal of uneasiness. At Newport we took in a number of passengers for New York, among which were two young women, com- panions, and a grave, sensible, matron-like Quakei woman, with her attendants. I had shown an oblig- ing readiness to do her some little services, which im- pressed her I suppose with a degree of good will to- ward me ; therefore, when she saw a daily growing familiarity between me and the two young women, which they appeared to encourage, she took me aside, and said, " Young man, I am concerned for thee, as thou has no friend with thee, and seems not to know much of the world, or of the snares youth is exjDosed to ; depend upon it, those are very bad women ; I can see it in all their actions ; and if thee art not upon thy guard, they will draw thee into some danger ; they are strangers to thee, and I advise thee, in a friendly concern for thy welfare, to have no acquaintance with them." As I seemed at first not to think so ill of them as she did, she mentioned some things she had observed and heard that had escaped my notice, but now convinced me she was right. I thanked her for her kind advice, and promised to follow it. When we arrived at New York, they told me where they lived, and invited me to come and see them ; but I avoided it, and it was well I did ; for the next day the captain missed a silver spoon and some other things, that had been taken out of his cabin, and ... he got a warrant to search their lodgings, found the stolen goods, and had the thieves punished. So, though we had escaped a sunken rock, which we scraped upon in the passage, I thought this escape of rather more importance to me. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 45 At New York I found my friend Collins, who had arrived there some time before me. We had been in- timate from children, and had read the same books together ; but he had the advantage of more time for reading and studying, and a wonderful genius for mathematical learning, in which he far outstripped me. While I lived in Boston, most of my hours of leisure for conversation were spent with him, and he contin- ued a sober as well as an industrious lad ; was much respected for his learning by several of the clergy and other gentlemen, and seemed to promise making a good figure in life. But, during my absence, he had acquired a habit of sotting with brandy ; and I found by his own account, and what I heard from others, that he had been drunk every day since his arrival at New York, and behaved very oddly. He had gamed, too, and lost his money, so that I was obliged to dis- charge his lodgings, and defray his expenses to and at Philadelphia, which proved extremely inconvenient to me. The then governor of New York, Burnet (son of Bishop Burnet), hearing from the captain that a young man, one of his passengers, had a great many books, desired he would bring me to see him. I waited upon him accordingly, and should have taken Collins with me but that he was not sober. The gov- ernor treated me with great civility, showed me his li- brary, which was a very large one, and we had a good deal of conversation about books and authors. This was the second governor who had done me the honor to take notice of me ; which, to a poor boy like me, was very pleasing. \Ye proceeded to Philadelphia. I received on the way Vernon's money, without which we could hardly 46 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF have finished our journey. Collins wished to be em- ployed in some counting-house ; but, whether they discovered his dramming by his breath, or by his behavior, though he had some recommendations, he met with no success in any application, and continued lodging and boarding at the same house with me, and at my expense. Knowing I had that money of Yer^ non's he was continually borrowing of me, still prom- ising repayment as soon as he should be in business. At length he had got so much of it that I was dis- tressed to think what I should do in case of being called on to remit it. His drinking continued, about which we sometimes quarrelled ; for, when a little intoxicated, he was very fractious. Once, in a boat on the Delaware with some other young men, he refused to row in his turn. '' I will be rowed home," says he. " We will not row you," says I. "You must, or stay all night on the water," says he, "just as you please." The others said, " Let us row ; what signifies it ? " But, my mind being soured with his other conduct, I continued to refuse. So he swore he would make me row, or throw me overboard ; and coming along, stepping on the thwarts, toward me, when he came up and struck at me, I clapped my hand under his crotch, and, ris- ing, pitched him head-foremost into the river. I knew he was a good swimmer, and so was under little con- cern about him ; but before he could get round to lay hold of the boat, we had with a few strokes pulled her out of his reach ; and ever when he drew near the boat, we asked if he would row, striking a few strokes to slide her away from him. He was ready to die with vexation, and obstinately would not promise to row. However, seeing him at last beginning to tire, BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 47 we lifted him in and brought him home dripping wet in the evening. We hardly exchanged a civil word afterwards, and a West India captain, who had a commission to procure a tutor for the sons of a gen- tleman at Barbadoes, happening to meet with him, agreed to carry him thither. He left me then, prom- ising to remit me the first money he should receive in order to discharge the debt ; but I never heard of him after. The breaking into this money of Vernon's was one of the first great errata of my life ; and this affair showed that my father was not much out in his judg- ment when he supposed me too young to manage busi- ness of importance. But Sir William, on reading his letter, said he was too prudent. There was great dif- ference in persons; and discretion did not always accompany years, nor was youth always without it. " And since he will not set you up," says he, " I will do it myself. Give me an inventory of the things necessary to be had from England, and I will send for them. You shall repay me when you are able ; I am resolved to have a good printer here, and I am sure you must succeed." This was spoken with such an appearance of cordiality that I had not the least doubt of his meaning what he said. I had hitherto kept the proposition of my setting up a secret in Phil- adelphia, and I still kept it. Had it been known that I depended on the governor, probably some friend, that knew him better, would have advised me not to rely on him, as I afterwards heard it as his known character to be liberal of promises which he never meant to keep. Yet, unsolicited as. he was by me, how could I think his generous offers insincere? I believed him one of the best men in the world. 48 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF I presented him an inventory of a little printing- house, amounting by my computation to about one hundred pounds sterling. He liked it, but asked me if my being on the sjiot in England to choose the types, and see that everything was good of the kind, might not be of some advantage. " Then," says he, " when there, you may make acquaintances, and es- tablish correspondences in the book-selling and sta- tionery way." I agreed that this might be advanta- geous. " Then," says he, " get yourself ready to go with Annis," which was the annual ship, and the only one at that time usually passing between London and Philadelphia. But it would be some months before Annis sailed, so I continued working with Keimer, fretting about the money Collins had got from me, and in daily apprehensions of being called upon by Vernon, which, however, did not happen for some years after. I believe I have omitted mentioning that, in my first voyage from Boston, being becalmed off Block Island, our people set about catching cod, and hauled up a great many. Hitherto I had stuck to my reso- lution of not eating animal food, and on this occasion I considered, with my master Tryon, the taking every fish as a kind of unprovoked murder, since none of them had, or ever could do us any injury that might justify the slaughter. All this seemed very reasona- ble. But I had formerly been a great lover of fish, and, when this came hot out of the frying-pan, it smelt admirably well. I balanced some time between prin- ciple and inclination, till I recollected that, when the fish were opened, I saw smaller fish taken out of their stomachs ; then thought I, " If you eat one another, I don't see why we may n't eat you." So I dined upon BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 49 cod very heartily, and continued to eat with other people, returning only now and then occasionally to a vegetable diet. 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. Ke^mer and I lived on a pretty good familiar foot- ing, and agreed tolerably well, for he suspected notho ing of my setting up. He retained a great deal of his old enthusiasm and loved argumentation. We therefore had many disputations. I used to work him so with my Socratic method, and trepanned him so often by questions apparently so distant from any point we had in hand, and yet by degrees led to the point, and brought him into difficulties and contradic- tions, that at last he grew ridiculously cautious, and would hardly answer me the most common question, without asking first, " What do you intend to infer from that ? " However, it gave him so high an opin- ion of my abilities in the confuting way, that he seri- ously proposed my being his colleague in a project he had of setting up a new sect. He was to preach the doctrines, and I was to confound all opponents. When he came to explain with me upon the doctrines, I found several conundrums which I objected to, unless I might have my way a little too, and introduce some of mine. Keimer wore his beard at full length, because some- where in the Mosaic law it is said, " Thou shalt not w,ar the corner a of thy heardP He likewise kept the Seventh day, Sabbath ; and these two points were essentials with him. I disliked both ; but agreed to admit them upon condition of his adopting the doc- trine of using no animal food. " I doubt," said he, " my constitution will not bear that." I assured him 50 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF it would, and that he would be the better for it. He was usually a great glutton, and I promised myself some diversion in half starving him. He agreed to try the practice, if I would keep him company. I did so, and we held it for three months. We had our vict- uals dressed, and brought to us regularly by a woman in the neighborhood, who had from me a list of forty dishes, to be prepared for us at different times, in all of which there was neither fish, flesh, nor fowl, and the whim suited me the better at this time from the cheapness of it, not costing us above eighteen pence sterling each per week. I have since kept several Lents most strictly, leaving the common diet for that and that for the common, abruptly without the least inconvenience, so that I think that there is little in the advice of making those changes by easy gradations. I went on pleasantly, but poor Keimer suffered griev- ously, tired of the project, longed for the flesh-pots of Egypt, and ordered a roast pig. He invited me and two women friends to dine with him ; but, it being too soon upon the table, he could not resist the temptation, and ate the whole before we came. I had made some courtship during this time to Miss Read. I had a great respect and affection for her, and had some reason to believe she had the same for me ; but as I was about to take a long voyage, and we were both very young, only a little above eighteen, it was thought most prudent by her mother to prevent our going too far at present, as a marriage, if it was to take place, would be more convenient after my return, when I should be, as I expected, set up in my business. Perhaps, too, she thought my expectations not so well founded as I imagined them to be. My chief acquaintances at this time were Charles BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 51 Osborne, Joseph Watson, and James Ralph, all lovers of reading. The two first were clerks to an eminent scrivener or conveyancer in the town, Charles Brog- den ; the other was clerk to a merchant. Watson was a pious, sensible young man, of great integrity; the others rather more lax in their principles of relig- ion, particularly Ralph, who as well as Collins, had been unsettled by me, for which they both made me suffer. Osborne was sensible, candid, frank ; sincere and affectionate to his friends ; but in literary matters, too fond of criticising. Ralph was ingenious, genteel in his manners, and extremely eloquent ; I think I never knew a prettier talker. Both of them great ad- mirers of poetry, and began to try their hands in little pieces. Many pleasant walks we four had together on Sundays into the woods, near Schuylkill, where we read to one another, and conferred on what we read. Ralph was inclined to pursue the study of poetry, not doubting but he might become eminent in it and make his fortune by it, alleging that the best poets must, when they first began to write, make as many faults as he did. Osborne dissuaded him, assured him he had no genius for poetry, and advised him to think of nothing beyond the business he was bred to ; that in the mercantile way, though he had no stock, he might by his diligence and punctuality recommend himself to employment as a factor, and in time acquire wherewith to trade on his own account. I approved the amusing one's self with poetry now and then, so far as to improve one's language, but no farther. On this it was proposed that we should each of us, at our next meeting, produce a piece of our own com- posing, in order to improve by our mutual observa- tions, criticisms, and corrections. As language and 52 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF expression were what we had in view, we excluded all considerations of invention by agreeing that the task should be a version of the eighteenth Psalm, which describes the descent of a Deity. When the time of our meeting drew nigh, Ralph called on me first, and let me know his piece was ready. I told him I had been busy, and having little inclination, had done nothing. He then showed me his piece for my opin- ion, and I much approved it, as it appeared to me to have great merit. " Now," says he, " Qsborne never will allow the least merit in anything of mine, but makes a thousand criticisms out of mere envy. He is not so jealous of you ; I wish, therefore, you would take this piece, and produce it as yours ; I will pre- tend not to have had time, and so produce nothing. We shall then see what he will say to it." It was agreed, and I immediately transcribed it, that it might appear in my own hand. We met ; Watson's performance was read ; there were some beauties in it, but many defects. Osborne's was read ; it was much better ; Kalph did it justice ; remarked some faults, but applauded the beauties. He himself had nothing to produce. I was backward ; seemed desirous of being excused ; had not had suffi. cient time to correct, etc. ; but no excuse could be ad« mitted ; produce I must. It was read and repeated ; Watson and Osborne gave up the contest, and joined in applauding it. Ralph only made some criticisms, and proposed some amendments ; but I defended my text. Osborne was against Ralph, and told him he was no better a critic than poet, so he dropped the argu- ment. As they two went home together, Osborne ex- pressed himself still more strongly in favor of what he thought my production ; having restrained himself be« BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 53 fore, as he said, lest I should think it flattery. " But who would haye imagined," said he, "that Franklin had been capable of such a performance ; such paint- ing, such force, such fire ! He has even improved the orio'inal. In his common conversation he seems to o have no choice of words ; he hesitates and blunders ; and yet, good God ! how he writes ! " When we next met, Ralph discovered the trick we had played him, and Osborne was a little laughed at. This transaction fixed Ralph in his resolution of be- coming a poet. I did all I could to dissuade him from it, but he continued scribbling verses till Pope cured him.i He became, however, a pretty good prose writer. More of him hereafter. But, as I may not have occasion again to mention the other two, I shall just remark here, that Watson died in my arms a few years after, much lamented, being the best of our set. Osborne went to the West Indies, where he became an eminent lawyer and made money, but died young. He and I had made a serious agreement, that the one who happened first to die should, if possible, make a friendly visit to the other, and acquaint him how he found things in that separate state. But he never ful- filled his promise. The governor, seeming to like my company, had me frequently to his house, and his setting me up was al- ways mentioned as a fixed thing. I was to take with me letters recommendatory to a number of his friends, besides the letter of credit to furnish me with the nec- essary money for purchasing the press and types, 1 Alexander Pope in his Dunciad, a witty characterization in versa Df contemporary writers, has these lines : — " Silence, ye wolves! while Ralph to Cynthia howls, And makes night hideous — answer him, ye owls." 54 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF paper, etc. For these letters I was appointed to call at different times, when they were to be ready ; but a future time was still named. Thus he went on till the ship, whose departure too had been several times post- poned, was on the point of sailing. Then, when I called to take my leave and receive the letters, his sec- retary. Dr. Bard, came out to me and said the gov. ernor was extremely busy in writing, but would be down at Newcastle before the ship, and there the let- ters would be delivered to me. Kalph, though married, and having one child, had determined to accompany me in this voyage. It was thought he intended to establish a correspondence, and obtain goods to sell on commission ; but I found afterwards, that, through some discontent with his wife's relations, he purposed to leave her on their hands, and never return again. Having taken leave of my friends, and interchanged some promises with Miss Read, I left Philadelphia in the ship, which an- chored at Newcastle. The governor was there ; but when I went to his lodging, the secretary came to me from him with the ci vilest message in the world, that he could not then see me, being engaged in business of the utmost importance, but should send the letters to me on board, wished me heartily a good voyage and a speedy return, etc. I returned on board a little puz- zled, but still not doubting. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 55 m. ADVENTURES IN LONDON. Me. Andeew Hamilton, a famous lawyer of PhiL adelphia, had taken passage in the same ship for him- self and son, and with Mr. Denham, a Quaker mer- chant, and Messrs. Onion and Russel, masters of an iron work in Maryland, had engaged the great cabin ; so that Kalph and I were forced to take up with a berth in the steerage, and none on board knowing us, were considered as ordinary persons. But Mr. Ham- ilton and his son (it was James, since governor) re- turned from Newcastle to Philadelphia, the father being recalled by a great fee to plead for a seized ship ; and, just before we sailed. Colonel French com- ing on board, and showing me great respect, I was more taken notice of, and, with my friend Ralph, in- vited by the other gentlemen to come into the cabin, there being now room. Accordingly, we removed thither. Understanding that Colonel French had brought on board the governor's dispatches, I asked the captain lor those letters that were to be under my care. He said all were put into the bag together and he could not then come at them ; but, before we landed in Eng- land, I should have an opportunity of picking them out ; so I was satisfied for the present, and we proceeded on our voyage. We had a sociable company in the cabin, and lived uncommonly well, having the addition 56 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF of all Mr. Hamilton's stores, who had laid in plenti- fully. In this passage Mr. Denham contracted a friendship for me that continued during his life. The voyage was otherwise not a pleasant one, as we had a great deal of bad weather. When we came into the Channel, the captain kept his word with me, and gave me an opportunity of ex« amining the bag for the governor's letters. I found none upon which my name was put as under my care. 1 picked out six or seven, that, by the handwriting, I thought might be the promised letters, esj)ecially as one of them was directed to Basket, the king's printer, and another to some stationer. We arrived in Lon- don the 24th of December, 1724. I waited u23on the stationer, who came first in my way, delivering the letter as from Governor Keith. " I don't know such a person," says he ; but, opening the letter, " Oh ! this is from Riddlesden. I have lately found him to be a complete rascal, and I will have nothing to do with him, nor receive any letters from him." So, putting the letter into my hand, he turned on his heel and left me to serve some customer. I was surprised to find these were not the governor's letters ; and, after rec- ollecting and comparing circumstances, I began to doubt his sincerity. I found my friend Denham, and opened the whole affair to him. He let me into Keith's character ; told me there was not the least probability that he had written any letters for me ; that no one, who knew him, had the smallest depend- ence on him ; and he laughed at the notion of the gov- ernor's giving me a letter of credit, having, as he said, no credit to give. On my expressing some concern about what I should do, he advised me to endeavoi getting some employment in the way of my business BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 57 "Among the printers here," said he, "you will im- prove yourself, and when you return to America, you will set up to greater advantage^" We both of us happened to know, as well as the stationer, that Riddlesden, the attorney, was a very knave. He had half ruined Miss Eead'a father by persuading him to be bound for him.^ By this letter it appeared there was a secret scheme on foot to the prejudice of Hamilton (supposed to be then coming over with us) ; and that Keith was concerned in it with Riddlesden. Denham, who was a friend of Hamilton's, thought he ought to be acquainted with it ; so, when he arrived in England, which was soon after, partly from resentment and ill-will to Keith and Riddlesden, and partly from good-will to him, I waited on him, and gave him the letter. He thanked me cordially, the information being of importance to him ; and from that time he became my friend, greatly to my advantage afterwards on many occasions. But what shall we think of a governor's playing such pitiful tricks, and imposing so grossly on a poor ignorant boy ! It was a habit he had acquired. He wished to please everybody ; and, having little to give, he gave expectations. He was otherwise an ingenious, sensible man, a pretty good writer, and a good gov- ernor for the people, though not for his constituents, the proprietaries, whose instructions he sometimes dis- regarded. Several of our best laws were of his plan- ning and passed during his administration. Ralph and I were inseparable companions. Wo took lodo^inofs too'ether in Little Britain at three shil- lings and sixpence a week — as much as we could then 1 To be bound for him was to give security for the payment of a ttote. 58 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF afford. He found some relations, but they were poor, and unable to assist him. He now let me know his intentions of remaining in London, and that he never meant to return to Philadelphia. He had brought no money with him, the whole he could muster having been expended in paying his passage. I had fifteen pistoles ; so he borrowed occasionally of me to subsist, while he was looking out for business. He first endeav- ored to get into the playhouse, believing himself quali- fied for an actor ; but Wilkes,^ to whom he applied, advised him candidly not to think of that employment, as it was impossible he should succeed in it. Then he proposed to Eoberts, a publisher in Paternoster Row, to write for him a weekly paper like the Spectator^ on certain conditions, which Roberts did not approve. Then he endeavored to get employment as a hackney writer, to copy for the stationers and lawyers about the Temple, but could find no vacancy. I immediately got into work at Palmer's, then a famous i^rinting-house in Bartholomew Close, and here I continued near a year. I was pretty diligent, but spent with Ralph a good deal of my earnings in going to plays and other places of amusement. We had together consumed all my pistoles, and now just rubbed on from hand to mouth. He seemed quite to forget his wife and child, and I, by degrees, my en- gagements with Miss Read, to whom I never wrote more than one letter, and that was to let her know I was not likely soon to return. This was another of the great errata of my life, which I should wish to correct if I were to live it over again. In fact, by our expenses, I was constantly kept unable to pay my passage. 1 A comedian of that time. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 59 At Palmer's I was employed in composing for the second edition of Wollaston's Religion of Nature, Some of liis reasonings not a.ppearing to me well founded, I wrote a little metaphysical piece in which I made remarks on them. It was entitled A Disser^ tation on Liberty and Necessity^ Pleasure and Pain. I inscribed it to my friend Ralph ; I printed a small number. It occasioned my being more considered by Mr. Palmer as a young man of some ingenuity, though he seriously expostulated with me upon the principles of my pamphlet, which to him appeared abominable. My printing this pamphlet was another erratum. While I lodged in Little Britain, I made an acquaint- ance with one Wilcox, a bookseller, whose shop was at the next door. He had an immense collection of second-hand books. Circulating libraries were not then in use ; but we agreed that, on certain reasonable terms, which I have now forgotten, I might take, read, and return any of his books. This I esteemed a great advantage, and I made as much use of it as I could. My pamphlet by some means falling into the hands of one Lyons, a surgeon, author of a book entitled The Infallibility of Human Judgment^ it occasioned an acquaintance between us. He took great notice of me, called on me often to converse on those subjects, carried me to the Horns, a pale-ale house in Lane, Cheapside, and introduced me to Dr. Mandeville, au- thor of the Fable of the Bees who had a club there, of which he was the soul, being a most facetious, en- tertaining companion. Lyons, too, introduced me to Dr. Pemberton, at Batson's Coffee-house, who prom- ised to give me an opportunity, some time or other, of seeing Sir Isaac Newton, of which I was extremely desirous ; but this never happened. 60 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF I had brought over a few curiosities, among which the principal was a purse made of the asbestos, which purifies by fire. Sir Han?-; Sloane ^ heard of it, came to see me, and invited me to his house in Bloomsbury Square, where he showed me all his curiosities, and persuaded me to let him add that to the number, for which he paid me handsomely. In our house there lodged a young woman, a mil- liner, who, I think, had a sho]) in the Cloisters. . She had been genteelly bred, was sensible and lively, and of most pleasing conversation. Kalj)h read plays to her in the evenings, they grew intimate, she took an- other lodging and he followed her. They lived to- gether some time ; but he being still out of business, and her income not sufficient to maintain them with her child, he took a resolution of going from London, to try for a country school, which he thought himself well qualified to undertake, as he wrote an excellent hand, and was a master of arithmetic and accounts. This, however, he deemed a business below him, and confident of future better fortune, when he should be unwilling to have it known that he once was so meanly employed, he changed his name, and did me the honor to assume mine; for I soon after had a letter from him, acquainting me that he was settled in a small vil- lage (in Berkshire, I think it was, where he taught reading and writing to ten or a dozen boys, at sixpence each per week), recommending Mrs. T to my care, and desiring me to write to him, directing for Mr. Franklin, schoolmaster at such a place. 1 Sir Hans Sloane Avas an EngVIsh physician who left to the nation, when he died in 1753, his large collection of curiosities and specimens of natural history. This gift was the foundation of the British Mu. BBum. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 61 He continued to write frequently, sending me large specimens of an epic poem which he was then compos- ing, and desiring my remarks and corrections. These I gave him from time to time, but endeavored rather to discourage his proceeding. One of Young's Satires was then just published. I copied and sent him a great part of it, which set in a strong light the folly of pursuing the Muses with any hope of advancement by them. All was in vain ; sheets of the poem contin- ued to come by every post. In the mean time [other circumstances] . . . made a breach between us ; and, when he returned again to London, he let me know he thought I had cancelled all the obligations he had been under to me. So I found I was never to expect his repaying me what I lent to him, or advanced for him. This, however, was not then of much conse- quence, as he was totally unable ; and in the loss of his friendship I found myself relieved from a burden. I now began to think of getting a little money be- forehand, and, expecting better work, I left Palmer's to work at Watts's, near Lincoln's Inn Fields, a still greater printing house. Here I continued all the rest of my stay in London. At my first admission into this printing-house I took to working at press, imagining I felt a want of the bodily exercise I had been used to in America, where presswork is mixed with composing. I drank only water ; the other workmen, near fifty in number, were great guzzlers of beer. On occasion, I carried up and down stairs a large form of types in each hand, when others carried but one in both hands. They wondered to see, from this and several instances, that the Water-American^ as they called me, was stronger than themselves, who drank strong beer! 62 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF We had an alehouse boy who attended always in the house to supply the workmen. My companion at the press drank every day a pint before breakfast, a pint at breakfast with his bread and cheese, a pint between breakfast and dinner, a pint at dinner, a pint in the afternoon about six o'clock, and another when he had done his day's work. I thought it a detestable cus- tom ; but it was necessary, he supposed, to drink stro?ig beer, that he might be stro7ig to labor. I en- deavored to convince him that the bodily strength afforded by beer could only be in proportion to the grain or flour of the barley dissolved in the water of which it was made ; that there was more flour in a pennyworth of bread ; and therefore, if he would eat that with a pint of water, it would give him more strength than a quart of beer. He drank on, however, and had four or five shillings to pay out of his wages every Saturday night for that muddling liquor; an expense I was free from. And thus these poor devils keep themselves always under. Watts, after some weeks, desiring to have me in the composing-room, I left the pressmen ; a new hien vemi or sum for drink, being five shillings, was de- manded of me by the compositors. I thought it an imposition, as I had paid below ; the master thought so too, and forbade my paying it. I stood out two or three weeks, was accordingly considered as an excom- municate, and had so many little pieces of private mischief done me, by mixing my sorts, transposing my Images, breaking my matter, etc., etc., if I were ever so little out of the room, and all ascribed to the chapel ghost, which they said ever haunted those not regularly admitted, that, notwithstanding the master's protection, I found myself obliged to comply and pay BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 63 fche money, convinced of the folly of being on ill terms with those one is to live with continually. I was now on a fair footing with them, and soon ac- quired considerable influence. I proposed some rea- sonable alterations in their chapel laws, and carried them against all opposition. From my example, a- great part of them left their muddling breakfast of beer, and bread, and cheese, finding they could, with me, be supplied from a neighboring house with a large porringer of hot water-gruel, sprinkled with pepper, crumbed with bread, and a bit of butter in it, for the price of a pint of beer, viz., three half -pence. This was a more comfortable as well as cheaper breakfast, and kept their heads clearer. Those who continued sotting with beer all day were often, by not paying, out of credit at the alehouse, and used to make inter- est with me to get beer ; their lights as they phrased it, hehig out. I watched the pay-table on Saturday night, and collected what I stood engaged for them, having to pay sometimes near thirty shillings a week on their accounts. This, and my being esteemed a pretty good riggit-e, that is, a jocular, verbal satirist, supported my consequence in the society. My constant attendance (I never making a St. Monday ^) recom- mended me to the master ; and my uncommon quick- ness at composing occasioned my being put upon all work of dispatch, which was generally better paid. So I went on now very agreeably. My lodging in Little Britain being too remote, I found another in Duke Street, opposite to the Romish ehapel. It was two pair of stairs backwards, at an 1 That is, never turning Monday into a holiday, as other workmen did, who, when paid Saturday night, squandered their earnings in ilrink and were good, for nothing before Tuesday. 64 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF Italian warehouse. A widow lady kept the house; she had a daughter, and a maid servant, and a jour- neyman who attended the warehouse, but lodged abroad. After sending to inquire my character at the house where I last lodged, she agTeed to take me in at the same rate, 3s. Q>d. per week ; cheaper, as she said, from the protection she expected in having a man lodge in the house. She was a widow, an elderly woman ; had been bred a Protestant, being a clergy- man's daughter, but was converted to the Catholic re- ligion by her husband, whose memory she much re- vered ; had lived much among people of distinction, and knew a thousand anecdotes of them as far back as the times of Charles the Second. She was lame in her knees with the gout, and, therefore, seldom stirred out of her room, so sometimes wanted company ; and hers was so highly amusing to me, that I was sure to spend an evening with her whenever she desired it. Our supper was only half an anchovy each, on a very little strip of bread and butter, and half a pint of ale between us ; but the entertainment was in her conver- sation. My always keeping good hours, and giving little trouble in the family, made her unwilling to part with me ; so that, when I talked of a lodging I had heard of, nearer my business, for two shillings a week, which, intent as I now was on saving money, made some difference, she bid me not think of it, for she would abate me two shillings a week for the future ; so I remained with her at one shilling and sixpence as long as I stayed in London. In a garret of her house there lived a maiden lady of seventy, in the most retired manner, of whom my landlady gave me this account : that she was a Roman Catholic, had been sent abroad when young, and BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 65 /oclged in a nunnery with an intent of becoming a nun ; but, the country not agreeing with her, she re- turned to England, where, there being no nunnery, she had vowed to lead the life of a nun, as near as might be done in those circumstances. Accordingly,, she had given all her estate to charitable uses, reserv- ing only twelve pounds a year to live on, and out of this sum she still gave a great deal in charity, living herself on water-gruel only, and using no fire but to boil it. She had lived many years in that garret, be- ing permitted to remain there gratis by successive Catholic tenants of the house below, as they deemed it a blessing to have her there. A priest visited her to confess her every day. " I have asked her," says my landlady, "how she, as she lived, could possibly find so much employment for a confessor?" "Oh," said she, " it is impossible to avoid vain thoughts^ I was permitted once to visit her. She was cheerful and polite, and conversed pleasantly. The room was clean, but had no other furniture than a mattress, a table with a crucifix and book, a stool which she gave me to sit on, and a j)icture over the chimney of Saint Veronica displaying her handkerchief, with the mirac- ulous figure of Christ's bleeding face on it, which she explained to me with great seriousness. She looked pale, but was never sick ; and I give it as another in- stance on how small an income life and health may be supported. At Watts's printing-house I contracted an acquaint- ance with an ingenious young man, one Wygate, who, having wealthy relations, had been better educated than most printers ; was a tolerable Latinist, spoke French, and loved reading. I taught him and a friend of his to swim at twice going into the river, and they 66 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF soon became good swimmers. They introduced me to some gentlemen from the country, who went to Chel- sea by water to see the College and Don Saitero's cu- riosities. In our return, at the request of the com- pany, whose curiosity Wygate had excited, I stripped and leaj^ed into the river, and swam from near Chel- sea to Blackfriar's, performing on the way many feats of activity, both upon and under water, that surj)rised and pleased those to whom they were novelties. I had from a child been ever delighted w^ith this exercise, had studied and practised all Thevenot's motions and positions, added some of my own, aiming at the gTaceful and easy as well as the useful. All these I took this occasion of exhibiting to the com- pany, and was much flattered by their admiration ; and Wygate, who was desirous of becoming a master, grew more and more attached to me on that account, as well as from the similarity of our studies. He at length proposed to me travelling all over Europe to- gether, supporting ourselves everywhere by working at our business. I was once inclined to it ; but, men- tioning it to my good friend Mr. Denham, with whom I often spent an hour when I had leisure, he dissuaded me from it, advising me to think only of returning to Pennsylvania, which he was now about to do. I must record one trait of this good man's charac- ter. He had formerly been in business at Bristol, but failed in debt to a number of people, compounded and went to America. There, by a close application to business as a merchant, he acquired a plentiful fortune in a few years. Returning to England in the ship with me, he invited his old creditors to an entertain- ment, at which he thanked them for the easy compo- BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 67 sition tliey had favored him with, and> when they ex- pected nothing but the treat, every man at the first remove found under his plate an order on a banker for the full amount of the unpaid remainder with in- terest. He now told me he was about to return to PhiladeL phia, and should carry over a great quantity of goods in order to open a store there. He proposed to take me over as his clerk, to keep his books, in which he would instruct me, copy his letters, and attend the store. He added that, as soon as I should be ac- quainted with mercantile business, he would promote me by sending me with a cargo of flour and bread, etc., to the West Indies, and procure me commissions from others which would be profitable ; and if I man- aged well, would establish me handsomely. The thing pleased me; for I was grown tired of London, re- membered with pleasure the happy months I had spent in Pennsylvania, and wished again to see it; therefore I immediately agreed on the terms of fifty pounds a year, Pennsylvania money ; less, indeed, than my present gettings as a compositor, but affording a better prospect. I now took leave of printing, as I thought, forever, and was daily employed in my new business, going about with Mr. Denham among the tradesmen to pur- chase various articles, and seeing them packed up, doing errands, calling upon workmen to dispatch, etc. ; and when all was on board, I had a few days' leisure. On one of these days, I was, to my surprise, sent for by a great man I knew only by name, a Sir William Wyndham, and I waited upon him. He had heard by some means or other of my swimming from 68 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF Chelsea to Blackfriar's, and of my teaching Wygate and another young man to swim in a few hours. He had two sons, about to set out on their travels ; he wished to have them first taught swimming, and pro- posed to gratify me handsomely if I would teach them. They were not yet come to town, and my stay was un- certain, so I could not undertake it ; but from this in- cident, I thought it likely that, if I were to remain in England and open a swimming-school, I might get a good deal of money; and it struck me so strongly that, had the overture been sooner made me, probably I should not so soon have returned to America. After many years, you and I had something of more impor- tance to do with one of these sons of Sir William Wynclham, become Earl of Egremont, which I shall mention in its place. Thus I spent about eighteen months in London ; most part of the time I worked hard at my business, and spent but little upon myself except in seeing plays and in books. My friend Ralph had kept me poor ; he owed me about twenty-seven pounds, which I was now never likely to receive ; a great sum out of my small earnings I I loved him, notwithstanding, for he had many amiable qualities. I had by no means im- proved my fortune ; but I had picked up some very ingenious acquaintances, whose conversation was of great advantage to me ; and I had read considerably. We sailed from Gravesend on the 23d of July, 1726. For the incidents of the voyage, I refer you to my Journal, where you will find them all minutely related. Perhaps the most important part of that journal is the 2^l<^f^''^ ^ to be found in it which I formed 1 This plan was not found in the manuscript journal. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 69 at sea, for regulating my future conduct in life. It is the more remarkable, as being formed when I was so young, and yet being pretty faithfully adhered to quite through to old age. Franklin's Printing Press 7G AUTOBIOGRAPHY. OF IV. RETUKN TO PHILADELPHIA. We landed in Philadelphia on the 11th of October, where I found sundry alterations. Keith was no longer governor, being superseded by Major Gordon. I met him walking the streets as a common citizen. He seemed a little ashamed at seeing me, but passed without saying anything. I should have been as much ashamed at seeing Miss Eead, had not her friends, despairing with reason of my return after the receipt of my letter, persuaded her to marry another, one Rogers, a potter, which was done in my absence. With him, however, she was never happy, and soon parted from him, refusing to cohabit with him or bear his name, it now being said that he had another wife. He was a worthless fellow, though an excellent workman, which was the temptation to her friends. He got into debt, ran away in 1727 or 1728, went to the West In- dies, and died there. Keimer had got a better house, a shop well supplied with stationery, plenty of new types, a number of hands, though none good, and seemed to have a great deal of business. Mr. Denham took a store in Water Street, where we opened our goods ; I attended the business dili- gently, studied accounts, and grew, in a little time, expert at selling. We lodged and boarded together ; he counselled me as a father, having a sincere regard for me. I respected and loved him, and we might BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 71 have goae on together very happy ; but in the begin- ning of February, 172f, when I had just passed my twenty-first year, we both were taken ill. My distem- per was a pleurisy, which very nearly carried me offo I suffered a good deal, gave up the point in my own mind, and was rather disappointed when I found my- self recovering, regretting, in some degree, that I must now, some time or other, have all that disagreeable work to do over again. I forget what his distemper was ; it held him a long time, and at length carried him off. He left me a small legacy in a nuncupative will as a token of his kindness for me, and he left me once more to the wide world ; for the store was taken into the care of his executors, and my employment under him ended. My brother-in-law. Holmes, being now at Philadel- phia, advised my return to my business ; and Keimer tempted me, with an offer of large wages by the year, to come and take the management of his printing- house, that he might better attend his stationer's shop. I had heard a bad character of him in London from his wife and her friends, and was not fond of having any more to do with him. I tried for further employment as a merchant's clerk ; but not readily meeting with any, I closed again with Keimer. I found in his house these hands : Hugh Meredith, a Welsh Pennsylvanian, thirty years of age, bred to country work ; honest, sen- sible, had a great deal of solid observation, was some- thing of a reader, but given to drink. Stephen Potts, a young countryman of full age, bred to the same, of uncommon natural parts, and great wit and humor, but a little idle. These he had agreed with at extreme low wages per week, to be raised a shilling every three months, as they would deserve by improving in their ^ 72 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF business ; and the expectation of these high wages, to come on hereafter, was what he had drawn them in with. Meredith was to work at press, Potts at book- binding, which he, by agreement, was to teach them, though he knew neither one nor the other. John , a wild Irishman, brought up to no business, whose service, for four years, Keimer had purchased from the captain of a ship ; he, too, was to be made a press- man. George Webb, an Oxford scholar, whose time for four years he had likewise bought,^ intending him for a compositor, of whom more presently ; and David Harry, a country boy, whom he had taken apprentice. I soon perceived that the intention of engaging me at wao:es so much higher than he had been used to give was to have these raw, cheap hands formed through me ; and as soon as I had instructed them, then they being all articled to him, he should be able to do without me. I went on, however, very cheer- fully, put his printing-house in order, which had been in great confusion, and brought his hands by degrees to mind their business and to do it better. It was an odd thing to find an Oxford scholar in the situation of a bought servant. He was not more than eighteen years of age, and gave me this account of himself ; that he was born in Gloucester, educated at a grammar-school there, had been distinguished among the scholars for some apparent superiority in performing his part, when they exhibited plays ; be- longed to the Witty Club there, and had written some pieces in prose and verse, which were printed in the Gloucester newspapers ; thence he was sent to Oxford ; where he continued about a year, but not well satiS' 1 Persons coming' penniless from Eiirope sold themselves for a tern) of years to pay the expense of their voyage and their keeping. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 73 fied, wishing of all things to see London, and become a player. At length receiving his quarterly allowance of fifteen guineas, instead of discharging his debts he walked out of town, hid his gown in a furze bush, and footed it to London, where, having no friend to advise him, he fell into bad company, soon spent his guineas, found no means of being introduced among the play- ers, grew necessitous, pawned his clothes, and wanted bread. Walking the street very hungry, and not knowing what to do with himself, a crimp's bill was put into his hand, offering immediate entertainment and encouragement to such as would bind themselves to serve in America. He went directly, signed the indentures, was put into the ship, and came over, never writing a line to acquaint his friends what was become of him. He was lively, witty, good-natured, and a pleasant companion, but idle, thoughtless, and imprudent to the last degree. John, the Irishman, soon ran away ; with the rest I began to live very agreeably, for they all respected me the more, as they found Keimer incapable of in- structing them, and that from me they learned some- thing daily. We never worked on Saturday, that be- ing Keimer' s Sabbath, so I had two days for reading. My acquaintance with ingenious people in the town increased. Keimer himself treated me with great ci- vility and apparent regard, and nothing now made me luneasy but my debt to Vernon, which I was yet unable to pay, being hitherto but a poor economist. He, how- ever, kindly made no demand of it. Our printing-house often wanted sorts, and there was no letter-founder in America ; I had seen types east at James's in London, but without much atten- tion to the manner ; however, I now contrived a mould, 74 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF made use of the letters we liad as puncheons, struck the matrices in lead, and thus supplied in a pretty tol- erable way all deficiencies. I also engraved several things on occasion ; I made the ink ; I was ware- houseman, and everj^thing, and, in short, quite a fac- totum. But, however serviceable I might be, I found that my services became every day of less importance, as the other hands improved in the business ; and when Keimer paid my second quarter's wages, he let me know that he felt them too heavy, and thought I should make an abatement. He grew by degrees less civil, put on more of the master, frequently found fault, was captious, and seemed ready for an outbreak- ing. I went on, nevertheless, with a good deal of pa- tience, thinking that his incumbered circumstances were partly the cause. At length a trifle snapped our connections ; for, a great noise happening near the court-house, I put my head out of the window to see what was the matter. Keimer, being in the street, looked up and saw me, called out to me in a loud voice and angry tone to mind my business, adding some re- proachful words, that nettled me the more for their publicity, all the neighbors who were looking out on the same occasion being witnesses how I was treated. He came up immediately into the printing-house, con- tinued the quarrel, high words passed on both sides, he gave me the quarter's warning we had stipulated, expressing a wish that he had not been obliged to so long a warning. I told him his wish was unnecessary, for I would leave him that instant ; and so, taking my hat, walked out of doors, desiring Meredith, whom ] saw below, to take care of some things 1 left, and bring them to my lodgings. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 75 Meredith came accordingly in the evening, when we talked my affair over. He had conceived a great re- gard for me, and was very unwilling that I should leave the house while he remained in it. He dissuaded me from returning to my native country, which I be= gan to think of ; he reminded me that Keimer was in debt for all he possessed ; that his creditors began to be uneasy ; that he kept his shop miserably, sold often without profit for ready money, and often trusted without keeping accounts ; that he must therefore fail, which would make a vacancy I might profit of. I ob- jected my want of money. He then let me know that his father had a high opinion of me, and from some discourse that had passed between them, he was sure would advance money to set us up, if I would enter into partnership with him. "My time," says he, "will be out with Keimer in the spring ; by that time we may have our press and types in from London. I am sensible I am no workman ; if you like it, your skill in the business shall be set against the stock I furnish, and we will share the profits equally." The proposal was agreeable, and I consented ; his father was in town and approved of it ; the more as he saw I had great influence with his son, had pre- vailed on him to abstain long from dram-drinking, and he hoped might break him of that wretched habit entirely, when we came to be so closely connected. I gave an inventory to the father, who carried it to a rfierchant ; the things were sent for, the secret was to be kept till they should arrive, and in the mean time I was to get work, if I could, at the other printing- house. But I found no vacancy there, and so remaibed idle a few days, when Keimer, on a prospect of being employed to print some paper money in New Jersey, 76 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF which would require cuts and various types that I only could supply, and apprehending Bradford might en- gage me and get the job from him, sent me a very civil message, that old friends should not part for a few words, the effect of sudden passion, and wishing me to return. Meredith persuaded me to comply, as it would give more opportunity for his improvement under my daily instructions ; so I returned, and we went on more smoothly than for some time before. The New Jersey job was obtained, I contrived a cop- per-plate press for it, the first that had been seen in the country; I cut several ornaments and checks for the bills. We went together to Burlington, where I executed the whole to satisfaction; and he received so large a sum for the work as to be enabled thereby to keep his head much longer above water. At Burlington I made an acquaintance with many principal j^eople of the province. Several of them had been appointed by the Assembly a committee to attend the press, and take care that no more bills were printed than the law directed. They were, therefore, by turns, constantly with us, and generally he who at- tended brought with him a friend or two for company. My mind having been much more improved by read- ing than Keimer's, I suppose it was for that reason my conversation seemed to be more valued. They had me to their houses, introduced me to their friends, and showed me much civilit}^ ; while he, though the mas- ter, was a little neglected. In truth, he was an odd fish ; ignorant of common life, fond of rudely oppos- ing received opinions, slovenly to extreme dirtiness^ enthusiastic in some points of religion, and a little knavish withal. We continued there near three months ; and by BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 77 that time, I could reckon among my acquired friends, Judge Allen, Samuel Bustill, the secretary of the province, Isaac Pearson, Joseph Cooper, and several of the Smiths, members of Assembly, and Isaac De- cow, the surveyor-general. The latter was a shrewd, sagacious old man, who told me that he began for himself, when young, by wheeling clay for the brick- makers, learned to write after he was of age, carried the chain for surveyors, who taught him surveying, and he had now by his industry acquired a good es- tate ; and says he, " I foresee that you will soon work this man out of his business, and make a fortune in it at Philadelphia." He had not then the least intima- tion of my intention to set up there or anywhere. These friends were afterwards of great use to me, as I occasionally was to some of them. They all continued their regard for me as long as they lived. Before I enter upon my public appearance in busi- ness, it may be well to let you know the then state of my mind with regard to my principles and morals, that you may see how far those influenced the future events of my life. My parents had early given me religious impressions, and brought me through my childhood piously in the Dissenting way. But I was scarce fifteen when, after doubting by turns of several points, as I found them disputed in the different books I read, I began to doubt of Eevelation itself. Some books against Deism fell into my hands; they were said to be the substance of sermons preached at Boyle's Lectures. It happened that they wrought an effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by them ; for the arguments of the Deists, which were quoted to be refuted, appeared to me much stronger than the refutations ; in short, I soon became a thor- 78 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ough Deist. My arguments perverted some others, particularly Collins and Kalpli; but each of them having afterwards wronged me greatly without the least compunction, and recollecting Keith's conduct towards me (who was another freethinker), and my own towards Vernon and Miss Read, which at times gave me great trouble, I began to suspect that this doctrine, though it might be true, was not very useful. My London pamphlet, which had for its motto these lines of Dryden : — " Whatever is, is rig-ht. Though purhlind man Sees but a part o' the chain, the nearest link : His eyes not carrying' to the equal beam, That poises all above ; ' ' and from the attributes of God, his infinite wisdom, goodness, and power, concluded that nothing could possibly be wrong in the world, and that vice and vir- tue were empty distinctions, no such things existing, appeared now not so clever a performance as I once thought it ; and I doubted whether some error had not insinuated itself unperceived into my argument, so as to infect all that followed, as is common in metaphys- ical reasonings. I grew convinced that truths sincerity, and integrity in dealings between man and man were of the utmost importance to the felicity of life ; and I formed writ- ten resolutions, which still remain in my journal book, to practise them ever while I lived. Revelation had indeed no weight with me, as such ; but I entertained an opinion that, though certain actions might not be bad because they were forbidden by it, or good because it commanded them, yet probably those actions might be forbidden because they were bad for us, or com- manded because they were beneficial to us, in their BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 79 own natu^-es, all the circumstances of things consid- ered. And this persuasion, with the kind hand of Providence, or some guardian angel, or accidental fa- vorable circumstances and situations, or all together, preserved me, through this dangerous time of youth, and the hazardous situations I was sometimes in among strangers, remote from the eye and advice of my father, without any wilful gross immorality or in- justice, that might have been expected from my want of religion. I say wilful, because the instances I have mentioned had something of necessity in them, from my youth, inexperience, and the knavery of others. I had, therefore, a tolerable character to begin the world with; I valued it properly, and determined to pre- serve it. We had not been long returned to Philadelphia be- fore the new types arrived from London. We settled with Keimer, and left him by his consent before he heard of it. We found a house to hire near the mar- ket, and took it. To lessen the rent, which was then but twenty-four pounds a year, though I have since known it to let for seventy, we took in Thomas God- frey, a glazier, and his family, who w^ere to pay a con- siderable part of it to us, and we to board with them. We had scarce opened our letters and put our press in order, before George House, an acquaintance of mine, brought a countryman to us, whom he had met in the street inquiring for a printer. All our cash was now expended in the variety of particulars we had been obliged to procure, and this countryman's five shillings, being our first-fruits, and coming so season- ably, gave me more pleasure than any crown I have since earned ; and the gratitude I felt toward House has made me often more ready than perhaps I should otherwise have been to assist young beginners. 80 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF There are croakers in every country, always boding its ruin. Such a one then lived in Philadelphia; a person of note, an elderly man, with a wise look and a very grave manner of speaking ; his name was Sam- uel Mickle. This gentleman, a stranger to me, stopped one day at my door, and asked me if I was the young man who had lately opened a new j)rinting-house. Being answered in the affirmative, he said he was sorry for me, because it was an expensive undertak- ing, and the expense would be lost ; for Philadelphia was a sinking place, the people already half bank- rupts, or near being so ; all appearances to the con- trary, such as new buildings and the rise of rents, be- ing to his certain knowledge fallacious ; for they were, in fact, among the things that would soon ruin us. And he gave me such a detail of misfortunes now ex- isting, or that were soon to exist, that he left me half melancholy. Had I known him before I engaged in this business, probably I never should have done it. This man continued to live in this decaying place, and to declaim in the same strain, refusing for many years to buy a house there, because all was going to destruc- tion ; and at last I had the pleasure of seeing him give five times as much for one as he might have bought it for when he first began his croaking. I should have mentioned before that, in the autumn of the preceding year, I had formed most of my inge- nious acquaintance into a club of mutual improve- ment, which we called the Junto ; we met on Friday evenings. The rules that I drew up required that every member, in his turn, should produce one or more queries on any point of Morals, Politics, or Nat urai Philosophy, to be discussed by the company ; and once in three months produce and read an essay of his BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 81 own writing, on any subject lie pleased. Our debates were to be under the direction of a president, and to be conducted in the sincere spirit of inquiry after truth, without fondness for dispute, or desire of vic- tory; and to prevent warmth, all expressions of posi- tiveness in opinions, or direct contradiction, were after some time made contraband, and prohibited under small pecuniary penalties. The first members were Joseph Breintnal, a copier of deeds for the scriveners, a good-natured, friendly, middle-aged man, a great lover of poetry, reading all he could meet with, and writing some that was toler- able; very ingenious in many little knicknackeries, and of sensible conversation. Thomas Godfrey, a self-taught mathematician, great in his way, and afterward inventor of what is now called Hadley's Quadrant. But he knew little out of his way, and was not a pleasing companion ; as, like most great mathematicians I have met with, he ex- pected universal precision in everything said, or was forever denying or distinguishing upon trifles, to the disturbance of all conversation. He soon left us. Nicholas Scull, a surveyor, afterward surveyor-gen- eral, who loved books, and sometimes made a few verses. William Parsons, bred a shoemaker, but, loving reading, had acquired a considerable share of mathe- matics, which he first studied with a view to astrology, and afterwards laughed at it. He also became sur- veyor-general. William Maugridge, a joiner, a most exquisite me- chanic, and a solid, sensible man. Hugh Meredith, Stephen Potts, and George Webb I have characterized beforCo 82 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF Robert Grace, a young gentleman of some fortune, generous, lively, and witty ; a lover of punning and of his friends. And William Coleman, then a merchant's clerk, about my age, who had the coolest, clearest head, the best heart, and the exactest morals of almost any man I ever met with. He became afterwards a merchant of great note, and one of our provincial judges. Our friendship continued without interruption to his death, upward of forty years ; and the club continued almost as long, and was the best school of philosophy, moral- ity, and politics that then existed in the province ; for our queries, which were read the week preceding their discussion, put us upon reading with attention upon .the several subjects, that we might speak more to the purpose ; and here, too, we acquired better habits of conversation, everything being studied in our rules which might prevent our disgusting each other. From hence the long continuance of the club, which I shall have frequent occasion to speak further of hereafter. But my giving this account of it here is to show something of the interest I had, every one of these ex- erting themselves in recommending business to us. Breintnal particularly procured us from the Quakers the printing of forty sheets of their history, the rest being done by Keimer ; and upon this we worked exceedingly hard, for the price was low. It was a folio, pro patria size, in pica, with long primer notes. I composed of it a sheet a day, and Meredith worked it off at press; it was often eleven at night, and some- times later, before I had finished my distribution for the next day's work, for the little jobs sent in by out other friends now and then put us back. But so de- termined I was to continue doing a sheet a day of the BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 83 folio, that one night, when, having imposed my forms, I thought my clay's work over, one of them by acci- dent was broken, and two pages reduced to pi, I im- •mediately distributed and composed it over again be- fore I went to bed ; and this industry, visible to our neighbors, began to give us character and credit ; par- ticularly, I was told, that mention being made of the new printing-office at the merchants' Every-night club, the general opinion was that it must fail, there being already two printers in the place, Keimer and Brad- ford ; but Dr. Baird (whom you and I saw many years after at his native place, St. Andrew's in Scotland) gave a contrary opinion : " For the industry of that Franklin," says he, " is superior to anything I ever saw of the kind ; I see him still at work when I go home from club, and he is at work again before his neighbors are out of bed." This struck the rest, and we soon after had offers from one of them to supply us with stationery ; but as yet we did not choose to en- gage in shop business. I mention this industry the more particularly and the more freely, though it seems to be talking in my own praise, that those of my posterity who shall read it may know the use of that virtue, when they see its effects in my favor throughout this relation. George Webb, who had found a female friend that lent him wherewith to purchase his time of Keimer, now came to offer himself as a journeyman to us. We could not then employ him ; but I foolishly let him know as a secret that I soon intended to begin a news- paper, and might then have work for him. My hopes of success, as I told him, were founded on this, that the then only newspaper, printed by Bradford, was a paltry thing, wretchedly managed, no way entertain' 84 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ing, and yet was profitable to him ; I therefore thought a good paper would scarcely fail of good encourage- ment. I requested Webb not to mention it ; but he told it to Keimer, who immediately, to be beforehand* with me, published proposals for printing one himself, on which Webb was to be employed. I resented this ; and to counteract them, as I could not yet begin our paper, I wrote several pieces of entertainment for Bradford's ]3aper, under the title of the Busy Body, which Breintnal continued some months. By this means the attention of the public w^as fixed on that paper, and Keimer's proposals, which we burlesqued and ridiculed, were disregarded. He began his paper, however, and, after carrying it on three quarters of a year, with at most only ninety subscribers, he offered it to me for a trifle ; and I, having been ready some time to go on with it, took it in hand directly ; and it proved in a few years extremely profitable to me. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 85 m BUSINESS FOR HIMSELF. I PERCEIVE that I am apt to speak in the singular number, though our partnership still continued; the reason may be that, in fact, the whole management of the business lay upon me. Meredith was no compos- itor, a poor pressman, and seldom sober. My friends lamented my connection with him, but I was to make the best of it. Our first papers made a quite different appearance from any before in the province ; a better type, and better printed ; but some spirited remarks of my writ- ing, on the dispute then going on between Governor Burnet and the Massachusetts Assembly ,i struc)?: the principal people, occasioned the paper and the man- ager of it to be much talked of, and in a few weeks brought them all to be our subscribers. Their eldmjtle was followed by many, and our num- ber went on growing continually. This was one of the first good effects of my having learned a little to scribble ; another was, that the leading men, seeing a newspaper now in the hands of one who could also 1 Under instructions from the king, Bm^net insisted uj)on the pay- ment by the Massachusetts General Court of a fixed salary. The General Court refused to pay a salary, but were ready to make a present, larger than the salary demanded. This was one of the dis- putes which divided the people and the king and led finally to the War for Independence. The people looked upon the salary as a tax forced upon them. 86 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF handle a pen, thought it convenient to oblige, and en- courage me. Bradford still printed the votes, and laws, and other public business. He had printed an address of the House to the governor in a coarse, blundering manner; we reprinted it elegantly and cor- rectly, and sent one to every member. They were sen^ sible of the difference : it strengthened the hands of our friends in the House, and they voted us their prints ers for the year ensuing. Among my friends in the House I must not forget Mr. Hamilton, before mentioned, who was then re- turned from England, and had a seat in it. He inter- ested himself for me strongly in that instance, as he did in many others afterward, continuing his patron- age till his death. Mr. Vernon, about this time, put me in mind of the debt I owed him, but did not press me. I wrote him an ingenuous letter of acknowledgment, craved his forbearance a little longer, which he allowed me, and as soon as I was able, I paid the principal with inter- est, and many thanks ; so that erratum was in some degree corrected. But now another difficulty came upon me which I had never the least reason to expect. Mr. Meredith's father, who was to have paid for our printing-house, according to the expectations given me, was able to advance only one hundred pounds currency, which had been paid ; and a hundred more was due to the mer- chant, who grew impatient, and sued us all. We gave bail, but saw that, if the money could not be raised in time, the suit must soon come to a judgment and execution, and our hopeful prospects must, witli us, be ruined, as the press and letters must be sold foj payment, perhaps at half price. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 87 In this distress two true friends, whose kindness I have never forgotten, nor ever shall forget while I can remember anything, came to me separately, unknown to each other, and, without any application from me, offering each of them to advance me all the money that should be necessary to enable me to take the whole business upon myself, if that should be practi- cable ; but they did not like my continuing the part- nership with Meredith, who, as they said, was often seen drunk in the streets, and playing at low games in ale-houses, much to our discredit. These two friends were William Coleman and Robert Grace. I told them I could not propose a separation while any prospect remained of the Merediths' fulfilling their part of our agreement, because I thought myself under great obligations to them for what they had done, and would do if they could ; but, if tliey finally failed in their performance, and our partnership must be dis- solved, I should then think myself at liberty to accept the assistance of my friends. Thus the matter rested for some time, w^hen I said to my partner, " Perhaps your father is dissatisfied at the part you have undertaken in this affair of ours, and is unwilling to advance for you and me what he would for you alone. If that is the case, tell me, and I will resign the whole to you, and go about my busi- ness." " No," said he, " my father has really been disappointed, and is really unable ; and I am unwill- ing to distress him further. I see this is a business I am not fit for. I was bred a farmer, and it was a folly in me to come to town, and put myself, at thirty years of age, an apprentice to learn a new trade. Many of our Welsh people are going to settle in North Carolina, where land is cheap. I am inclined to go 88 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF with them, and follow my old employment. You may find friends to assist you. If you will take the debts of the company upon you, return to my father the hun- dred pounds he has advanced, pay my little personal debts, and give me thirty pounds and a new saddle, I will relinquish the partnership, and leave the whole in your hands." I agreed to this proposal; it was drawn up in writing, signed, and sealed immediately. I gave him what he demanded, and he went soon after to Carolina, from whence he sent me next year two long letters, containing the best account that had been given of that countr}^, the climate, the soil, husbandry, etc., for in those matters he was very judicious. I printed them in the papers, and they gave great satis- faction to the public. As soon as h^ was gone, I recurred to my two friends ; and because I would not give an unkind preference to either, I took half of what each had of- fered and I wanted of one, and half of the other ; paid off the company's debts, and went on with the busi- ness in my own name, advertising that the partnership was dissolved. I think this was in or about the year 1729. About this time there was a cry among the people for more paper money, only fifteen thousand pounds being extant in the province, and that soon to be sunk. The wealthy inhabitants opposed any addition, being against all paper currency, from an apprehen- sion that it would depreciate, as it had done in New England, to the prejudice of all creditors. We had discussed this point in our Junto, where I was on the side of an addition, being persuaded that the first small sum struck in 1723 had done much good by in. creasing the trade, employment, and number of inhabi BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 89 itants in the province, since I now saw all the old houses inhabited, and many new ones building ; whereas I remembered well that when I first walked about the streets of Philadelphia, eating my roll, I saw most of the houses in Walnut Street, between Second and Front streets, with bills on tlieir doors, " To be let ; " and many likewise in Chestnut Streei and other streets, which made ^me then think the in- habitants of the city were deserting it one after another. Our debates possessed me so fully of the subject that I wrote and printed an anonymous pamphlet on it, entitled The Nature and Necessity of a Paper Currency, It was well received by the common people in general ; but the rich men disliked it, for it increased and strengthened the clamor for more money, and they happening to have no writers among them that were able to answer it, their opposition slackened, and the point was carried by a majority in the House. My friends there, who conceived I had been of some service, thought fit to reward me by em- ploying me in printing the money ; a very profitable job and a great help to me. This was another advan- tage gained by my being able to write. The utility of this currency became by time and ex- perience so evident as never afterwards to be much disputed ; so that it grew soon to fifty-five thousand pounds, and in 1739 to eighty thousand pounds, since which it arose during war to upwards of three hun- dred and fifty thousand pounds, trade, building, and inhabitants all the while increasing, though I now think there are limits beyond which the quantity may be hurtful. I soon after obtained, through my friend Hamilton, 90 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF the printing of the Newcastle paper money, another profitable job as I then thought it ; small things ap- pearing great to those in small circumstances ; and these, to me, were really great advantages, as they were great encouragements. He procured for mcj also, the printing of the laws and votes of that gov- ernment, which continued in my hands as long as I followed the business. I now opened a little stationer's shop. I had in it blanks of all sorts, the correctest that ever appeared among us, being assisted in that by my friend Breint- nal. I had also paper, parchment, chapmen's books, etc. One Whitemash, a compositor I had known in London, an excellent workman, now came to me, and worked with me constantly and diligently; and I took an apprentice, the son of Aquila Rose. I began now gradually to pay off the debt I was under for the printing-house. In order to secure my credit and character as a tradesman, I took care not only to be in reality industrious and frugal, but to avoid all appearances to the contrary. I dressed plainly; I was seen at no places of idle diversion. I never wxnt out a fishing or shooting ; a book, indeed, sometimes debauched me from my work, but that was seldom, snug, and gave no scandal ; and, to show that I was not above my business, I sometimes brought home the paper I purchased at the stores through the streets on a wheelbarrow. Thus being esteemed an industrious, thriving young man, and paying duly for what I bought, the merchants who imported station- ery solicited my custom ; others proposed supplying me with books, and I went on swimmingly. In the mean time, Keimer's credit and business declining daily, he was at last forced to sell his printing-house BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 91 to satisfy his creditors. He went to Barbadoes, and there lived some years in very poor circumstances. His apprentice, David Harry, whom I had instructed while I worked with him, set up in his place at Phila- delphia, having bought his materials. I was at first apprehensive of a powerful rival in Harry, as his friends were very able, and had a good deal of inter- est. I therefore proposed a partnership to him, which he, fortunately for me, rejected with scorn. He was very proud, dressed like a gentleman, lived expen- sively, took much diversion and pleasure abroad, ran in debt, and neglected his business ; uj^on which, all business left him ; and finding nothing to do, he fol- lowed Keimer to Barbadoes, taking the printing-house with him. There this apprentice employed his former master as a journeyman ; they quarreled often ; Harry went continually behindhand, and at length was forced to sell his types and return to his country work in Pennsylvania. The person that bought them em- ployed Keimer to use them, but in a few years he died. There remained now no competitor with me at Phil- adelphia but the old one, Bradford ; who was rich and easy, did a little printing now and then by straggling hands, but was not very anxious about the business. However, as he kept the post-office, it was imagined he had better opportunities of obtaining news ; his paper was thought a better distributer of advertise- ments than mine, and therefore had many more, which was a profitable thing to him, and a disadvantage to me ; for, though I did indeed receive and send papers by the post, yet the public opinion was otherwise, for what I did send was by bribing the riders, who took them privately, Bradford being unkind enough to for- 92 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF bid it, wliich occasioned some resentment on my part ; and I tliought so meanly of him for it that, when 1 afterward came into his situation, I took care never to imitate it. I had hitherto continued to board with Godfrey, who lived in part of my house with his wife and chil» dren3 and had one side of the shop for his glazier's business, though he worked little, being always ab- sorbed in his mathematics. Mrs. Godfrey projected a match for me with a relation's daughter, took oppor- tunities of bringing us often together, till a serious courtship on my part ensued, the girl being in herself very deserving. The old folks encouraged me by con- tinual invitations to supper, and by leaving us to- gether, till at length it was time to explain. Mrs. Godfrey managed our little treaty. I let her know that I expected as much money with their daughter as would pay off my remaining debt for the printing- house, which I believe was not then above a hundred pounds. She brought me word they had no such sum to spare ; I said they might mortgage their house in the loan-office. The answer to this, after some days, was, that they did not approve the match : that, on inquiry of Bradford, they had been informed the print- ing business was not a profitable one ; the types would soon be worn out, and more wanted ; that S. Keimer and D. Harry had failed one after the other, and I should probably soon follow them ; and, therefore, I was forbidden the house, and the daughter shut up. Whether this was a real change of sentiment or only artifice, on a supposition of our being too far en- gaged in affection to retract, and therefore that we should steal a marriage, which would leave them at liberty to give or withhold what they pleased, I know BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 93 not ; but I suspected the latter, resented it, and went no more. Mrs, Godfrey brought me afterward some more favorable accounts of their disposition, and would have drawn me on again ; but I declared abso- lutely my resolution to have nothing more to do with that family. This was resented by the Godfreys; we differed, and they removed, leaving me the whole house, and I resolved to take no more inmates. But this affair having turned my thoughts to mar- riage, I looked round me and made overtures of ac- quaintance in other places ; but soon found that, the business of a printer being generally thought a poor one, I was not to expect money with a wife, unless with such a one as I should not otherwise think agree- able. ... A friendly correspondence as neighbors and old acquaintances had continued between me and Mrs. Read's family, who all had a regard for me from the time of my first lodging in their house. I was often invited there and consulted in their affairs, wherein I sometimes was of service. I pitied poor Miss Read's unfortunate situation, who was generally dejected, seldom cheerful, and avoided company. I considered my giddiness and inconstancy when in London as in a great degree the cause of her unhappi- ness, though the mother was good enough to think the fault more her own than mine, as she had prevented our marrying before I went thither, and persuaded the other match in my absence. Our mutual affection was revived, but there were now great objections to our union. The match ^ was indeed looked upon as invalid, a preceding wife being said to be living in England ; but this could not easily be proved, because of the dis- 1 That is, the match between Miss Read and Rogers, See page 70, ante. 94 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF tance ; and though there was a report of his death, it was not certain. Then, though it should be true, he had left many debts, which his successor might be called upon to pay. We ventured, however, over all these difficulties, and I took her to wife, September 1, 1730. None of the inconveniences happened that we had apprehended ; she proved a good and faithfujl helpmate, assisted me much by attending the shop^ we throve together, and have ever mutually endeav= ored to make each other happy. Thus I corrected that great erratum as well as I could.^ About this time, our club meeting, not at a tavern, but in a little room of Mr. Grace's, set apart for that purpose, a proposition was made by me that, since our books were often referred to in our disquisitions upon the queries, it might be convenient to us to have them all together where we met, that upon occasion they might be consulted ; and by thus clubbing our books to a common library, we should, while we liked to keep them together, have each of us the advantage of using the books of all the other members, which would be nearly as beneficial as if each owned the whole. It was liked and agreed to, and we filled one end of the room with such books as we could best spare. The number was not so great as we expected ; and though they had been of great use, yet some in- conveniences occurring for want of due care of them, the collection, after about a year, was separated, and each took his books home again. And now I set on foot my first project of a public nature, that for a subscription library. I drew up the proposals, got them put into form by our great scriv- ener, Brockden, and by the help of my friends in the 1 Mrs. Franklin died December 19, 1774. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 95 Junto, procured fifty subscribers of forty shillings each to begin with, and ten shillings a year for fifty years, the term our company was to continue. We afterwards obtained a charter, the company being in- creased to one hundred ; this was the mother of all the North American subscription libraries, now so numer- ous. It is become a great thing itself, and continu- ally increasing. These libraries have improved the general conversation of the Americans, made the com- mon tradesmen and farmers as intelligent as most gentlemen from other countries, and perhaps have contributed in some degree to the stand so generally made throughout the colonies in defence of their priv- ileges.^ At the time I established myself in Pennsylvania, there was not a good bookseller's shop in any of the colonies to the southward of Boston. In New York and Philadelphia the printers were indeed stationers ; they sold only paper, etc., almanacs, ballads, and a few common school books. Those who loved reading wei'e obliged to send for their books from England ; the members of the Junto had each a few. We had left the alehouse, where we first met, and hired a room to hold our club in. I proposed that we should all of us bring our books to that room, where they would not only be ready to consult in our conferences, but become a common benefit, each of us being at liberty to borrow such as he wished to read at home. This was accordingly done, and for some time contented us, 1 Thus far Franklin wrote in 1T71 when in England. He took up the pen again in France, thirteen years later, and wrote what follows, but not having a copy of what he had already written he repeated himself a little in the opening paragraphs. 96 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF Finding the advantage of this little collection, 1 proposed to render the benefit from books more com- mon, by commencing a public subscription library. I drew a sketch of the j^lan and rules that would be necessary, and got a skilful conveyancer, Mr. Charles Brockden, to put the whole in form of articles of agreement to be subscribed, by which each subscriber engaged to pay a certain sum down for the first pur- chase of books, and an annual contribution for in- creasing them. So few were the readers at that time in Philadelphia, and the majority of us so poor, that I was not able, with great industry, to find more than fifty persons, mostly young tradesmen, willing to pay down for this purpose forty shillings each, and ten shillings per annum. ^ On this little fund we began. The books w^ere imported ; the library was opened one day in the week for lending to the subscribers, on their promissory notes to pay double the value if not duly returned. The institution soon manifested its utility, was imitated by other towns, and in other provinces. The libraries were augmented by donations ; reading became fashionable ; and our people, having no pub- lic amusements to divert their attention from study, became better acquainted with books, and in a few years were observed by strangers to be better in- structed and more intelligent than people of the same rank generally are in other countries. When we were about to sign the above-mentioned articles, which were to be binding on us, our heirs, etc., for fifty years, Mr. Brockden, the scrivener, said to us, " You are young men, but it is scarcely j^roba- ^ The notion of an entirely free public library, sustained by the town, was not then held. The present system of town and city libra ries dates from about 1850. J BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 97 hie that any of jow will live to see the expiration of the term fixed in the instrument." A number of us, however, are yet living ; but the instrument was after a few years rendered null by a charter that incorpo- rated and gave perpetuity to the company.^ The objections and reluctances I met with in solic- iting the subscriptions made me soon feel the impro- priety of presenting one's self as the proposer of any useful project, that might be supposed to raise one's reputation in the smallest degree above that of one's neighbors, when one has need of their assistance to accomplish that project. I therefore put myself as much as I could out of sight, and stated it as a scheme of a numher of friends^ who had requested me to go ^ The books were at first kept in the chamber of one of Franklin's friends ; the librarian was in attendance an hour on Wednesday and two hours on Saturday. After eight years, that is, in 1740, a room was obtained in the State House, and the next year Franklin printed a catalogue of the library ; in 1773 another removal was made to Carpenters' Hall, and in 1790 the Philadelphia Library was housed in the building which it still occupies. A tablet was inserted in the building bearing this inscription : — Be it remembered in honor of the Philadelphia youth (then chiefly artificers) that in MDCCXXXI they cheerfully, at the instance of Benjamin Franklin, one of their number, instituted the Philadelphia Library which, though small at first, is become highly valuable and extensively useful, and which the walls of this edifice are now destined to contain and preserve : the first stone of whose foundation was here placed the thirty-first day of August, 1789. The inscription was prepared by Franklin, with the exception of the reference to himself, which was inserted by the committee. 98 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF about and propose it to sucli as they thought lovers of reading. In this way my affair went on more smoothly, and I ever after practised it on such occa- sions ; and from my frequent successes can heartily rec- ommend it. The present little sacrifice of your vanity will afterwards be amply repaid. If it remains a while uncertain to whom the merit belongs, some one more vain than yourself will be encouraged to claim it, and then even envy will be disposed to do you jus- tice by plucking those assumed feathers, and restoring them to their right owner. This library afforded me the means of improvement by constant sti^dy, for which I set apart an hour or two each day, and thus repaired in some degree the loss of the learned education my father once intended for me. Reading was the only amusement I allowed myself. I spent no time in taverns, games, or frolics of any kind ; and my industry in my business contin- ued as indefatigable as it was necessary. I was in- debted for my printing-house ; I had a young family coming on to be educated, and I had to contend with for business two printers, who were established in the place before me. My circumstances, however, grew daily easier. My original habits of frugality continu- ing, and my father having, among his instructions to me when a boy, frequently rej)eated a proverb of Sol' omon, " Seest thou a man diligent in his calling, he shall stand before kings, he shall not stand before mean men," I from thence considered industry as a means of obtaining wealth and distinction, which en- couraged me, though I did not think that I should ever literally stand before, Mngs^ which, however, has since happened; for I have stood before j^^e, and even had the honor of sitting down with one, the King of Denmark, to dinner. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 99 We have an English proverb that says, "ZTe that would thrive^ must ash Ms wife^ It was lucky for me that I had one as much disposed to industry and frugality as myself. She assisted me cheerfully in my business, folding and stitching pamphlets, tending shop, purchasing old linen rags for the paper makers, etc., etc. We kept no idle servants, our table was plain and simple, our furniture of the cheapest. For instance, my breakfast was a long time bread and milk (no tea), and I ate it out of a twopenny earthen porringer, with a pewter spoon. But mark how lux- ury will enter families, and make a progress, in spite of principle : being called one morning to breakfast, I found it in a China bowl, with a spoon of silver ! They had been bought for me without my knowledge by my wife, and had cost her the enormous sum of three-and-twenty shillings, for which she had no other excuse or apology to make, but that she thought her husband deserved a silver spoon and China bowl as well as any of his neighbors. This was the first ap- pearance of plate and China in our house, which after- ward, in a course of years, as our wealth increased, augmented gradually to several hundred pounds in value. I had been religiously educated as a Presbyterian ; and though some of the dogmas of that persuasion, such as the eternal decrees of God^ election^ reproha- tion, etc.., appeared to me unintelligible, others doubt- ful, and I early absented myself from the public as- semblies of the sect, Sunday being my studying day, I never was without some religious principles. I never doubted, for instance, the existence of the Deity ; that He made the world, and governed it by his Provi- dence ; that the most acceptable service of God was 100 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF the doing good to man ; that our souls are immortal ; and that all crime will be punished, and virtue re- warded, either here or hereafter. These I esteemed the essentials of every religion ; and being to be found in all the religions we had in our country, I respected them all, though with different degrees of resjDect, as I found them more or less mixed with other articles, which, without any tendency to inspire, promote, or confirm morality, served principally to divide us, and make us unfriendly to one another. This respect to all, with an opinion that the worst had some good ef- fects, induced me to avoid all discourse that might tend to lessen the good opinion another might have of his own religion ; and as our province increased in people, and new places of worship were continually wanted, and generally erected by voluntary contribu- tion, my mite for such purpose, whatever might be the sect, was never refused. Though I seldom attended any public worship, I had still an opinion of its propriety, and of its utility when rightly conducted, and I regularly paid my an- nual subscription for the support of the only Presby- terian minister or meeting we had in Philadelphia. He used to visit me sometimes as a friend, and ad- monish me to attend his administrations, and I was now and then prevailed on to do so, once for five Sun- days successively. Had he been in my opinion a good preacher, perhaps I might have continued, notwith- standing the occasion I had for the Sunday's leisure in my course of study ; but his discourses were chiefly either polemic arguments, or explications of the pe^ culiar doctrines of our sect, and were all to me very dry, luiinteresting, and unedifying, since not a single moral principle was inculcated or enforced, their ainj BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 101 seeming to be rather to make us Presbyterians than good citizens. At length he took for his text that verse of the fourth chapter of Philippians, " Finally^ hretlwen, whatsoever things are true., honesty just., jrtiire., lovely^ or of good rejiort.^ if there he any virtue^ or any praise^ think on these things.''^ And I imagined, in a sermon on such a text, we could not miss of having some morality. But he confined himself to five points only, as meant by the apostle, viz. : 1. Keeping holy the Sabbath day. 2. Being diligent in reading the holy Scriptures. 3. Attending duly the public wor- ship. 4. Partaking of the Sacrament. 5. Paying a due respect to God's ministers. These might be all good things ; but as they were not the kind of good things that I expected from that text, I despaired of ever meeting with them from any other, was disgusted, and attended his preaching no more. I had some years before composed a little Liturgy, or form of prayer, for my own private use (viz., in 1728), enti- tled. Articles of Belief and Acts of Religion. I re- turned to the use of this, and went no more to the public assemblies. My conduct might be blamable, but I leave it, without attempting further to excuse it ; my present purpose being to relate facts, and not to make apologies for them. It was about this time I conceived the bold and arduous project of arriving at moral perfection. I wished to live without committing any fault at any time ; I would conquer all that either natural inclina- tion, custom, or company might lead me into. As I knew, or thought I knew, what was right and wrong, I did not see why I might not always do the one and avoid the other. But I soon found I had undertaken 102 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF a task of more difficulty than I had imagined. While my care was employed in guarding against one fault, I was often surprised by another ; habit took the ad- vantage of inattention ; inclination was sometimes too strong for reason. I concluded, at length, that the mere sjjeculative conviction that it was our interest to be completely virtuous was not sufficient to prevent our slipping ; and that the contrary habits must be broken, and good ones acquired and established, be- fore we can have any dependence on a steady, uniform rectitude of conduct. For this purpose I therefore contrived the following method. In the various enumerations of the moral virtues I had met with in my reading, I found the catalogue more or less numerous, as different writers included more or fewer ideas under the same name. Temper- ance, for example, was by some confined to eating and drinking, while by others it was extended to mean the moderating every other pleasure, appetite, inclination, or passion, bodily or mental, even to our avarice and ambition. I proposed to myself, for the sake of clear- ness, to use rather more names, with fewer ideas an- nexed to each, than a few names with more ideas ; and I included under thirteen names of virtues all that at that time occurred to me as necessary or desirable, and annexed to each a short precept, which fully expressed the extent I gave to its meaning. These names of virtues, with their precepts were : — 1. Temperance. Eat not to dullness ; drink not to elevation. 2. Silence. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself^, avoid triflino^ conversation. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 103 3. Order. Let all your things have their places ; let each part of your business have its time. 4. Eesolution. Resolve to perform what you ought ; perform with* out fail what you resolve. 5. Frugality. Make no expense but to do good to others or your- self ; i. e., waste nothing. 6. Industry. Lose no time ; be always employed in something useful ; cut off all unnecessary actions. 7. Sincerity. Use no hurtful deceit ; think innocently and justly ; and, if you speak, speak accordingly. 8. Justice. Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the ben- efits that are your duty. 9. Moderation. Avoid extremes ; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve. 10. Cleanliness. Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, clothes, or habi- tation. 11. Tranquillity. Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable. 104 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF 12. Chastity. 13. Humility. My intention being to acquire the habitude of all these virtues, I judged it would be well not to distract my attention by attempting the whole at once, but to fix it on one of them at a time ; and, when I should be master of that, then to proceed to another, and so on, till I should have gone through the thirteen ; and as the previous acquisition of some might facilitate the acquisition of certain others, I arranged them with that view, as they stand above. Temperance first, as it tends to procure that coolness and clearness of head, which is so necessary where constant vigilance was to be kept up, and guard maintained against the unre- mitting attraction of ancient habits, and the force of perpetual temptations. This being acquired and es- tablished. Silence would be more easy ; and my desire being to gain knowledge at the same time that I im- proved in virtue, and considering that in conversation it was obtained rather by the use of the ears than of the tongue,* and therefore wishing to break a habit I was getting into of prattling, punning, and joking, which only made me acceptable to trifling company, I gave Silence the second place. This and the next, Order^ I expected would allow me more time for at- tending to my project and my studies. Resolution^ once become habitual, would keep me firm in my en- deavors to obtain all the subsequent virtues ; Frugal- ity and Industry freeing me from my remaining debt, and producing affluence and independence, would BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 105 make more easy the practice of Sincerity and Justice, etc., etc. Conceiving then, that, agreeably to the ad^ vice of Pythagoras in his Golden Yerses, daily examt nation would be necessary, I contrived the following method for conducting that examination. I made a little book, in which I allotted a page for each of the virtues. I ruled each page with red ink, so as to have seven columns, one for each day of the week, marking each column with a letter for the day. I crossed these columns with thirteen red lines, mark- ins: the beofinnins^ of each line with the first letter of one of the virtues, on which line, and in its proper column, I might mark, by a little black spot, every fault I found upon examination to have been com- mitted respecting that virtue upon that day. Form of the pages. i TEMPERANCE. \ EAT NOT TO DULNESS ; DRINK NOT TO ELEVATION. S. M. T. W. T. F. S. T. S. * * * * 0. R. * * * * * * * * * * F. * I. * S. J. . . M. C. T. C. ! H. i 106 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF I determined to give a week's strict attention to each of the virtues successively. Thus, in the first week, my great guard was to avoid every the least of- fense against Temperance^ leaving the other virtues to their ordinary chance, only marking every evening the faults of the day. Thus, if in the first week I could keej) my first line, marked T, clear of spots, I supposed the habit of that virtue so much strength- ened, and its 02)posite weakened, that I might venture extending my attention to include the next, and for the following week keep both lines clear of spots. Proceeding thus to the last, I could go through a course complete in thirteen weeks, and four courses in a year. And like him who, having a garden to weed, does not attempt to eradicate all the bad herbs at once, which would exceed his reach and his strength, but works on one of the beds at a time, and, having accomplished the first, proceeds to a second, so I should have, I hoped, the encouraging pleasure of see- ing on my pages the progress I made in virtue, by clearing successively my lines of their spots, till in the end, by a number of courses, I should be happy in viewing a clean book, after a thirteen weeks' daily ex- amination. This my little book had for its motto these lines from Addison's Cato : — " Here will I hold. If there 's a power above us (And that there is, all nature cries aloud Through all her works), He must delight in virtue ; And that which he delights in must be happy." Another from Cicero, ' ' vitse Philosophia dux ! O virtutum indagatrix expultrixque vitiorum ! Unus dies, bene et ex praeceptis tuis actus, peccanti im^ mortalitati est anteponendus. " BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 107 [O Philosophy, guide of life ! investigator and expeller of crimes ! A single day, lived well and in accordance -with your pre° cepts, is to be preferred to sinning immortality.] Another from the Proverbs of Solomon, speaking of wisdom or virtue : — * ' Length of days is in her right hand, and in her left hand riches and honor. Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace." iii. 16, 17. And conceiving God to be the fountain of wisdom, I thought it right and necessary to solicit his assist- ance for obtaining it ; to this end I formed the follow- ing little prayer, which was prefixed to my tables of examination, for daily use. " O powerful Goodness ! bountiful Father ! merciful Guide ! Increase in me that ivisdom which discovers my truest interest. Strengthen my resolutions to perform what that wisdom dictates. Accept my kind offices to thy other children as the only return in my power for thy continual fa- vors to me.''"' I used also sometimes a little prayer which I took from Thomson's Poems, viz. : — *' Father of light and life, thou Good Supreme ! O teach me what is good ; teach me Thyself ! Save me from folly, vanity, and vice, From every low pursuit ; and fill my soul With knowledge, conscious peace, and virtue pure ; Sacred, substantial, never-fading bliss ! ' ' The precept of Order requiring that every part oj my hiisiness should have its allotted time, one page in my little book contained the following scheme of eni= ployment for the twenty-four hours of a natural day. The Morning. - f 5 1 Rise, wash, and address Pow- Question. What good shall I | | erful Goodness ! Contrive day's do this day ? \ ^ \ business, and take the resolu- I j tion of the day ; prosecute the 1 1 J present stvidy, and breakfast. 9 10 11 Work. 108 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF Noon. Evening. Question. Wliat good have I lone to-day ? Night. 2 3 4 5 f 6 I 7 8 9 10 11 12 1 2 3 4 Read, or overlook my ao counts, and dine. MVork. Put things in their places. Supper. Music or diversion, or conversation. Examination of the day. Sleep. I entered upon the execution of this plan for self- examination, and continued it with occasional inter- missions for some time. I was surprised to find my- self so much fuller of faults than I had imagined ; but I had the satisfaction of seeing them diminish. To avoid the trouble of renewing now and then my little book, which, by scraping out the marks on the paper of old faults to make room for new ones in a new course, became full of holes, I transferred my tables and precepts to the ivory leaves of a memorandum book, on which the lines were drawn with red ink, that made a durable stain, and on those lines I marked my faults with a black lead pencil, which marks I could easily wipe out with a wet sponge. After a while I went through one course only in a year, and afterward only one in several years, till at length I omitted them entirely, being employed in voyages and business abroad, with a multiplicity of affairs that interfered ; but I always carried my little book with me. My scheme of Oeder gave me the most trouble; and I found that, though it might be practicable BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 109 where a man's business was such as to leave him the disposition of his time, that of a journeyman printer, for instance, it was not possible to be exactly observed by a master, who must mix with the world, and often receive people of business at their own hours. Order^ too, with regard to places for things, papers, etc., I found extremely difficult to acquire. I had not been early accustomed to it, and, having an exceeding good memory, I was not so sensible of the inconvenience at- tending want of method. This article, therefore, cost me so much painful attention, and my faults in it vexed me so much, and I made so little progress in amendment, and had such frequent relapses, that I was almost ready to give up the attempt, and content myself with a faulty character in that respect, like the man who, in buying an axe of a smith, my neighbor, desired to have the whole of its surface as bright as the edge. The smith consented to grind it bright for him if he would turn the wheel ; he turned, while the smith pressed the broad face of the axe hard and heav- ily on the stone, which made the turning of it very fatiguing. The man came every now and then from the wheel to see how the work went on, and at length would take his axe as it was, without farther grinding. " No," said the smith, " turn on, turn on ; we shall have it bright by and by ; as yet, it is only speckled." "Yes," says the man, '' hut I think I like a speckled axe hest.''^ And I believe this may have been the case with many, who, having, for want of some such means as I employed, found the difficulty of obtaining good and breaking bad habits in other points of vice and virtue, have given up the struggle, and concluded that " a sjjeckled axe was best ; " for something, that pre- tended to be reason, was every now and then suggest- no AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ing to me that such extreme nicety as I exacte J of myself might be a kind of foppery in morals, which, if it were known, would make me ridiculous ; that a per- fect character might be attended with the inconven- ience of being envied and hated ; and that a benevo= lent man should allow a few faults in himself, to kee|: his friends in countenance. In truth, I found myself incorrigible with respect to Order ; and now I am grown old, and my memory bad, I feel very sensibly the want of it. But, on the whole, though I never arrived at the perfection I had been so ambitious of obtaining, but fell far short of it, yet I was, by the endeavor, a better and a happier man than I otherwise should have been if I had not attempted it ; as those wdio aim at perfect writing by imitating the engraved copies, though they never reach the wished-for excellence of those copies, their hand is mended by the endeavor, and is tolerable while it con- tinues fair and legible. It may be well my posterity should be informed that to this little artifice, with the blessing of God, their ancestor owed the constant felicity of his life, down to his 79th year, in which this is written. What reverses may attend the remainder is in the hand of Providence ; but, if they arrive, the reflection on past happiness enjoyed ought to help his bearing them with more resignation. To Temperance he ascribes his long-continued health, and what is still left to him of a good constitution ; to Industry and Frugality, the early easiness of his circumstances and acquisition of his fortune, with all that knowledge that enabled him to be a useful citizen, and obtained for him some degree of reputation among the learned , to Sincerity and Justice, the confidence of his countryt BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 111 and the honorable employs it conferred upon him; and to the joint influence of the whole mass of the virtues, even in the imperfect state he was able to acquire them, all that evenness of temper, and that cheerfulness in conversation, which makes his com- pany still sought for, and agreeable even to his younger acquaintance. I hope, therefore, that some of my de- scendants may follow the example and reap the ben- efit. It will be remarked that, though my scheme was not wholly without religion, there was in it no mark of any of the distinguishing tenets of any particular sect. I had purposely avoided them ; for, being fully persuaded of the utility and excellency of my method, and that it might be serviceable to people in all re- ligions, and intending some time or other to publish it, I would not have anything in it that should preju- dice any one, of any sect, against it. I purposed writ- ing a little comment on each virtue, in which I would have shown the advantages of possessing it, and the mischiefs attending its opposite vice ; and I should have called my book The Art of Virtue, because it would have shown the means and manner of obtain- ing virtue, which would have distinguished it from the mere exhortation to be good, that does not instruct and indicate the means, but is like the apostle's man of verbal charity, who only without showing to the naked and hungry how or where they might get clothes or victuals exhorted them to be fed and clothed. — James ii. 15, 16. But it so happened that my intention of writing and publishing this comment was never fulfilled. I did, indeed, from time to time, put down short hints of the sentiments, reasonmgs, etc., to be made use of in it, ( 112 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF some of which I have still by me ; but the necessary close attention to private business in the earlier part of my life, and public business since, have occasioned my postponing it ; for, it being connected in my mind with a great and extensive p^^oject^ that required the whole man to execute, and which an unforeseen suc- cession of employs prevented my attending to, it has hitherto remained unfinished. In this piece it was my design to explain and en- force this doctrine, that vicious actions are not hurt- ful because they are forbidden, but forbidden because they are hurtful, the nature of man alone considered ; that it was, therefore, every one's interest to be virtu- ous who wished to be happy even in this world ; and I should, from this circumstance (there being always in the world a number of rich merchants, nobility, states, and princes, who have need of honest instru- ments for the management of their affairs, and such being so rare), have endeavored to convince young persons that no qualities were so likely to make a poor man's fortune as those of probity and integrity. My list of virtues contained at first but twelve ; but a Quaker friend having kindly informed me that I was generally thought proud ; that my pride showed itself frequently in conversation ; that I was not con- tent with being in the right w^hen discussing any point, but was overbearing, and rather insolent, of which he convinced me by mentioning several in- stances ; I determined endeavoring to cure myself, if I could, of this vice or folly among the' rest, and I added Humility to my list, giving an extensive mean- ing to the word. I cannot boast of much success in acquiring the reality of this virtue, but I had a good deal with re. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. IIB gard to the appearance of it. I made it a rule to for^ bear all direct contradiction to the sentiments of others, and all positive assertion of my own. I even forbid myself, agreeably to the old laws of our Junto, the use of every word or expression in the language that imported a fixed opinion, such as certainly., un- douhtedly^ etc., and I adopted, instead of them, I con° ceive, I apprehend^ or I imagine a thing to be so or so ; or it so appears to me at present. When another asserted something that I thought an error, I denied myself the pleasure of contradicting him abruptly, and of showing immediately some absurdity in his prop- osition ; and in answering I began by observing that in certain cases or circumstances his opinion would be right, but in the present case there appeared or seemed to me some difference, etc, I soon found the advantage of this change in my manner ; the conver- sations I engaged in went on more pleasantly. The modest way in which I proposed my opinions procured them a readier reception and less contradiction ; I had less mortification when I was found to be in the wrong, and I more easily prevailed with others to give up their mistakes and join with me when I hap- pened to be in the right. And this mode, which I at first put on with some violence to natural inclination, became at length so easy, and so habitual to me, that perhaps for these fifty years past no one has ever heard a dogmatical expression escape me. And to this habit (after my character of integrity) I think it principally owing that I had early so much weight with my fellow-citi- zens when I proposed new institutions, or alterations in the old, and so much influence in public councils when I became a member; for I was but a bad 114 A UTOBIOGRAPHY. speaker, never eloquent, subject to much hesitation in my choice of words, hardly correct in language, and yet I generally carried my points. In reality, there is, perhaps, no one of our natural passions so hard to subdue as pride. Disguise it, struggle with it, beat it down, stifle it, mortify it as much as one pleases, it is still alive, and will every now and then peep out and show itself ; you will see it, perhaps, often in this history ; for, even if I could conceive that I had completely overcome it, I should probably be proud of my humility. VI. SELF-EDUCATION. Having mentioned a great and extensive 2^'i"oject which I had conceived, it seems proper that some account should be here given of that project and its object. Its first rise in my mind appears in the fol- lowing little paper, accidentally preserved, viz. : — Observations on my reading history, in Library, May 19, 1731. " That the great affairs of the world, the wars, rev- olutions, etc., are carried on and affected by parties. " That the view of these parties is their present gen- eral interest, or what they take to be such. " That the different views of these different parties occasion all confusion. " That while a party is carrying on a general de- sign, each man has his particular private interest in view. " That as soon as a party has gained its general point, each member becomes intent upon his j)articular interest ; which, thwarting others, breaks that party into divisions, and occasions more confusion. " That few in public affairs act from a mere view of the good of their country, whatever they may pretend ; and, though their actings bring real good to their country, yet men primarily considered that their own and their country's interest w^s united, and did not act from a principle of benevolence. 116 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF " That fewer still, in public affairs, act with a view to the good of mankind. " There seems to me at present to be great occasion for raising a United Party for Virtue, by forming the virtuous and good men of all nations into a regular body, to be governed by suitable, good, and wise rules, which good and wise men may probably be more unan- imous in their obedience to, than common people are to common laws. "I at present think that whoever attempts this aright, and is well qualified, cannot fail of pleasing- God, and of meeting with success. B. F." Revolving this project in my mind, as to be under- taken hereafter, when my circumstances should afford me the necessary leisure, I put down from time to time, on pieces of paper, such thoughts as occurred to me respecting it. Most of these are lost ; but I find one purporting to be the substance of an intended creed, containing, as I thought, the essentials of every known religion, and being free of everything that might shock the professors of any religion. It is ex- pressed in these words, viz. : — " That there is one God, who made all things. " That He governs the world by his providence. "That He ought to be worshipped by adoration, prayer, and thanksgiving. " But that the most acceptable service of God is do- ing good to man. " That the soul is immortal. "And that God will certainly reward virtue and punish vice, either here or hereafter." My ideas at that time were that the sect should be begun and spread at first among young and single men only ; that each person to be initiated should noi? ! BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 117 only declare his assent to sucli creed, but should have exercised himself with the thirteen weeks' examina- tion and practice of the virtues, as in the before-men- tioned model; that the existence of such a society should be kept a secret, till it was become consider- able, to prevent solicitations for the admission of im= proper persons, but that the members should each of them search among his acquaintance for ingenuous, well-disposed youths, to whom, with prudent caution, the scheme should be gradually communicated ; that the members should engage to afford their advice, as- sistance, and support to each other in promoting one another's interests, business, and advancement in life; that, for distinction, we should be called The Society of the Free and Easy : free, as being, by the general practice and habit of the virtues, free from the do- minion of vice ; and particularly by the practice of industry and frugality, free from debt, which exposes a man to confinement, and a species of slavery to his creditors. This is as much as I can now recollect of the proj- ect, except that I communicated it in part to two young men, who adopted it with some enthusiasm; but my then narrow circumstances, and the necessity I was under of sticking close to my business, occasioned my postponing the further prosecution of it at that time ; and my multifarious occupations, public and private, induced me to continue postponing, so that it has been omitted till I have no longer strength or activity left sufficient for such an enterprise ; though I am still of opinion that it was a practicable scheme, and might have been very useful, by forming a great number of good citizens ; and I was not discouraged by the seem- ing magnitude of the undertaking, as I have always 118 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF tliought that one man of tolerable abilities may work great changes, and accomplish great affairs among mankind, if he first forms a good plan, and, cutting off all amusements or other employments that would divert his attention, makes the execution of that same plan his sole study and business. In 1732 I first published my Almanack, under the name of Richard Saunders ; it was continued by me about twenty-five years, commonly called Poor Richard's Almanac. I endeavored to make it both entertaining and useful ; and it accordingly came to be in such demand, that I reaped considerable profit from it, vending annually near ten thousand. And observing that it was generally read, scarce any neigh- borhood in the province being without it, I considered it as a proper vehicle for conveying instruction among the common people, who bought scarcely any other books ; I therefore filled all the little spaces that oc- curred between the remarkable days in the calendar with proverbial sentences, chiefly &uch as inculcated industry and frugality as the means of procuring wealth, and thereby securing virtue ; it being more difficult for a man in want to act always honestly, as, to use here one of those proverbs, it is hard for an emjity sach to stand iqwlght. These proverbs, which contained the wisdom of many ages and nations, I assembled and formed into a connected discourse prefixed to the Almanack of 1757, as the harangue of a wise old man to the people attending an auction. The bringing all these scat- tered counsels thus into a focus enabled them to make greater impression. The piece, being universally ap- proved, was copied in all the newspapers of the Con- tinent ; reprinted in Britain on a broadside, to be XII Mm- February hath xxviii days^ Man's rich with Jjtcle, were his Judgment true, NTature is frugal^ and her Wanfs are few ; Thofe few Watics aniwerM^ b/ing finceie Delights, But Fools create tliemfslveS new Appetites. Fancy and Pride fcek: Things at vaft Expence, Which lelifh not ro Red/on nor to Serr/e Like Gats in Airp'Jf!?ps, to fubfift weibive Onjoys too thin ro kepp the Soulalive. M.!^aUnnne. 7 "^ near 7 *s ^ i ^unb inUcnt 2 clouds wiih 3 v/ind and 4irEmhcr ilDeefi. 5 n 01/.' rain d or fnow« 7 then change- £" 2. ^unDjnUent. 4' able even to the 4 yery end* 12 12 i z 3 3h 4 5 Sh (5 7 8 9 Ic 10 2 1 r 2 i5!6 43 28p 42 6 246 39 6 t8|(^3 7 12^ 34 6 Lafi: Ckiarter. 3 with % Sirius fo. 8 41 > rife^ 42 mo ^ goad IVifeQP b nfe 5? 7 Oin K . rife S 32 N"ew J' 9 day, ar 3 morn. gwith^c^Sc?- D fets 8 5<^ af. Health, is a U^'eaifh. $ kis-j 18 Fir (I Qijairer. Sirias 10 7 43 7* fct 12 o 6 52 28 6 26 ^ 6 25 6 6 2^ 6 ^ fets 4 2 mo 5 22 6J^ riles 8 1 1 6 20 6 J4 quarre\j6me (5 19 6/J^ with Tj (^ T4 <5 ^ rjfe 9 5*5 aft, "^ 13 5 Neighbours, ^ (U ry) o -^< I g rt fe c/] X 5" c) ^ o r^' 4t rt C '^ i^ ~ o _ t; o (U o U^ (J ., !■« 7) >- v^ S "o a; S 2i 2-2 OJ i" -^ r- O r^ ^ o ^ c r-' o BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 157 scriptions accordingly soon exceeded the requisite sum, and we claimed and received the public gift, which en- abled us to carry the design into execution. A conven- ient and handsome building was soon erected ; the in- stitution has by constant experience been found useful, and flourishes to this day ; and I do not remember any of my political manoeuvres, the success of which gave me at the time more pleasure, or wherein, after thinking of it, I more easily excused myself for having made some use of cunning. It was about this time that another projector, the Rev. Gilbert Tennent, came to me with a request that I would assist him in procuring a subscription for erecting a new meeting-house. It was to be for the use of a congregation he had gathered among the Presbyterians, who were originally disciples of Mr. Whitefield. Unwilling to make myself disagreeable to my fellow-citizens by too frequently soliciting their contributions, I absolutely refused. He then desired I would furnish him with a list of the names of per- sons I knew by experience to be generous and public- spirited. I thought it would be unbecoming in me^ after their kind compliance with my solicitations, to mark them out to be worried by other beggars, and therefore refused also to give such a list. He then desired I would at least give him my advice. " That I will readily do," said I ; " and, in the first place, I advise you to apply to all those whom you know will give something ; next, to those whom you are uncer- tain whether they will give anything or not, and show them the list of those who have given ; and, lastly, do not neglect those who you are sure will give nothing, for in some of them you may be mistaken." He laughed and thanked me, and said he would take my 158 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF advice. He did so, for he asked of everybody^ and lie obtained a much larger sum than he expected, with which he erected the capacious and very elegant meetins-house that stands in Arch Street.^ o 1 The society which was then organized abandoned the " very ele- gant meeting-house," which they had once enlarged, in 1837, and now have a church on the corner of Twenty-first and Walnut streetSo BENJAMIN FRANKJ.IN, 159 X. A PHILADELPHIA CITIZEN". Our city, though laid out with a beautiful regu- larity, the streets large, straight, and crossing each other at right angles, had the disgrace of suffering those streets to remain long unpaved, and in wet weather the wheels of heavy carriages ploughed them into a quagmire, so that it was difficult to cross them ; and in dry weather the dust was offensive. I had lived near what was called the Jersey Market, and saw with pain the inhabitants wading in mud while purchasing their provisions. A strip of ground down the middle of that market was at length paved with brick, so that, being once in the market, they had firm footing, but were often over shoes in dirt to get there. By talking and writing on the subject, I was at length instrumental in getting the street paved with stone be- tween the market and the bricked foot pavement, that was on each side next the houses. This, for some time, gave an easy access to the market dry-shod ; but the rest of the street not being paved, whenever a car- riage came out of the mud upon this pavement, it shook off and left its dirt upon it, and it was soon covered with mire, which was not removed, the city as yet having no scavengers. After some inquiry, I found a poor, industrious man, who was willing to undertake keeping the pave- ment clean, by sweeping it tv^ice a week, carrying off 160 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF the dirt from before all the neighbors' doors, for the sum of sixpence per month, to be paid by each house. I then wrote and printed a paper setting forth the ad- vantages to the neighborhood that might be obtained by this small expense ; the greater ease in keeping our houses clean, so much dirt not being brought in by people's feet ; the benefit to the shops by more cus- tom, etc., etc., as buyers could more easily get at them ; and by not having, in windy weather, the dust blown in upon their goods, etc., etc. I sent one of these papers to each house, and in a day or two went round to see who would subscribe an agreement to pay these sixpences ; it was unanimously signed, and for a time well executed. All the inhabitants of the city were delighted with the cleanliness of the pave- ment that surrounded the market, it being a conven- ience to all, and this raised a general desire to have all the streets paved, and made the people more willing to submit to a tax for that purpose. After some time I drew a bill for paving the city, and brought it into the Assembly. It was just before I went to England, in 1757, and did not pass till I was gone, and then with an alteration in the mode of assessment, which I thought not for the better, but with an additional provision for lighting as well as paving the streets, which was a great improvemento It was by a private person, the late Mr. John Clifton, his giving a sample of the utility of lamps, by placing one at his door, that the people were first impressed with the idea of enlighting all the city. The honor of this public benefit has also been ascribed to me, but it belongs truly to that gentleman. I did but follow his example, and have only some merit to claim re- specting the form of our lamps, as differing from the BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 161 globe lamps we were at first supplied with from Lon- don. Those we found inconvenient in these respects : they admitted no air below ; the smoke, therefore, did not readily go out above, but circulated in the globe, lodged on its inside, and soon obstructed the light they were intended to afford ; giving, besides, the daily trouble of wiping them clean ; and an accidental stroke on one of them would demolish it and render it totally useless. I therefore suggested the composing them of four flat panes, with a long funnel above to draw up the smoke, and crevices admitting air below, to facili- tate the ascent of the smoke ; by this means they were kept clean, and did not grow dark in a few hours, as the London lamps do, but continued bright till morn- ing, and an accidental stroke would generally break but a single pane, easily repaired. I have sometimes wondered that the Londoners did not, from the effect holes in the bottom of the globe lamps used at Vauxhall have in keeping them clean, learn to have such holes in their street lamps. But, these holes being made for another purpose, viz., to communicate flame more suddenly to the wick by ^ little flax hanging down through them, the other use, of letting in air, seems not to have been thought of *, and therefore, after the lamps have been lit a few hours, the streets of London are very poorly illumi- nated. The mention of these improvements puts me in mind of one I proposed, when in London, to Dr. Fothergill, who was among the best men I have known, and a great promoter of useful projects. I had observed that the streets, when dry, were never swept, and the light dust carried away,* but it was suffered to accumu- late till wet weather reduced it to mud, and then, after 162 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF lying some days so deep on the pavement that there was no crossing but in paths kept clean by poor people with brooms, it was with great labor raked together and thrown up into carts open above, the sides of which suffered some of the slush at every jolt on the pavement to shake out and fall, sometimes to the an- noyance of foot-passengers. The reason given for not sweeping the dusty streets was, that the dust would fly into the windows of shops and houses. An accidental occurrence had instructed me how much sweeping might be done in a little time. I found at my door in Craven Street, one morning, a poor woman sweeping my pavement with a birch broom; she appeared very pale and feeble, as just come out of a fit of sickness. I asked who emplo^^ed her to sweep there ; she said, " Nobody ; but I am very poor and in distress, and I sweeps before gentlefolkses doors, and hopes they will give me something." I bid her sweep the whole street clean, and I would give her a shilling ; this was at nine o'clock ; at twelve she came for the shilling. From the slowness I saw at first in her working I could scarce believe that the work was done so soon, and sent my servant to examine it, who reported that the whole street was swept perfectly clean, and all the dust placed in the gutter, which was in the middle ; and the next rain washed it quite away, so that the pavement and even the kennel were perfectly clean. I then judged that, if that feeble woman could sweep such a street in three hours, a strong, active man might have done it in half the time. And here let me remark the convenience of havinsf but one out- ter in such a narrow street, running down its middle, instead of two, one on each side, near the footway; BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 163 for where all the rain that falls on a street runs from the sides and meets in the middle, it forms there a current strong enough to wash away all the mud it meets with ; but when divided into two channels, it is often too weak to cleanse either, and only makes the mud it finds more fluid, so that the wheels of car- riages and feet of horses throw and dash it upon the foot-pavement, which is thereby rendered foul and slippery, and sometimes splash it upon those who are walking. My proposal, communicated to the good doctor, was as follows : " For the more effectual cleaning and keeping clean the streets of London and Westminster, it is proposec( that the several watchmen be contracted with to have the dust swept up in dry seasons, and the mud raked up at other times, each in the several streets and lanev of his round ; that they be furnished with brooms and other proper instruments for these purposes, to be kept at their respective stands, ready to furnish the poor people they may employ in the service. " That in the dry summer months the dust be all swept up into heaps at proper distances, before the shops and windows of houses are usually opened, when the scavengers, with close-covered carts, shall also carry it all away. " That the mud, when raked up, be not left in heaps to be spread abroad again by the wheels of carriages and trampling of horses, but that the scavengers be provided with bodies of carts, not placed high upon wheels, but low upon sliders with lattice bottoms, which, being covered with straw, will retain the mud thrown into them, and permit the water to drain from it, whereby it will become much lighter, water making the greatest part of its weight ; these bodies of carts 164 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF to be placed at convenient distances, and the mud brought to them in wheelbarrows ; they remaining where placed till the mud is drained, and then horses brought to draw them away." I have since had doubts of the practicability of the latter part of this proposal, on account of the narrow- ness of some streets, and the difficulty of placing the draining-sleds so as not to encumber too much the pas- sage ; but I am still of opinion that the former, re- quiring the dust to be swept uj) and carried away before the shops are open, is very practicable in the summer, when the days are long ; for, in walking through the Strand and Fleet Street one morning at seven o'clock, I observed there was not one sho]) open, though it had been daylight and the sun up above three hours ; the inhabitants of London choosing vol- untarily to live much by candle-light, and sleep by sunshine, and yet often complain, a little absurdly, of the duty on candles, and the high price of tallow. Some may think these trifling matters not worth minding or relating ; but when they consider that though dust blown into the eyes of a single person, or into a single shop on a windy day, is but of small im- portance, yet the great number of the instances in a populous city, and its frequent repetitions give it weight and consequence, perhaps they will not censure very severely those who bestow some attention to af- fairs of this seemingly low nature. Human felicity is produced not so much by great pieces of good fortune that seldom happen, as by little advantages »that occur every day. Thus, if you teach a poor young man to shave himself, and keep his razor in order, you may contribute more to the happiness of his life than in giv' ing him a thousand guineas. The money may be sood BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 165 spent, the regret only remaining of having foolishly consumed it ; but in the other case, he escapes the fre- quent vexation of waiting for barbers, and of their sometimes dirty fingers, offensive breaths, and dull razors ; he shaves when most convenient to him, and enjoys daily the pleasure of its being done with a good instrument. With these sentiments I have hazarded the few preceding pages, hoping they may afford hints which some time or other may be useful to a city I love, having lived many years in it very haj)pily, and perhaps to some of our towns in America. Having been for some time employed by the post- master-general of America as his comptroller in regu- lating several offices, and bringing the officers to ac- count, I was, upon his death in 1753, appointed, jointly with Mr. William Hunter, to succeed him, by a commission from the postmaster-general in England. The American office never had hitherto paid any- thing to that of Britain. We were to have six hun- dred pounds a year between us, if we could make that sum out of the profits of the office. To do this a variety of improvements were necessary; some of these were inevitably at first expensive, so that in the first four years the office became above nine hundred pounds in debt to us. But it soon after began to re- pay us ; and before I was dis])laced by a freak of the ministers, of which I shall speak hereafter, we had brought it to yield three thnes as much clear revenue to the crown as the post-office of Ireland. Since that imprudent transaction, they have received from it — not one farthing I The business of the post-office occasioned my taking a journey this year to New England, where the Col- lege of Cambridge, of their own motion, presented me 166 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF with the degree of Master of Arts. Yale College, in Connecticut, had before made me a similar compli- ment. Thus, without studying in any college, I came to partake of their honors. They were conferred in consideration of my improvements and discoveries in the electric branch of natural philosophy. In 1754, war with France being again apprehended, a congress of commissioners from the different colonies was, by an order of the Lords of Trade, to be assem- bled at Albany, there to confer with the chiefs of the Six Nations concerning the means of defending both their country and ours. Governor Hamilton, having received this order, acquainted the House with it, re- questing they would furnish proper presents for the Indians, to be given on this occasion ; and naming the speaker (Mr. Norris) and myself to join Mr. Thomas Penn and Mr. Secretary Peters as commis- sioners to act for Pennsylvania. The House approved the nomination, and provided the goods for the pres* ent, though they did not much like treating out of the provinces ; and we met the other commissioners at Albany about the middle of June. In our way thither, I projected and drew a plan for the union of all the colonies under one government, so far as might be necessary for defence and other im- portant general purposes. As we passed through New York, I had there shown my project to Mr, James Alexander and Mr. Kennedy, two gentlemen of great knowledge in public affairs, and, being fortified by their approbation, I ventured to lay it before the Con- gress.. It then appeared that several of the commis- sioners had formed plans of the same kind. A pre- vious question was first taken, whether a union should be established, which passed in the affirmative unani BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 167 moiisly. A committee was then appointed, one mem«= ber from each colony, to consider the several plans, and report. Mine happened to be preferred, and, with ?. few amendments, was accordingly reported. By this plan the general government was to be ad*' ministered by a president-general, appointed and sup«i ported by the crown, and a grand council was to be chosen by the representatives of the people of the several colonies, met in their respective assemblies. The debates upon it in Congress went on daily, hand in hand with the Indian business. Many objections and difficulties were started, but at length they were all overcome, and the plan was unanimously agreed to, and copies ordered to be transmitted to the Board of Trade and to the assemblies of the several prov- inces. Its fate was singular : the assemblies did not adopt it, as they all thought there was too much pre- rogative in it, and in England it was judged to have too much of the democratic. The Board of Trade therefore did not approve of it, nor recommend it for the approbation of his majesty; but another scheme was formed, supposed to answer the same purpose bet- ter, whereby the governors of the provinces, with some members of their respective councils, were to meet and order the raising of troops, building of fortSj etc., and to draw on the treasury of Great Britain for the expense, which was afterwards to be refunded by an act of Parliament laying a tax on America. My plan, with my reasons in support of it, is to be found among my political papers that are printed. Being the winter following in Boston, I had much conversation with Governor Shirley upon both the plans. Part of what passed between us on the occa- sion may also be seen among those papers. The differ- 168 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ent and contrary reasons of dislike to my plan makes me suspect that it was really the true medium ; and I am still of opinion it would have been haj^py for both sides the water if it had been adopted. The colonies, so united, would have been sufficiently strong to have defended themselves ; there would then have been nc need of troops from England; of course, the subse- quent pretence for taxing America, and the bloody ccmtest it occasioned, would have been avoided. But such mistakes are not new : history is full of the er- rors of states and princes. * ' Look round the habitable world, how few Know their owng-ood, or, knowing it, pursue ! " Those who govern, having much business on their hands, do not generally like to take the trouble of con- sidering and carrying into execution new projects. The best public measures are therefore seldom adopted from 'premous 'wisdom^ hut forced by the occasion. The Governor of Pennsylvania, in sending it down to the Assembly, expressed his approbation of the plan, " as appearing to him to be drawn up with great clearness and strength of judgment, and therefore rec- ommended it as well worthy of their closest and most serious attention." The House, however, by the man- agement of a certain member, took it up when I happened to be absent, which I thought not very fair, and reprobated it without paying any attention to it at all, to my no small mortification. In my journey to Boston this year, I met at New York with our new governor, Mr. Morris, just arrived there from England, with whom I had been before intimately acquainted. He brought a commission to BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 169 supersede Mr. Hamilton, who, tired with the disputes his proprietary instructions subjected him to, had re- signed. Mr. Morris asked me if I thought he must expect as uncomfortable an administration. I said, " No ; you may, on the contrary, have a very comfort- able one, if you will only take care not to enter into any dispute with the Assembly." " My dear friend,'' says he, pleasantly, " how can you advise my avoiding disputes ? You know I love disputing ; it is one of my greatest pleasures ; however, to show the regard I have for your counsel, I promise you I will, if possible, avoid them." He had some reason for loving to dis- pute, being eloquent, an acute sophister, and therefore generally successful in argumentative conversatiouo He had been brought up to it from a boy, his father, as I have heard, accustoming his children to dispute with one another for his diversion, while sitting at table af- ter dinner ; but I think the practice was not wise ; for, in the course of my observation, these disputing, con- tradicting, and confuting people arc generally unfortu- nate in their affairs. They get victory sometimes, but they never get good will, which would be of more use to them. We parted, he going to Philadelphia, and I to Boston. In returning, I met at New York with the votes of the Assembly, by which it appeared that, notwith- standing his promise to me, he and the House were already in high contention ; and it was a contin- ual battle between them as long as he retained the government. I had my share of it ; for, as soon as I got back to my seat in the Assembly, I was put or every committee for answering his speeches and mes- sages, and by the committees always desired to make the drafts. Our answers, as well as his messages, 170 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF were often tart, and sometimes indecently abusive; and as he knew. I wrote for the Assembly, one might have imagined that, when we met, we could hardly avoid cutting throats ; but he was so good-natured a man that no personal difference between him and me was occasioned by the contest, and we often dined together. One afternoon, in the height of this public quarrel, we met in the street. " Franklin," says he, " you must go home with me and spend the evening ; I am to have some company that you will like ; " and taking me by the arm, he led me to his house. In gay con- versation over our wine, after supper, he told us, jok- ingly, that he much admired the idea of Sancho Panza, who, when it was proposed to give him a government, requested it might be a government of blacks, as then, if he could not agree with his people, he might sell them. One of his friends, who sat next to me, says, " Franklin, why do you continue to side with these damned Quakers ? Had you not better sell them ? The proprietor would give a good price." " The gov- ernor," says I, " has not yet blacked them enough." He, indeed, had labored hard to blacken the Assem- bly in all his messages, but they wiped oif his coloring as fast as he laid it on, and placed it, in return, thick upon his own face ; so that, finding he was likely to be negrofied himself, he, as well as Mr. Hamilton, grew tired of the contest, and quitted the governmento These public quarrels were all at bottom owing to the proprietaries, our hereditary governors, who, when any expense was to be incurred for the de- fence of their province, with incredible meanness in- structed their deputies to pass no act for levying the necessary taxes, unless their vast estates were in the BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 171 same act expressly excused ; and they had even taken bonds of these deputies to observe such instructions. The Assemblies for three years held out against this injustice, though constrained to bend at last. At length Captain Denny, who was Governor Morris's successor, ventured to disobey those instructions : how that was brought about I shall show hereafter. But I am got forward too fast with my story : there are still some transactions to be mentioned that hap- pened during the administration of Governor Morris. 172 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF XI. IN THE SERVICE OF THE KING. War being in a manner commenced with France, the government of Massachusetts Bay projected an attack upon Crown Point, and sent Mr. Quincy to Pennsylvania, and Mr. Pownall, afterward Governor Pownall, to New York, to solicit assistance.' As I was in the Assembly, knew its temper, and was Mr, Quincy's countryman, he applied to me for my influ- ence and assistance. I dictated his address to them, which was well received. They voted an aid of ten thousand pounds, to be laid out in provisions. But the governor refusing his assent to their bill (which included this with other sums granted for the use of the crown), unless a clause were inserted exempting the proprietary estate from bearing any part of the tax that would be necessary, the Assembly, though very desirous of making their grant to New England effect- ual, were at a loss how to accomplish it. Mr. Quincy labored hard with the governor to obtain his assent y but he was obstinate. I then suggested a method of doing the business without a governor, by orders on the trustees of the Loan Office, which, by law, the Assembly had the right of drawing. There was, indeed, little or no money at that time in the office, and therefore I pro- posed that the orders should be payable in a year, and BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 173 to bear an interest of five per cent. With these orders I supposed the provisions might easily be purchased. The Assembly, with very little hesitation, adopted the proposal. The orders were immediately printed, and I was one of the committee directed to sign and dispose of them. The fund for paying them was the interest of all the paper currency then extant in the province up= on loan, together with the revenue arising from the ex- cise, which being known to be more than sufficient, they obtained instant credit, and were not only received in payment for the provisions, but many moneyed people, who had cash lying by them, vested it in those orders, which they found advantageous, as they bore interest while upon hand, and might on any occasion be used as money, so that they were eagerly all bought up, and in a few weeks none of them were to be seen. Thus this important affair was by my means com- pleted. Mr. Quincy returned thanks to the As- sembly in a handsome memorial, went home highly pleased with the success of his embassy, and ever after bore for me the most cordial and affectionate friendship. The British government, not choosing to permit the union of the colonies as proposed at Albany, and to trust that union with their defence, lest they should thereby grow too military and feel their own strength, suspicions and jealousies at this time being entertained of them, sent over General Braddock with two regi- ments of regular English troops for that purpose. He landed at Alexandria, in Virginia, and thence marched to Fredericktown, in Maryland, where he halted for carriages. Our Assembly apprehending, from some in- formation, that he had conceived violent prejudices against them, as averse to the service, wished me to wait upon him, not as from them, but as postmaster* 174 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF general, under the guise of proposing to settle with him the mode of conducting with most celerity and certainty the despatches between him and the govern- ors of the several j^rovinces, with whom he must neces- sarily have continual correspondence, and of which they proposed to pay the expense. My son accompa- nied me on this journey. We found the general at Fredericktown, waiting im- patiently for the return of those he had sent through the back parts of Maryland and Virginia to collect wagons. I stayed with him several days, dined with him daily, and had full opportunity of removing all his preju- dices, by the information of what the Assembly had before his arrival actually done, and were still willing to do, to facilitate his operations. When I was about to depart, the returns of wagons to be obtained were brought in, by which it appeared that they amounted only to twenty-five, and not all of those were in ser- viceable condition. The general and all the officers were surprised, declared the expedition was then at an end, being impossible, and exclaimed against the min- isters for ignorantly landing them in a country desti- tute of the means of conveying their stores, baggage, etc., not less than one hundred and fifty wagons being necessary. I happened to say I thought it was a pity they had not been landed rather in Pennsylvania, as in that country almost every farmer had his wagon. The general eagerly laid hold of my words, and said, " Then you, sir, who are a man of interest there, can probably procure them for us ; and I beg you will un- dertake it." I asked what terms were to be offered the owners of the wagons ; and I was desired to put on paper the terms that appeared to me necessary. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 175 This I did, and they were agreed to, and a commission and instructions accordingly prepared immediately. What those terms were will ai3pear in the advertise- ment I published as soon as I arrived at Lancaster, which being, from the great and sudden effect it pro- duced, a piece of some curiosity, I shall insert it at length, as follows : " ADVERTISEMENT. " Lancaster, April 26, 1755. " Whereas, one hundred and fifty wagons, with four horses to each wagon, and fifteen hundred saddle or pack horses, are wanted for the service of his majes- ty's forces now about to rendezvous at Will's Creek, and his excellency General Braddock having been pleased to empower me to contract for the hire of the same, I hereby give notice that I shall attend for that purpose at Lancaster from this day to next Wednes- day evening, and at York from next Thursday morn- ing till Friday evening, where I shall be ready to agree for wagons and teams, or single horses, on the following terms, viz. : 1. That there shall be paid for each wagon, with four good horses and a driver, fif- teen shillings per diem ; and for each able horse with a pack-saddle or other saddle and furniture, two shil- lings per diem ; and for each able horse without a sad- dle, eighteen pence per diem. 2. That the pay com- mence from the time of their joining the forces at Will's Creek, which must be on or before the 20th of May ensuing, and that a reasonable allowance be paid over and above for the time necessary for their travel- ling to Will's Creek and home again after their dis- charge. 3. Each wagon and team, and every saddle or pack horse, is to be valued by indifferent persons 176 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF chosen between me and the owner ; and in case of the loss of any wagon, team, or other horse in the service, the price according to such vakiation is to be allowed and paid. 4. Seven days' pay is to be advanced and paid in hand by me to the owner of each wagon and team or horse, at the time of contracting, if required, and the remainder to be paid by General Braddock. or by the paymaster of the army, at the time of their dis- charge, or from time to time, as it shall be demanded, 5. No drivers of wagons, or persons taking care of the hired horses, are on any account to be called upon to do the duty of soldiers, or be otherwise employed than in conducting or taking care of their carriages or horses. 6. All oats, Indian corn, or other forage that wagons or horses bring to the camp, more than is ne- cessary for the subsistence of the horses, is to be taken for the use of the army, and a reasonable price paid for the same. " Note. — My son, William Franklin, is empowered to enter into like contracts with any person in Cum- berland county. B. Franklin." " To the Inliahitants of the Counties of Lancaster^ York, and Cumberland. " Friends and Countrymen : " Being occasionally at the camp at Frederick a few days since, I found the general and officers extremely exasperated on account of their not being supplied with horses and carriages, which had been expected from this province, as most able to furnish them ; but, through the dissensions between our governor and As- sembly, money had not been provided, nor any steps taken for that purpose. " It was proposed to send an armed force immedi BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. Ill ately into these counties, to seize as many of the best carriages and horses as should be wanted, and compel as many persons into the service as would be neces- sary to drive and take care of them. " I apprehended that the progress of British sol= diers through these counties on such an occasion, especially considering the temper they are in, aud their resentment against us, would be attended with many and great inconveniences to the inhabitants, and there- fore more willingly took the trouble of trying first what might be done by fair and equitable means. The people of these back counties have lately complained to the Assembly that a sufficient currency was want- ing ; you have an opportunity of receiving and divid- ing among you a very considerable sum ; for, if the service of this expedition should continue, as it is more than probable it will, for one hundred and twenty days, the hire of these wagons and horses will amount to upward of thirty thousand pounds, which will be paid you in silver and gold of the king's money. "The service will be light and easy, for the army will scarce march above twelve miles per day, and the wagons and baggage-horses, as they carry those things that are absolutely necessary to the welfare of the army, must march with the army, and no faster ; and are, for the army's sake, always placed where they can be most secure, whether in a march or in a camp. " If you are really, as I believe you are, good and loyal subjects to his majesty, you may now do a most acceptable service, and make it easy to yourselves ; for three or four of such as can not sej)arately spare from the business of their plantations a wagon and four horses and a driver, may do it together, one furnish- 178 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ing the wagon, another one or two horses, and another the driver, and divide the pay proportionably between you ; but if you do not this service to your king and country voluntarily, when such good pay and reasons- able terms are offered to you, your loyalty will be strongly suspected. The king's business must be done ; so many brave troops, come so far for your de° fence, must not stand idle through your backwardness to do what may be reasonably expected from you ; wagons and horses must be had ; violent measures will probably be used, and you will be left to seek for a recompense where you can find it, and your case, perhaps, be little pitied or regarded. " I have no particular interest in this affair, as, except the satisfaction of endeavoring to do good, 1 shall have only my labor for my pains. If this method of obtaining the wagons and horses is not likely to succeed, I am obliged ^ to send word to the general in fourteen days ; and I suppose Sir John St. Clair, the hussar, with a body of soldiers, will immediately enter the province for the purpose, which I shall be sorry to hear, because I am very sincerely and truly your friend and well-wisher, " B. Franklin." I received of the general about eight hundred pounds, to be disbursed in advance-money to the wagon owners, etc. ; but that sum being insufficient, I advanced upward of two hundred pounds more, and in two weeks the one hundred and fifty wagons, with two hundred and fifty-nine carrying horses, were on their march for the camp. The advertisement prom- ised payment according to the valuation, in case any wagon or horse should be lost. The owners, how BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 179 ever, alleging they did not know General Braddock, or what dependence might be had on his promise, in- sisted on my bond for the performance, which I accord- ingly gave them. While I was at the camp, supping one evening witti the officers of Colonel Dunbar's regiment, he repre= sented to me his concern for the subalterns, who, he said, were generally not in affluence, and could ill afford, in this dear country, to lay in the stores that might be necessary in so long a march, through a wilder- ness, where nothing was to be purchased. I commis- erated their case, and resolved to endeavor procuring them some relief. I said nothing, however, to him of my intention, but wrote the next morning to the com- mittee of the Assembly, who had the disposition of some public money, warmly recommending the case of these officers to their consideration, and proposing that a present should be sent them of necessaries and refreshments. My son, who had some experience of a camp life, and of its wants, drew up a list for me, which I enclosed in my letter. The committee ap- proved, and used such diligence that, conducted by my son, the stores arrived at the camp as soon as the wagons. They consisted of twenty parcels, each con- taining — 6 lbs. loaf sugar. 1 Gloucester cheese. 6 lbs. g-ood Muscovado do. 1 keg containing 20 lbs. good but- 1 lb, good green tea. ter. 1 lb. good bohea do. 2 doz. old Madeira wine. 6 lbs. good ground coffee. 2 gallons Jamaica si^irits. 6 lbs. chocolate. 1 bottle flour of mustard. 1-2 cwt. best white biscuit, 2 well-cured hams, 1-2 lb. pepper. 1-2 dozen dried tongues. 1 quart best white wine vine- 6 lbs. rice, gar. 6' lt)s. raisins. 180 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF These twenty parcels, well packed, were placed on as many horses, each parcel, with the horse, being in- tended as a present for one officer. They were very thankfully received, and the kindness acknowledged by letters to me from the colonels of both regiments, in the most grateful terms. The general, too, was highly satisfied with my conduct in procuring him the wagons, etc., and readily paid my account of dis- bursements, thanking me repeatedly, and requesting my farther assistance in sending provisions after him. I undertook this also, and was busily emj^loyed in it till we heard of his defeat, advancing for the service of my own money upwards of one thousand pounds sterling, of which I sent him an account. It came to his hands, luckily for me, a few days before the battle, and he returned me immediately an order on the paymaster for the round sum of one thousand pounds, leaving the remainder to the next account. I consider this payment as good luck, having never been able to obtain that remainder, of which more hereafter. This general was, I think, a brave man, and might probably have made a figure as a good officer in some European war. But he had too much self-confidence, too high an opinion of the validity of regular troops, and too mean a one of both Americans and Indians. George Croghan, our Indian interpreter, joined him on his march with one hundred of those people, who might have been of great use to his army as guides, scouts, etc., if he had treated them kindly ; but he slighted and neglected them, and they gradually left him. In conversation with him one day, he was giving me some account of his intended progress. " After tak- BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 181 ing Fort Duquesne," ^ says he, " I am to proceed to Niagara ; and, having taken that, to Frontenac, if the season will allow time ; and I suppose it will, for Du- quesne can hardly detain me above three or four days | and then I see nothing that can obstruct my march to Niagara." Having before revolved in my mind the long line his army must make in their march by a very narrow road, to be cut for them through the woods and bushes, and also what I had read of a former de- feat of fifteen hundred French, who invaded the Iro- quois country, I had conceived some doubts and some fears for the event of the campaign. But I ventured only to say, "To be sure, sir, if you arrive well before Duquesne, with these fine troops, so well provided with artillery, that place not yet completely fortified, and as we hear with no very strong garrison, can prob- ably make but a short resistance. The only danger I apprehend of obstruction to your march is from am- buscades of Indians, who, by constant practice, are dexterous in laying and executing them ; and the slen- der line, near four miles long, which your army must make, may expose it to be attacked by surprise in its flanks, and to be cut like a thread into several pieces, which, from their distance, can not come up in time to support each other." He smiled at my ignorance, and replied, " These savages may, indeed, be a formidable enemy to your raw American militia, but upon the king's regular and disciplined troops, sir, it is impossible they should make any impression." I was conscious of an impro- priety in my disputing with a military man in mat- ^ Fort Duquesne stood where is now the city of Pittsburg. Wash- ington, it will be remembered, was an aid-de-camp of General Brad- dock and gave him the same advice regarding Indian warfare that Franklin did. 182 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ters o£ his profession, and said no more. The enemy, however, did not take the advantage of his army which I apprehended its long line of march exposed it to, but let it advance without interruption till within nine miles of the place ; and then, when more in a body (for it had just passed a river, where the front had halted till all were come over), and in a more open part of the woods than any it had passed, attacked its advanced guard by a heavy fire from behind trees and bushes, which was the first intelligence the general had of an enemy's being near him. This guard being disordered, the general hurried the troops up to their assistance, which was done in great confusion, through wagons, baggage, and cattle ; and presently the fire came upon their flank : the officers, being on horse- back, were more easily distinguished, picked out as marks, and fell very fast ; and the soldiers were crowded together in a huddle, having or hearing no orders, and standing to be shot at till two-thirds of them were killed ; and then, being seized with a panic, the whole fled with precipitation. The wagoners took each a horse out of his team and scampered; their example was immediately fol- lowed by others ; so that all the wagons, provisions, artillery, and stores were left to the enemy. The gen- eral, being wounded, was brought off with difficulty ; his secretary, Mr. Shirley, was killed by his side ; ' and out of eighty-six officers, sixty-three were killed or wounded, and seven hundred and fourteen men killed out of eleven hundred. These eleven hundred had been picked men from the whole army ; the rest had been left behind with Colonel Dunbar, who was to follow with the heavier part of the stores, provisions, and baggage. The flyers, not being pursued, arrived BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 183 at Dunbar's camp, and the panic they brought with them instantly seized him and all his people; and, though he had now above one thousand men, and the enemy who had beaten Braddock did not at most ex- ceed four hundred Indians and French together, in- stead of proceeding, and endeavoring to recover some of the lost honor, he ordered all the stores, ammuni- tion, etc., to be destroyed, that he might have more horses to assist his flight towards the settlements, and less lumber to remove. He was there met with re- quests from the governors of Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania, that he would post his troops on the frontiers, so as to afford some protection to the inhab- itants ; but he continued his hasty march through all the country, not thinking himself safe till he arrived at Philadelphia, where the inhabitants could protect him. This whole transaction gave us Americans the first suspicion that our exalted ideas of the prowess of British regulars had not been well founded. In their first march, too, from their landing till they got beyond the settlements, they had plundered and stripped the inhabitants, totally ruining some poor families, besides insulting, abusing, and confining the people if they remonstrated. This was enough to put us out of conceit of such defenders, if we had reaUy wanted any. How different was the conduct of our French friends in 1781, who, during a march through the most inhabited part of our country from Rhode Island to Virginia, near seven hundred miles, occa^ sioned not the smallest complaint for the loss of a pig, a chicken, or even an apple. Captain Orme, who was one of the general's aides- de-camp, and, being grievously wounded, was brought off with him, and continued with him to his death, 184 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF which happened in a few days, told me that he was totally silent all day, and at night only said, " Who would have thought it ? " That he was silent again the following day, saying only at last, " T'Fe shall better know how to deal %oith them another time ; " and died in a few minutes after. The secretary's papers, with all the general's orders, instructions, and correspondence, falling into the ene- my's hands, they selected and translated into French a number of the articles, which they printed, to prove the hostile intentions of the British court before the declaration of war. Among these I saw some letters of the general to the ministry, speaking highly of the great service 1 had rendered the army, and recom- mending me to their notice. David Hume, too, who was some years after secretary to Lord Hertford, when minister in France, and afterward to General Conway, when secretary of state, told me he had seen among the papers in that office, letters from Braddock highly recommending me. But the expedition having been unfortunate, my service, it seems, was not thought of much value, for those recommendations were never of any use to me. As to rewards from himself, I asked only one, which was that he would give orders to his officers not to enlist any more of our bought servants, and that he would discharge such as had been already enlisted. This he readily granted, and several were accordingly returned to their masters, on tny application. Dun- bar, when the command devolved on him, was not so generous. He being at Philadelphia, on his retreat or rather flight, I applied to him for the discharge of the servants of three poor farmers of Lancaster county that he had enlisted, reminding him of the late gea BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 185 eral's orders on that head. He promised me that, if the masters would icome to him at Trenton, where he should be in a few days on his march to New York, he would there deliver their men to them. They accord- ingly were at the expense and trouble of going to Trenton, and there he refused to perform his promise, to their great loss and disappointment. As soon as the loss of the wagons and horses was generally known, all the owners came upon me for the valuation which I had given bond to pay. Their de- mands gave me a great deal of trouble, my acquaint- ing them that the money was ready in the paymaster's hands, but that orders for paying it must first be ob- tained from General Shirley, and my assuring them that I had applied to that general by letter, but he being at a distance, an answer could not soon be re- ceived, and they must have patience ; all this was not sufficient to satisfy, and some began to sue me. Gen- eral Shirley at length relieved me from this terrible situation by appointing commissioners to examine the claims, and ordering payment. They amounted to near twenty thousand pound, which to pay would have ruined me. Before we had the news of this defeat, the two Doc- tors Bond came to me with a subscription paper for raising money to defray the expense of a grand fire- work, which it was intended to exliibit at a rejoicing on receipt of the news of our taking Fort Duquesne. I looked grave, and said it would, I thought, be time enough to prepare for the rejoicing when we knew we should have occasion to rejoice. They seemed sur- prised that I did not immediately comply with their proposal. " Why . . . ! " says one of them, " you surely don't suppose that the fort will not be taken ? " 186 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF " I don't know that it will not be taken, but I know that the events of war are subject to great uncer- tainty." I gave tbem the reasons of my doubting; the subscription was dropped, and the projectors thereby missed the mortification they would have un- dergone if the firework had been prepared. Dr. Bond, on some other occasion afterward, said that he did not like Franklin's forebodings. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 187 XII. COMMON-SENSE IN WAE MATTERS. Governor Morris, who had continually worried the Assembly with message after message before the defeat of Braddock, to beat them into the making of acts to raise money for the defence of the province without taxing, among others, the proprietary estates, and had rejected all their bills for not having such an exempting clause, now redoubled his attacks with more hope of success, the danger and necessity being greater. The Assembly, however, continued firm, be- lieving they had justice on their side, and that it would be giving up an essential right if they suffered the governor to amend their money-bills. In one of the last, indeed, which was for granting fifty thousand pounds, his proposed amendment was only of a single word. The bill expressed " that all estates, real and personal, were to be taxed, those of the proprietaries not excepted." His amendment was, for not read only : a small but very material alteration. However^ when the news of this disaster reached England, our friends there, whom we had taken care to furnish with all the Assembly's answers to the governor's messages, raised a clamor against the proprietaries for their meanness and injustice in giving their governor such instructions ; some going so far as to say that by ob- structing the defence of their province they forfeited 188 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF their right to it. They were intimidated by this, and sent orders to their receiver-general to add five thou- sand pounds of their moirpy to whatever sum might be given by the Assembly for such purpose. This, being notified to the House, was accepted in lieu of their share of a general tax, and a new bill was formed, with an exempting clause, which passed accordingly. By this act I was appointed one of the commissioners for disposing of the money, sixty thou- sand pounds. I had been active in modelling the bill and procuring its passage, and had, at the same time, drawn a bill for establishing and disciplining a volun- tary militia, which I carried through the House with- out much difficulty, as care was taken in it to leave the Quakers at their liberty. To promote the associ- ation necessary to form the militia, I wrote a dialogue, stating and answering all the objections I could think of to such a militia, which was printed, and had, as I thought, great effect. While the several companies in the city and coun- try were forming, and learning their exercise, the gov- ernor prevailed with me to take charge of our North- western frontier, which was infested by the enemy, and provide for the defence of the inhabitants by raising troops and building a line of forts. I undertook this military business, though I did not conceive myself well qualified for it. He gave me a commission with full powers, and a parcel of blank commissions for officers, to be o^iven to whom I thought fit. I had but little difficulty in raising men, having soon filve hun- dred and sixty under my command. My son, who had in the preceding war been an officer in the army raised against Canada, was my aide-de-camp, and of great use to me. The Indians had burned Gnadenhut, a BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 189 village settled by the Moravians, and massacred the in- habitants ; but the place was thought a good situation for one of the forts. In order to march thither, I assembled the compa- nies at Bethlehem, the chief establishment of those people, I was surprised to find it in so good a pos- ture of defence ; the destruction of Gnadenhut had made them apprehend danger. The principal build- ings were defended by a stockade ; they had purchased a quantity of arms and ammunition from New York, and had even placed quantities of small paving stones between the windows of their high stone houses for their women to throw down upon the heads of any In- dians that should attempt to force into them. The armed brethren, too, kept watch, and relieved as me- thodically as any garrison town. In conversation with the bishop, Spangenberg, I mentioned this my sur- prise ; for, knowing they had obtained an act of Par- liament exempting them from military duties in the colonies, I had supposed they were conscientiously scrupulous of bearing arms. He answered me that it was not one of their established principles, but that, at the time of their obtaining that act, it was thought to be a principle with many of their people. On this occasion, however, they, to their surprise, found it adopted by but a few. It seems they were either de- ceived in themselves or deceived the Parliament; but common sense, aided by present danger, will some- times be too strong for whimsical opinions. It was the beginning of January when we set out upon this business of building forts. I sent one de- tachment toward the Minisink, with instructions to erect one for the security of that upper part of the country, and another to the lower part, with similar in- 190 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF structions ; and I concluded to go myself with the rest of my force to Gnadenhut, where a fort was thought more immediately necessary. The Moravians 23rocured me five wagons for our tools, stores, baggage, etc. Just before we left Bethlehem, eleven farmers, whc had been driven from their plantations by the Indians^ came to me requesting a supply of firearms, that they might go back and fetch off their cattle. I gave them each a gun with suitable ammunition. We had not marched many miles before it began to rain, and it con- tinued raining all day ; there were no habitations on the road to shelter us, till we arrived near night at the house of a German, where, and in his barn, we were all huddled together, as wet as water could make us. It was well we were not attacked in our march, for our arms were of the most ordinary sort, and our men could not keep their gunlocks dry. The Indians are dex- terous in contrivances for that purpose, which we had not. They met that day the eleven poor farmers above mentioned, and killed ten of them. The one who es- caped informed that his and his companions' guns would not go off, the priming being wet with the rain. The next day being fair, we continued our march and arrived at the desolated Gnadenhut. There was a saw-mill near, round which were left several piles of boards, with which we soon hutted our« selves ; an operation the more necessary at that in= clement season as we had no tents. Our first work was to bury more effectually the dead we found there, who had been half interred by the country people. The next morning our fort was planned and marked out, the circumference measuring four hundred and fifty-five feet, which would require as many palisades to be made of trees, one with another, of a foot diametei BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 191 each. Our axes, of which we had seventy, were immedi- ately set to work to cut down trees, and, our men being dexterous in the use of them, great dispatch was made. Seeing the trees fall so fast, I had the curiosity to look at my watch when two men began to cut at a pine ; in six minutes they had it upon the ground, and I found it of fourteen inches diameter. Each pine made three palisades of eighteen feet long, pointed at one end. While these were preparing, our other men dug a trench all round, of three feet deep, in which the pali- sades were to be planted ; and our wagons, the bodies being taken off, and the fore and hind wheels separated by taking out the pin which united the two parts of the perch, we had ten carriages, with two horses each, to bring the palisades from the woods to the spot. When they were set up, our carpenters built a stage of boards all round within, about six feet high, for the men to stand on when to fire through the loopholes. We had one swivel gun, which we mounted on one of the angles, and fired it as soon as fixed, to let the In- dians know, if any were within hearing, that we had such pieces ; and thus our fort, if such a magnificent name may be given to so miserable a stockade, was finished in a week, though it rained so hard every other day that the men could not work. This gave me occasion to observe, that when men are employed they are best contented ; for on the days they worked they were good-natured and cheerful, and, with the consciousness of having done a good day's work, they spent the evening jollily ; but on our idle days they were mutinous and quarrelsome, finding fault with their pork, the bread, etc., and in contin- ual ill-humor, which put me in mind of a sea-captain, whose rule it was to keep his men constantly at work f 192 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF and when liis mate once told him that they had done everything, and there was nothing further to employ them about, " OJi^^^ says he, '''"make them scour the anchor. ''^ This kind of fort, however contemptible, is a suffi- cient defence against Indians, who have no cannon. Finding ourselves now posted securely, and having a place to retreat to on occasion, we ventured out in parties to scour the adjacent country. We met with no Indians, but we found the places on the neighbor- ing hills where they had lain to watch our proceedings. There was an art in their contrivance of those places that seems worth mention. It being winter, a fire was necessary for them ; but a common fire on the sur- face of the ground would by its light have discovered i their position at a distance. They had therefore dug holes in the ground about three feet diameter and somewhat deeper ; we saw where they had with their hatchets cut off the charcoal from the sides of burnt logs lying in the woods. With these coals they had made small fires in the bottom of the holes, and we ob- served among the weeds and grass the prints of their bodies, made by their lying all round, with their legs hanging down in the holes to keep their feet warm, which with them is an essential point. This kind of fire, so managed, could not discover them, either by its light, flame, sparks, or even smoke : it appeared that their number was not great, and it seems they saw we were too many to be attacked by them with prospect of advantage. We had for our chaplain a zealous Presbyterian minister, Mr. Beatty, who complained to me that the men did not generally attend his prayers and exhorta- tions. When they enlisted, they were promised, be- BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 193 sides pay and provisions, a gill of rum a day, which was punctually served out to them, half in the morn- ing and the other half in the evening ; and I observed they were as punctual in attending to receive it ; upon which I said to Mr. Beatty, " It is, perhaps, below the dignity of your profession to act as steward of the rum, but if you were to deal it out and only just after prayers, you would have them all about you." He liked the thought, undertook the office, and, with the help of a few hands to measure out the liquor, executed it to satisfaction, and never were prayers more gen- erally and more punctually attended ; so that I thought this method preferable to the punishment inflicted by some military laws for non-attendance on divine service. I had hardly finished this business, and got my fort well stored with provisions, when I received a letter from the governor, acquainting me that he had called the Assembly, and wished my attendance there, if the posture of affairs on the frontiers was such that my re- maining there was no longer necessary. My friends, too, of the Assembly, pressing me by their letters to be, if possible, at the meeting, and my three intended forts being now completed, and the inhabitants con- tented to remain on their farms under that protection, I resolved to return ; the more willingly, as a New England officer. Colonel Clapham, experienced in Indian war, being on a visit to our establishment, consented to accept the command. I gave him a com- mission, and, parading the garrison, had it read before them, and introduced him to them as an officer who, from his skill in military affairs, was much more fit to command them than myself ; and, giving them a little exhortation, took my leave. I was escorted as far as Bethlehem, where I rested a few days to recover from 194 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF the fatigue I had undergone. The first night, being in a good bed, I could hardly sleep, it was so different from my hard lodging on the floor of our hut at Gna- den, wrapped only in a blanket or two. While at Bethlehem, I inquired a little into the practice of the Moravians : some of them had accom° panied me, and all were very kind to me. I found they worked for a common stock, eat at common tables, and slept in common dormitories, great numbers to- gether. In the dormitories I observed loopholes, at certain distances all along just under the ceiling, which I thought judiciously placed for change of air. I was at their church, where I was entertained with good music, the organ being accompanied with violins, hautboys, flutes, clarinets, etc. I understood that their sermons were not usually preached to mixed con- gregations of men, women, and children, as is our com- mon practice, but that they assembled sometimes the married men, at other times their wives, then the young men, the young women, and the little children, each division by itself. The sermon I heard was to the latter, who came in and were placed in rows on benches ; the boys under the conduct of a young man, their tutor, and the girls conducted by a young woman. The discourse seemed well adapted to their capacities, and was delivered in a pleasing, familiar manner, coaxing them, as it were, to be good. They behaved very orderly, but looked pale and unhealthy, which made me suspect they were kept too much within doors, or not allowed sufficient exercise. I inquired concerning the Moravian marriages, whether the report was true that they were by lot. 1 was told that lots were used only in particular cases, that generally, when a young man found himself di» BENJAMIN FRANKLIN 195 posed to marry, he informed the elders of his class, who consulted the elder ladies that governed the young women. As these elders of the different sexes were well acquainted with the tempers and dispositions of their respective pupils, they could best judge what matches were suitable, and their judgments were gen- erally acquiesced in ; but if, for example, it should happen that two or three young women were found to be equally proper for the young man, the lot was then recurred to. I objected, if the matches are not made by the mutual choice of parties, some of them may chance to be very unhappy. " And so they may," answered my informer, " if you let the parties choose for themselves ; " which, indeed, I could not deny. Being returned to Philadelphia, I found the associa- tion went on swimmingly, the inhabitants that were not Quakers having pretty generally come into it, formed themselves into companies, and chose their cap- tains, lieutenants, and ensigns, according to the new law. Dr. B. visited me, and gave me an account of the pains he had taken to spread a general good liking to the law, and ascribed much to those endeavors. I had had the vanity to ascribe all to my Dialogue-, however, not knowing but that he might be in the right, I let him enjoy his opinion, which I take to be generally the best way in such cases. The officers, meeting, chose me to be colonel of the regiment, which I this time accepted. I forget how many companies we had, but we paraded about twelve hundred well- looking men, with a company of artillery, who had been furnished with six brass field-pieces, which they had become so expert in the use of as to fire twelve times in a minute. The first time I reviewed my regi= ment they accompanied me to my house, and would 196 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF salute me with some rounds Hred before my door, which shook down and broke several glasses of my elec- trical apparatus. And my new honor proved not much less brittle ; for all our commissions were soon after broken by a repeal of the law in England. During this short time of my colonelship, being about to set out on a journey to Virginia, the officers of my regiment took it into their heads that it would be proper for them to escort me out of town, as far as the Lower Ferry. Just as I was getting on horse- back they came to my door, between thirty and forty, mounted, and all in their uniforms. I had not been previously acquainted with the project, or I should have prevented it, being naturally averse to the as- suming of state on any occasion ; and I was a good deal chagrined at their appearance, as I could not avoid their accompanying me. What made it worse was, that, as soon as we began to move, they drew their swords and rode with them naked all the way. Somebody wrote an account of this to the proprietor, and it gave him great offence. No such honor had been paid him when in the province, nor to any of his governors ; and he said it was only proper to princes of the blood royal, which may be true for aught I know, who was, and still am, ignorant of the etiquette in such cases. This silly affair, however, greatly increased his rancor against me, which was before not a little, on account of my conduct in the Assembly respecting the exemption of his estate from taxation, which I had al- ways opposed very warmly, and not without severe re. flections on his meanness and injustice of contending for it. He accused me to the ministry as, being the great obstacle to the king's service, preventing, by my BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 197 influence in the House, the proper form of the bills for raising money, and he instanced this parade with my officers as a proof of my having an intention to take the government of the province out of his hands by force. He also applied to Sir Everard Fawkener, the postmaster-general, to deprive me of my office; but it had no other effect than to procure from Sir Everard a gentle admonition. Notwithstanding the continual wrangle between the governor and the House, in which I, as a member, had so large a share, there still subsisted a civil intercourse between that gentleman and myself, and we never had any personal difference. I have sometimes since thought that his little or no resentment against me, for the answers it was known I drew up to his mes- sages, might be the effect of professional habit, and that, being bred a lawyer, he might consider us both as merely advocates for contending clients in a suit, he for the proprietaries and I for the Assembly. He would, therefore, sometimes call in a friendly way to advise with me on difficult points, and sometimes, though not often, take my advicec We acted in concert to supply Braddock's army with provisions ; and when the shocking news arrived of his defeat, the governor sent in haste for me to con- sult with him on measures for preventing the deser- tion of the back counties. I forget now the advice I gave ; but I think it was, that Dunbar should be writ- ten to, and prevailed with, if possible, to post his troops on the frontiers for their protection, till, by re- enforcements from the colonies, he might be able to proceed on the expedition. And, after my return from the frontier, he would have had me undertake the conduct of such an expedition with provincial 198 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OP troops, for the reduction of Fort Duquesne, Dunbar and his men being otherwise employed ; and he pro- posed to commission me as general. I had not so good an opinion of my military abilities as he pro- fessed to have, and I believe his professions must have exceeded his real sentiments ; but probably he might think that my popularity would facilitate the raising of the men, and my influence in Assembly, the grant of money to pay them, and that, perhaps, without taxing the proprietary estate. Finding me not so forward to engage as he expected, the project was dropped, and he sooh after left the government, being superseded by Captain Denny. Before I proceed in relating the part I had in pub- lic affairs under this new governor's administration, it may not be amiss here to give some account of the rise and progress of my philosophical reputation. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 199 XIII. FRANKLIN THE PHILOSOPHER. In 1746, being at Boston, I met there with a Dr. Spence, who was lately arrived from Scotland, and showed me some electric experiments. They were imperfectly performed, as he was not very expert; but, being on a subject quite new to me, they equally surprised and pleased me. Soon after my return to Philadelphia, our library company received from Mr. P. Collinson, Fellow of the Royal Society of London, a present of a glass tube, with some account of the use of it in making such experiments. I eagerly seized the opportunity of repeating what I had seen at Bos- ton ; and, by much practice, acquired great readiness in performing those, also, which we had an account of from England, adding a number of new ones. I say much practice, for my house was continually full, for some time, with people who came to see these new wonders. To divide a little this incumbrance among my friends, I caused a number of similar tubes to be blown at our glass-house, with which they furnished themselves, so that we had at length several perform- ers. Among these, the principal was Mr. Kinnersley, an ingenious neighbor, who, being out of business, I encouraged to undertake showing the experiments for money, and drew up for him two lectures, in which 200 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF tlie experiments were ranged in such order, and ac» companied with such explanations in such method, as that the foregoing should assist in comprehending the following. He procured an elegant apparatus for the purpose, in which all the little machines that I had roughly made for myself were nicely formed by instru- ment-makers. His lectures were well attended, and gave great satisfaction ; and after some time he went through the colonies, exhibiting them in every capital town, and picked up some money. In the West India islands, indeed, it was with difficulty the experiments could be made, from the general moisture of the air. Obliged as we were to Mr. Collinson for his pres- ent of the tube, etc., I thought it right he should be informed of our success in using it, and wrote him several letters containing accounts of our experiments. He got them read in the Royal Society, where they were not at first thought worth so much notice as to be printed in their Transactions. One paper, which I wrote for Mr. Kinnersley, on the sameness of light- ning with electricity, I sent to Dr. Mitchel, an ac- quaintance of mine, and one of the members also of that society, who wrote me word that it had been read but was laughed at by the connoisseurs. The papers, however, being shown to Dr. FothergiU, he thought them of too much value to be stifled, and ad- vised the printing of them. Mr. Collinson then gave them to Cave for publication in his Gentleman's Mag- azine ; but he chose to print them separately in a pam- phlet, and Dr. Fothergill wrote the preface. Cave, it seems, judged rightly for his profit, for by the ad- ditions that arrived afterward, they swelled to a quarto volume, which has had five editions, and cost him nothing for copy-money. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 201 It was, however, some time before those papers were much taken notice of in England. A copy of them happening to fall into the hands of the Count de Buf- fon, a philosopher deservedly of great reputation in France, and, indeed, all over Europe, he prevailed with M. Dalibard to translate them into French, and they were printed at Paris. The publication offended the Abbe Nollet, preceptor in Natural Philosophy to the royal family, and an able experimenter, who had formed and published a theory of electricity, which then had the general vogue. He could not at first believe that such a work came from America, and said it must have been fabricated by his enemies at Paris, to decry his system. Afterwards, having been assured that there really existed such a person as Franklin at Philadelphia, which he had doubted, he wrote and published a volume of Letters, chiefly addressed to me, defending his theory, and denying the verity of my experiments, and of the positions deduced from them. I once purposed answering the abbe, and actually be- gan the answer ; but, on consideration that my writings contained a description of experiments which any one might repeat and verify, and if not to be verified, could not be defended ; or of observations offered as con- jectures, and not delivered dogmatically, therefore not laying me under any obligation to defend them ; and reflecting that a dispute between two persons, writing in different languages, might be lengthened greatly by mistranslations, and thence misconceptions of one an- other's meaning, much of one of the abbe's letters being founded on an error in the translation, I concluded to let my papers shift for themselves, believing it was bet- ter to spend what time I could spare from public busi« 202 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ness in making new experiments, than in disputing about those ah'eady made. I therefore never answered M. Nollet, and the event gave me no cause to repent my silence ; for my friend M. le Roy, of the Royal Academy of Sciences, took up my cause and refuted him ; my book was translated into the Italian, German, and Latin languages ; and the doctrine it contained was by degrees universally adopted by the philosophers of Europe, in preference to that of the abbe ; so that he lived to see himself the last of his sect, except Mon- sieur B , of Paris, his Sieve and immediate dis- ciple. What gave my book the more sudden and general celebrity, was the success of one of its proposed ex- periments, made by Messrs. Dalibard and De Lor at Marly, for drawing lightning from the clouds. This engaged the public attention everywhere. M. de Lor, who had an apparatus for experimental philosophy, and lectured in that branch of science, undertook to repeat what he called the Philadelphia Experiments ; and, after they were performed before the king and court, all the curious of Paris flocked to see them. I will not swell this narrative with an account of that capital experiment, nor of the infinite pleasure I re- ceived in the success of a similar one I made soon after with a kite at Philadelphia, as both are to be found in the histories of electricity. Dr. Wright, an English physician, when at Paris, wrote to a friend, who was of the Royal Society, an account of the high esteem my experiments were in among the learned abroad, and of their wonder that my writings had„ been, so little noticed in England. The society, on this, resumed the consideration of the letters that had been read to them ; and the celebrated BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 203 Dr. Watson drew up a summary account of them, and of all I had afterwards sent to England on the sub- ject, which he accompanied with some praise of the writer. This summary was then printed in their Transactions ; and some members of the society in London, particularly the very ingenious Mr. Canton, having verified the experiment of procuring lightning from the clouds by a pointed rod, and acquainting them with the success, they soon made me more than amends for the slight with which they had before treated me. Without my having made any application for that honor, they chose me a member, and voted that I should be excused the customary payments, which would have amounted to twenty-five guineas ; and ever since have given me their Transactions gratis. They also presented me with the gold medal of Sir Godfrey Copley for the year 1753, the delivery of which was accompanied by a very handsome speech of the president, Lord Macclesfield, wherein I was highly honored. Our new governor. Captain Denny, brought over for me the before-mentioned medal from the Royal Soci- ety, which he presented to me at an entertainment given him by the city. He accompanied it with very polite expressions of his esteem for me, having, as he said, been long acquainted with my character. After dinner, when the company, as was customary at that time, were engaged in drinking, he took me aside into another room, and acquainted me that he had been ad- vised by his friends in England to cultivate a friend- ship with me, as one who was capable of giving him the best advice, and of contributing most effectually to the making his administration easy ; that he there- fore desired of all things to have a good understand- 204 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF ing with me, and he begged me to be assured of his readiness on all occasions to render me every service that might be in his power. He said much to me, also, of the proprietor's good disposition towards the province, and of the advantage it might be to us all, and to me in particular, if the opposition that had been so long continued to his measures was dropped, and har- mony restored between him and the people ; in effect- ing which, it was thought no one could be more service- able than myself ; and I might depend on adequate acknowledgments and recompenses, etc., etc. The drinkers, finding we did not return immediately to the table, sent us a decanter of Madeira, whicli the gov- ernor made liberal use of, and in proj^ortion became more profuse of his solicitations and promises. My answers were to this purpose: that my circum- stances, thanks to God, were such as to make proprie- tary favors unnecessary to me ; and that, being a member of the Assembly, 1 could not possibly accept of any ; that, however, I had no personal enmity to the proprietary, and that, whenever the public meas- ures he proposed should appear to be for the good of the people, no one should espouse and forward them more zealously than myself ; my past opposition hav- ing been founded on this, that the measures which had been urged were evidently intended to serve the pro- prietary interest, with great prejudice to that of the people ; that I was much obliged to him (the gov- ernor) for his professions of regard to me, and that he might rely on everything in my power to make his ad- ministration as easy as possible, hoping at the same time that he had not brought with him the same un- fortunate instruction his predecessor had been ham. pered with. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 205 On tliis he did not then explain himself ; but when he afterwards came to do business with the Assembly, they appeared again, the disputes were renewed, and I was as active as ever in the opposition, being the penman, first, of the request to have a communication of the instructions, and then of the remarks upon them, which may be found in the votes of the time, and in the Historical Keview I afterward published. But between us personally no enmity arose ; we were often together ; he was a man of letters, had seen much of the world, and was very entertaining and pleas- ing in conversation. He gave me the first informa- tion that my old friend Jas. Ralph was still alive ; that he was esteemed one of the best political writers in England ; had been employed in the dispute be- tween Prince Frederic and the king, and had obtained a pension of three hundred a year ; that his reputation was indeed small as a poet, Pope having damned his poetry in the Dunciad ; but his prose was thought as good as any man's. The Assembly finally finding the proprietary obsti- nately persisted in manacling their deputies with in- structions inconsistent not only with the privileges of the people, but with the service of the crown, resolved to petition the king against them, and appointed me their agent to go over to England, to present and sup- port the petition. The House had sent up a bill to the governor, granting a sum of sixty thousand pounds for the king's use (ten thousand pounds of which was subjected to the orders of tlie then general, Lord Lou- doun), which the governor absolutely refused to pass, in compliance with his instructions. 206 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF XIV. DEPAKTUEE FOR ENGLAND. I HAD agreed with Captain Morris, of the packet at New York, for my passage, and my stores were put on board, when Lord Loudoun arrived at Philadelphia, expressly, as he told me, to endeavor an accommodation between the governor and Assembly, that his majesty's service might not be obstructed by their dissensions. Accordingly, he desired the governor and myself to meet him, that he might hear what was to be said on both sides. We met and discussed the business. In behalf of the Assembly, I urged all the various argu- ments that may be found in the public papers of that time, which were of my writing, and are printed with the minutes of the Assembly ; and the governor pleaded his instructions ; the bond he had given to observe them, and his ruin if he disobeyed, yet seemed not unwilling to hazard himself if Lord Loudoun w^ould advise it. This his lordship did not choose to do, though I once thought I had nearly prevailed with liim to do it ; but finally he rather chose to urge the compliance of the Assembly ; and he entreated me to use my endeavors with them for that purpose, declaring that he would spare none of the king's troops for the defence of our frontiers, and that, if we did not con- tinue to provide for that defence ourselves, they must remain exposed to the enemy. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 207 I acquainted the House with what had passed, and, presenting them with a set of resohitions I had drawn up, declaring our rights, and that we did not relinquish our claim to those rights, but only suspended the exer- cise of them on this occasion through force^ against which we protested, they at length agreed to drop that bill, and frame another conformable to the proprie- tary instructions. This of course the governor passed, and I was then at liberty to proceed on my voyage. But, in the mean time, the packet had sailed with my sea-stores, which was some loss to me, and my only recompense was his lordship's thanks for my service, all the credit of obtaining the accommodation falling to his share. He set out for New York before me ; and, as the time for dispatching the packet-boats was at his dispo- sition, and there were two then remaining there, one of which, he said, was to sail very soon, I requested to know the precise time, that I might not miss her by any delay of mine. His answer was, " I have given out that she is to sail on Saturday next ; but I may let you know entre nous, that if you are there by Monday morning, you will be in time, but do not delay longer." By some accidental hindrance at a ferry, it was Mon- day noon before i arrived, and I was much afraid she might have sailed, as the wind was fair ; but I was soon made easy by the information that she was still in the harbor and would not move till the next day. One would imagine that I was now on the very point of departing for Europe. I thought so ; but I was not then so well acquainted with his lordship's character, of which i?idecision was one of the strongest features. I shall give some instances. It was about the begin- ning of April that I came to New York, and I think it 208 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF was near the end of June before we sailed. There were then two of the packet-boats which had been long in port, but were detained for the general's letters, which were always to be ready to-morrow. Another ]3acket arrived ; she too was detained ; and before we sailed, a fourth was expected. Ours was the first to be dis- patched, as having been there longest. Passengers were engaged in all, and some extremely impatient to be gone, and the merchants uneasy about their letters and the orders they had given for insurance (it being war time) for fall goods ; but their anxiety availed nothing ; his lordship's letters were not ready ; and yet whoever waited on him found him always at his desk, pen in hand, and concluded he must needs write abundantly. Going myself one morning to pay my respects, I found in his antechamber one Innis, a messenger of Philadelphia, who had come from thence express with a packet from Governor Denny for the General. He delivered to me some letters from my friends there, which occasioned my inquiring when he was to return, and where he lodged, that I might send some letters by him. He told me he was ordered to call to-morrow at nine for the general's answer to the governor, and should set off immediately. I put my letters into his hands the same day. A fortnight after I met him again in the same place. " So, you are soon returned, Innis ? " '* Returned ! no, I am not gone yet." " How so ? " "I have called here by order every morning these two weeks past for his lordship's letter, and it is not yet ready." " Is it possible, when he is so great a writer ? for I see him constantly at his escritoire." " Yes," says Innis, " but he is like St. George on the signs, always on horseback^ and never rides on."*^ This BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 209 observation of the messenger was, it seems, well founded ; for, when in England, I understood that Mr. Pitt gave it as one reason for removing this general, and sending Generals Amlierst and Wolfe, that the minister never heard from him., and could not hnow what he was doing. This daily expectation of sailing, and all the three packets going down to Sandy Hook, to join the fleet there, the passengers thought it best to be on board, lest by a sudden order the ships should sail, and they be left behind. There, if I remember right, we were about six weeks, consuming our sea-stores, and obliged to procure more. At length the fleet sailed, the Gen- eral and all his army on board, bound to Louisburg, with intent to besiege and take that fortress ; all the packet-boats in company ordered to attend the Gen- eral's ship, ready to receive his dispatches when they should be ready. We were out five days before we got a letter with leave to part, and then our ship quitted the fleet and steered for England. The other two packets he still detained, carried them with him to Halifax, where he stayed some time to exercise the men in sham attacks upon sham forts, then altered his mind as to besieging Louisburg, and returned to New York, with all his troops, together with the two pack- ets above mentioned, and all their passengers. Dur- ing his absence the French and savages had taken Fort George, on the frontier of that province, and the savages had massacred many of the garrison after capitulation. I saw afterwards in London Captain Bonnell, who commanded one of those packets. He told me that, when he had been detained a month, he acquainted his lordship that his ship had grown foul, to a degree 210 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF that must necessarily hinder her fast sailing, a point of consequence for a packet-boat, and requested an al- lowance of time to heave her down and clean her bot- tom. He was asked \\o^ long time that would require. He answered, three days. The general replied, " If you can do it in one day, I give you leave : otherwise not ; for you must certainly sail the day after to-mor- row." So he never obtained leave, though detained afterwards from day to day during full three months. I saw also in London one of Bonnell's passengers, who was so enraged against his lordship for deceiving and detaining him so long at New York, and then carrying him to Halifax and back again, that he swore he would sue him for damages. Whether he did or not, I never heard ; but, as he represented the injury to his affairs, it was very considerable. On the whole, I wondered much how such a man came to be intrusted with so important a business as the conduct of a great army ; but, having since seen more of the great world, and the means of obtaining, and motives for giving places, my wonder is dimin- ished. General Shirley, on whom the command of the army devolved upon the death of Braddock, would, in my opinion, if continued in place, have made a much better campaign than that of Loudoun in 1757, which was frivolous, expensive, and disgraceful to our nation beyond conception ; for, though Shirley was not a bred soldier, he was sensible and sagacious in himself, and attentive to good advice from others, capable of forming judicious plans, and quick and ac- tive in carrying them into execution. Loudoun, in- stead of defending the colonies with his great army, left them totally exposed, while he paraded idly at Halifax, by which means Fort George was lost ; be- BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 211 sides, he deranged all our mercantile operations, and distressed ojur trade, by a long embargo on the expor- tation of provisions, on pretence of keeping supplies from being obtained by the enemy, but in reality for beating down their price in favor of the contractors, in whose profits, it was said, perhaps from suspicion only, he had a share. And, when at length the em- bargo was taken off, by neglecting to send notice of it to Charleston, the Carolina fleet was detained near three months longer, whereby their bottoms were so much damaged by the worm that a great part of them foundered in their passage home. Shirley w^as, I believe, sincerely glad of being re- lieved from so burdensome a charge as the conduct of an army must be to a man unacquainted with military business. I was at the entertainment given by the city of New York to Lord Loudoun,^ on his taking upon him the command. Shirley, though thereby su- perseded, was present also. There was a great com- pany of officers, citizens, and strangers, and, some chairs having been borrowed in the neighborhood, there was one among them very low, which fell to the lot of Mr. Shirley. Perceiving it as I sat by him, I said, " They have given you, sir, too low a seat." "No matter," says he, "Mr. Franklin, I find alow seat the easiest." While I was, as afore mentioned, detained at New York, I received all the accounts of the provisions, etc., that I had furnished to Braddock, some of which ac- counts could not sooner be obtained from the different persons I had employed to assist in the business. I presented them to Lord Loudoun, desiring to be paid the balance. He caused them to be regularly ex- amined by the proper officer, who, after comparing 212 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF every article with its voucher, certified them to be right; and the balance due for which his lordship promised to give me an order on the paymaster. This was, however, put off from time to time ; and, though I called often for it by appointment, I did not get it. At length, just before my departure, he told me ho had, on better consideration, concluded not to mix his accounts with those of his predecessors. " And you," says he, " when in England, have only to exhibit your accounts at the treasury, and you will be paid immedi- ately." I mentioned, but without effect, the great and unex- pected expense I had been put to by being detained so long at New York, as a reason for my desiring to be presently paid ; and on my observing that it was not right I should be put to any further trouble or delay in obtaining the money I had advanced, as I charged no commission for my service, " O, sir," says he, " you must not think of persuading us that you are no gainer ; we understand better those affairs, and know that everyone concerned in supplying the army finds means, in the doing it, to fill his own pockets." I assured him that was not my case, and that I had not pocketed a farthing ; but he appeared clearly not to believe me ; and, indeed, I have since learnt that immense fortunes are often made in such employ- ments. As to my balance, I am not paid it to this day, of which more hereafter. Our captain of the packet had boasted much, be- fore we sailed, of the swiftness of his ship ; unfortu- nately, when we came to sea, she proved the dullest of ninetj^-six sail, to his no small mortification. After many conjectures respecting the cause, when we were near another ship almost as dull as ours, which, how- BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 213 ever, gained upon us, the captain ordered all hands to come aft, and stand as near the ensign staff as possi- ble. We were, passengers included, about forty per- sons. While we stood there, the ship mended her pace, and soon left her neighbor far behind, which proved clearly what our captain suspected, that she was loaded too much by the head. The casks of water, it seems, had been all placed forward ; these he therefore ordered to be moved further aft, on which the ship recovered her character, and proved the best sailer in the fleet. * The captain said she had once gone at the rate of thirteen knots, which is accounted thirteen miles per hour. We had on board, as a passenger, Captain Kennedy, of the Navy, who contended that it was im- possible, and that no ship ever sailed so fast, and that there must have been some error in the division of the log-line, or some mistake in heaving the log. A wager ensued between the two captains, to be decided when there should be sufficient wind. Kennedy thereupon examined rigorously the log-line, and, being satisfied with that, he determined to throw the log himself. Accordingly some days after, when the wind blew very fair and fresh, and the captain of the packet, Lutwidge, said he believed she then went at the rate of thirteen knots, Kennedy made the experi- ment, and owned his v/ager lost. The above fact I give for the sake of the following observation. It has been remarked, as an imperfec- tion in tiie art of ship-building, that it can never be known, till she is tried, whether a new ship will or will not be a good sailer ; for that the model of a good- sailing ship has been exactly followed in a new one, which has proved, on the contrary, remarkably dull. 214 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF 1 apprehend that this may partly be occasioned by the different opinions of seamen respecting the modes of lading, rigging, and sailing of a ship ; each has his system; and the same vessel, laden by the judgment and orders of one captain, shall sail better or worse than when by the orders of another. Besides, it scarce ever happens that a ship is formed, fitted for the sea, and sailed by the same person. One man builds the hull, another rigs her, a third lades and sails her. No one of these has the advantage of knowing all the ideas and experience of the others, and, therefore, cannot draw just conclusions from a combination of the whole. Even in the simple operation of sailing when at sea, I have often observed different judgments in the officers who commanded the successive watches, the wind being the same. One would have the sails trimmed sharper or flatter than another, so that they seemed to have no certain rule to govern by. Yet I think a set of exjjeriments might be instituted, first, to determine the most proper form of the hull for swift sailing ; next, the best dimensions and properest place for the masts ; then the form and quantity of sails, and their position, as the wind may be ; and, lastly, the disposition of the lading. This is an age of experiments, and I think a set accurately made and combined would be of great use. I am persuaded, therefore, that ere long some ingenious philosopher will undertake it, to whom I wish success. We were several times chased in our passage, but outsailed everything, and in thirty days had sound- ings. We had a good observation, and the captain judged himself so near our port, Falmouth, that, if Vve made a good run in the night, we might be off the BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 215 mouth of that harbor in the morning, and by running in the night might escape the notice of the enemy's privateers, who often cruised near the entrance of the channel. Accordingly, all the sail was set that we could possibly make, and the wind being very fresh and fair, we went right before it, and made great way. The captain, after his observation, shaped his course, as he thought, so as to pass wide of the Scilly Isles ; but it seems there is sometimes a strong indraught set- ting uj) St. George's Channel, which deceives seamen and caused the loss of Sir Cloudesley Shovel's squad- ron. This indraught was probably the cause of what happened to us. We had a watchman placed in the bow, to whom they often called, " Look loell out before there^^^ and he as often answered, "^y, ay ; " but perhaps had his eyes shut, and was half asleep at the time, they some- times answering, as is said, mechanically ; for he did not see a light just before us, which had been hid by. the studding-sails from the man at the helm, and from the rest of the watch, but by an accidental yaw of the ship was discovered, and occasioned a great alarm, we being very near it, the light appearing to me as big as a cart-wheel. It was midnight, and our captain fast asleep; but Captain Kennedy, jumping upon deck, and seeing the danger, ordered the ship to wear round, all sails standing ; an operation dangerous to the masts, but it carried us clear, and we escaped shipwreck, for we were running right upon the rocks on which the lighthouse was erected. This deliver- ance impressed me strongly with the utility of light- houses, and made me resolve to encourage the build- ing more of them in America, if I should live to re- turn there. 216 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF In the morning it was found by the soundings, etc., that we were near our port, but a thick fog hid the land from our sight. About nine o'clock the fog began to rise, and seemed to be lifted up from the water like the curtain at a play-house, discovering underneath, the town of Falmouth, the vessels in its harbor, and the fields that surrounded it. This was a most pleasing spectacle to those who had been so long without any other prospects than the uniform view of a vacant ocean, and it gave us the more pleas- ure as we were now free from the anxieties which the state of war occasioned. I set out immediately, with my son, for London, and we only stopped a little by the way to view Stonehenge on Salisbury Plain, and Lord Pembroke's house and gardens, with his very curious antiquities at Wilton. We arrived in London the 27tli of July, 1757o BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, 217 XV. THE AFFAIR WITH THE PROPRIETARIES. As soon as I was settled in a lodging Mr. Charles had provided for me, I went to visit Dr. Fothergill, to whom I was strongly recommended, and whose counsel respecting my proceedings I was advised to obtain. He was against an immediate complaint to govern- ment, and thought the proprietaries should first be personally applied to, who might possibly be induced by the interposition and persuasion of some private friends, to accommodate matters amicably. I then waited on my old friend and correspondent, Mr. Peter Collinson, who told me that John Hanbury, the great Virginia merchant, had requested to be informed when I should arrive, that he might carry me to Lord Gran- ville's, who was then President of the Council and wished to see me as soon as possible. I agreed to go with him the next morning. Accordingly Mr. Han- bury called for me and took me in his carriage to that nobleman's, who received me with great civility ; and after some questions respecting the present state of affairs in America and discourse thereupon, he said to me : " You Americans have wrong ideas of the nature of your constitution ; you contend that the king's instructions to his governors are not laws, and think yourselves at liberty to regard or disregard them at your own discretion. But those instructions are not like the pocket instructions given to a minister 218 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF going abroad, for regulating his conduct in some trifling point of ceremony. They are first drawn up by judges learned in the laws; they are then con- sidered, debated, and perhaps amended in Council, after which they are signed by the king. They are then, so far as they relate to you, the laio of the land, for the king is the Legislator of the Colonies." I told his lordship this was new doctrine to me. I had always understood from our charters that our laws were to be made by our Assemblies, to be presented indeed to the king for his royal assent, but that being once given the king could not repeal or alter them. And as the Assemblies could not make permanent laws without his assent, so neither could he make a law for them without theirs. He assured me I was totally mistaken. I did not think so, however, and his lordship's conversation having a little alarmed me as to what might be the sentiments of the court concern- ing us, I wrote it down as soon as I returned to my lodgings. I recollected that . about twenty years be- fore, a clause in a bill brought into Parliament by the ministry had proposed to make the king's instructions laws in the colonies, but the clause was thrown out by the Commons, for which we adored them as our friends and friends of liberty, till by their conduct towards us in 1765 it seemed that, they had refused that point of sovereignty to the king only that they might reserve it for themselves. After some days. Dr. Fothergill having spoken to the proprietaries, they agreed to a meeting with me at Mr. T. Penn's house in Spring Garden. The con- versation at first consisted of mutual declarations of disposition to reasonable accommodations, but I sup- pose each party had its own ideas of what should be BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 219 meant by reasonable. We then went into considera- tion of our several points of complaint, which I enu- merated. The proprietaries justified their conduct as well as they could, and I the Assembly's. We now appeared very wide, and so far from each other in our opinions as to discourage all hope of agreement. How- ever, it was concluded that I should give them the heads of our complaints in writing, and they promised then to consider them. I did so soon after, but they put the paper into the hands of their solicitor, Ferdi- nand John Paris, who managed for them all their law business in their great suit with the neighboring pro- prietary of Maryland, Lord Baltimore, which had subsisted seventy years, and wrote for them all their papers and messages in their dispute with the Assem- bly. He was a proud, angry man, and as I had occa- sionally in the answers of the Assembly treated his papers with some severity, they being really weak in point of argument and haughty in expression, he had conceived a mortal enmity to me, which discovering itself whenever we met, I declined the proprietary's proposal that he and I should discuss the heads of complaint between our two selves and refused treating with any one but them. They then by his advice put the paper into the hands of the Attorney and Solicitor- General for their opinion and counsel upon it, where it lay unanswered a year wanting eight days, during which time I made frequent demands of an answer from the proprietaries, but without obtaining any other than that they had not yet received the opinion of the Attorney and Solicitor-General. What it was when they did receive it I never learnt, for they did not communicate it to me, but sent a long message to the Assembly drawn and signed by Paris, reciting my 220 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF paper, complaining of its want of formality, as a rude- ness on my part, and giving a flimsy justification of their conduct, adding thrt they should be willing to accommodate matters if the Assembly would send out some person of candor to treat with them for that purpose, intimating thereby that I was not such. The want of formality or rudeness was, probably, my not having addressed the paper to them with their assumed titles of True and Absolute Proprietaries of the Province of Pennsylvania, which I omitted as not thinking it necessary in a paper, the intention of which was only to reduce to a certainty by writing, what in conversation I had delivered viva voce} But during this delay, the Assembly having pre- vailed with Governor Denny to pass an act taxing the proprietary estate in common with the estates of the people, which was the grand point in dispute, they omitted answering the message. When this act however came over, the proprietaries, counselled by Paris, determined to oppose its receiv- ing the royal assent. Accordingly they petitioned the king in Council, and a hearing was appointed in which two lawyers were employed by them against the act, and two by me in support of it. They alleged that the act was intended to load the proprietary estate in order to spare those of the people, and that if it were suffered to continue in force, and the proprieta- ries, who were in odium with the people, left to their mercy in proportioning the taxes, they would inevita^ bly be ruined. We replied that the act had no such intention, and would have no such effect. That the assessors were honest and discreet men under an oath to assess fairly and equitably, and that any advantage ^ That is, by word of mouth. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 221 each of them might expect in lessening his own tax by augmenting that of the proprietaries was too trifling to induce them to perjure themselves. This is the purport of what I remember as urged by both sides, except that we insisted strongly on the mischievous consequences that must attend a repeal, for that the money, c£100,000, being printed ^ and given to the king's use, expended in his service, and now spread among the people, the repeal would strike it dead in their hands to the ruin of many, and the total discour- agement of future grants, and the selfishness of the proprietors in soliciting such a general catastrophe, merely from a groundless fear of their estate being taxed too highly, was insisted on in the strongest terms. On this. Lord Mansfield, one of the counsel, rose, and beckoning me took me into the clerk's chamber, while the lawyers were pleading, and asked me if I was really of opinion that no injury would be done the proprietary estate in the execution of the act. I said, certainly. " Then," says he, " you can have little objection to enter into an engagement to assure that point." I answered, " None at all." He then called in Paris, and after some discourse, his lordship's proposition was accepted on both sides ; a paper to the purpose was drawn up by the Clerk of the Council, which I signed with Mr. Charles, who was also an Agent of the Province for their ordinary affairs, when Lord Mansfield returned to the Council Chamber, where finally the law was allowed to pass. Some changes were however recommended, and we also en- gaged they should be made by a subsequent law, but the Assembly did not think them necessary ; for one year's tax having been levied by the act before the ^ The himclred thousand pounds was paper money, not coin. 222 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF FRANKLIN. order o£ Council arrived, they appointed a committee to examine the proceedings of the assessors, and on this committee they put several particular friends of the proprietaries. After a full enquiry, they unani- mously signed a report that they found the tax had been assessed with perfect equity. The Assembly looked into my entering into the first part of the engagement as an essential service to the Province, since it secured the credit of the paper money then spread over all the country. They gave me their thanks in form when I returned. But the proprietaries were enraged at Governor Denny for having passed the act, and turned him out with threats of suino- him for breach of instructions which he had given bond to observe. He, however, having done it at the instance of the General, and for His Majesty's service, and having some powerful interest at court, despised the threats and they were never put in exe- cution. A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. FROM THE POINT AT WHICH HIS AUTOBIOGRAPHY ENDS, CHIEFLY DRAWN FROM HIS LETTERS. Franklin went to England in 1757 as agent for the colony of Pennsylvania, for the purpose of settling a controversy which the colony had with the Penn fam- ily. He was detained on this business three years, but was able to carry his main point, which was the right of the Assembly to tax the proprietary estates. He went without his wife and daughter, but was attended by his son William. At the end of the three years he did not return immediately to America. His public business had made him acquainted with many mem- bers of the government, and he was very desirous of securing the best terms for America in the treaty which was pending between England and France. The fall of Quebec had put an end to the French power in Canada, but Franklin thought, and thought truly, that England did not understand how important Canada was to her. By his familiarity with Ameri- can affairs he was able to give advice to the gov- ernment in this matter, and at the same time could inform English people generally about his native coun- try through the public journals. He found there was dense ignorance about America, and saw clearly that it was of the utmost importance that Englishmen 224 A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. should understand Americans if there was to be good feeling between the two parts of the British empire. He was greatly interested also in his philosophical ex- periments. While he was in London he made his home with Mrs. Margaret Stevenson in Craven Street, Strand, and became greatly attached to her and to her daugh- ter Mary, then a girl of eighteen, whom he hoped his son William would marry. These ladies were very civil to him ; and when he wrote home to his wife he frequently showed her how much they did to make his stay agreeable. Almost everything of the better sort in the way of clothing and household stuff which the Americans of that day used came from England, and Franklin pleased himself and his wife by sending goods to her from time to time. "■I send you," he writes, "by Captain Budden a large case and a small box. In the large case is an- other small box, containing some English china, viz., melons and leaves for a dessert of fruit and cream, or the like ; a bowl remarkable for the neatness of the figures, made at Bow, near this city ; some coffee-cups of the same ; a Worcester bowl, ordinary. To show the difference of workmanship, there is something from all the china works in England ; and one old true china basin mended, of an odd color. The same box contains four silver salt-ladles, newest but ugliest fash- ion ; a little instrument to core apples ; another to make little turnips out of great ones ; six coarse diaper breakfast-cloths ; they are to spread on the tea-table, for nobody breakfasts here on the naked table, but on the cloth they set a large tea-board with the cups. ... In the great case, besides the little box, is contained some carpeting for a best-room floor. There A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. 225 is enough for one large or two small ones ; it is to be sewed together, the edges being first felled down, and care taken to make the figures meet exactly ; there is bordering for the same. This was my fancy. Also two large, fine Flanders bed-ticks, and two pair of large superfine blankets, two fine damask table-cloths and napkins, and forty-three ells of Ghentish sheeting, Holland. These you ordered. There are also fifty-six yards of cotton printed curiously from copper plates, a new invention, to make bed and window curtains ; and seven yards of chair-bottoms, printed in the same way, very neat. These were my fancy ; but Mrs. Ste- venson tells me I did wrong not to buy both of the same color. Also seven yards of printed cotton, blue ground, to make you a gown. I bought it by candle- light, and liked it then, but not so well afterwards. If you do not fancy it, send it as a present from me to sister Jenny. There is a better gown for you of flow- ered tissue, sixteen yards, of Mrs. Stevenson's fancy, cost nine guineas ; and I think it a great beauty. There was no more of the sort, or you should have had enough for a negligee or suit. " There are also snuffers, a snuff -stand, and extin- guisher, of steel, which I send for the beauty of the work. The extinguisher is for spermaceti candles only, and is of a new contrivance, to preserve the snuff upon the candle. There is some music Billy bought for his sister, and some pamphlets for the Speaker and for Susy Wright. A mahogany and a little shagreen box, with microscopes, and other opti- cal instruments loose, are for Mr. Alison, if he likes them ; if not, put them in my room till I return. I send the invoice of them, and I wrote to him formerly the reason of my exceeding his orders. There are 226 A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. also two sets of books, a present from me to Sally, — The World, and The Connoisseur. My love to her. " I forgot to mention another of my fancyings, viz., a pair of silk blankets, very fine. They are of a new kind, were just taken in a French prize, and such were never seen in England before. They are called blank ets, but I think they will be very neat to cover a sum- mer bed, instead of a quilt or counterpane. I had no choice, so you will excuse the soil on some of the folds ; your neighbor Foster can get it off. I also for- got, among the china, to mention a large, fine jug for beer, to stand in the cooler. I fell in love with it at first sight ; for I thought it looked like a fat, jolly dame, clean and tidy, with a neat blue and white calico gown on, good-natured and lovely, and put me in mind of — somebody. It has the coffee-cups in it, packed in best crystal salt, of a peculiar nice flavor, for the table, not to be powdered. " I hope Sally applies herself closely to her French and music, and that I shall find she has made great proficiency. The harpsichord I was about, and which was to have cost me forty guineas, Mr. Stanley advises me not to buy ; and we are looking out for another, one that has been some time in use, and is a tried good one, there being not so much dependence on a new one, though made by the best hands. Sally's last letter to her brother is the best wrote that of late I have seen of hers. I only wish she was a little more careful of her spelling. I hope she continues to love going to church, and would have her read over and over again the Whole Duty of 3Ia?i, and the Lady's Library. " Look at the figures on the china bowl and coffee* cups with your spectacles on ; they will bear exam* ining. A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. 22T " I have made your compliments to Mrs. Stevenson. She is indeed very obliging, takes great care of my health, and is very diligent when I am any way indis- posed ; but yet I have a thousand times wished you with me, and my little Sally with her ready hands and feet to do, and go, and come, and get what I wanted." Franklin's experiments in electricity and his several inventions had made him well known in England, and his attention to public business brought him into connection with many of the members of govern- ment, as well as with other persons of consequence. He made friends with every one, and was interested in everything. He went to Cambridge, and was received by the principal people at the university there with great civility. He made a trip to Northamptonshire and looked up the graves of his ancestors and gathered stories about them. His father was born at Ecton, as he mentions in the Autobiography, and his father's brother, Thomas Franklin, had lived and died in Ec- ton. Thomas Franklin's daughter was living there, and entertained her cousin with stories about her father. " He was ' a conveyancer,' " Franklin writes to his wife, " something of a lawyer, clerk of the county courts, and clerk to the archdeacon in his visitations ; a very leading man in all county affairs, and much employed in jxiblic business. He set on foot a sub- scription for erecting chimes in their steeple, and com- pleted it, and we heard them play. He found out an easy method of saving their village meadows from being drowned, as they used to be sometimes by the river, which method is still in being ; but, when first proposed, nobody could conceive how it could be ; * but however,' they said, ' if Franklin says he knows 228 A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. how to do it, it will be done.' His advice and opinion were sought for on all occasions, by all sorts of peo- ple, and he was looked upon, she said, by some, as something of a conjurer. He died just four years be- fore I was born, on the same day of the same month." Here was a village Franklin of much the same charac= ter as his more famous nephew, who had Philadelphia instead of Ecton to experiment in. The America of Franklin's time was scarcely more than a strip of sea-coast from Canada to Florida ; little was known of the country that lay behind the AUeghanies, and most of the business was in the way of commerce with England. Franklin had had excel- lent opportunities for knowing his country. He had travelled through it more than many ; he had been postmaster-general, and he had had to do with people in many different ways. His stay in England had taught him not only how little English people really knew about America, but how rapidly America was growing in comparison with England. When he travelled through the English counties and compared the farmers, living as their ancestors had lived for hundreds of years, scarcely stirring out of their little village, with the farmers of America, who needed to be on the alert all the while and to use their wits in a new country among hostile savages, he was struck by the importance of the American colonies. He was proud of belonging to the British empire, and he wanted to see all America a part of that empire. The French had just been defeated in Canada, but the terms of peace had not yet been arranged between England and France; and Franklin found that some of the English did not seem to understand the value of their conquest in America. He wrote to an emi* nent man : A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. 229 " No one can more sincerely rejoice than I do, on the reduction of Canada ; and this is not merely as 1 am a colonist, but as I am a Briton. I have long been of opinion that the foundations of the future gran- deur and stability of the British enijnre lie in Amer- ica ; and though, like other foundations, they are low and little now, they are, nevertheless, broad and strong enough to support the greatest political structure that human wisdom ever yet erected. I am, therefore, by no means for restoring Canada. If we keep it, all the country from the St. Lawrence to the Mississippi will in another century be filled with British people. Brit- ain itself will become vastly more populous, by the immense increase of its commerce ; the Atlantic sea will be covered with your trading ships ; and your naval power, thence continually increasing, will extend your influence round the whole globe, and awe the world! If the French remain in Canada, they will continually harass our colonies by the Indians, and impede, if not prevent, their growth : your progress to greatness will at best be slow, and give room for many accidents that may forever prevent it. But I refrain, for I see you begin to think my notions extravagant, and look upon them as the ravings of a mad prophet." It is one mark of a great man that he can pass ea= sily from important to trifling matters, and Franklin seemed as much himself when he was buying china bowls for his wife as when he was studying how to enlarge the boundaries of the British emj)ire. So he never was in a hurry and had abundant leisure to write to his friends and to look after the education of Mary Stevenson. He advised her what books to read and how to read them. " I send my good girl the books I mentioned to her 230 A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. last night. I beg her to accept of them as a small mark of my esteem and friendship. They are written in the familiar, easy manner for which the French are so remarkable, and afford a good deal of philo- sophic and practical knowledge, unembarrassed with the dry mathematics used by more exact reasoners, but which are apt to discourage young beginners. " I would advise you to read with a pen in your hand, and enter in a little book short hints of what you find that is curious, or that may be useful ; for this will be the best method of imprinting such partic- ulars in your memory, where they will be ready, either for practice on some future occasion, if they are mat- ters of utility, or at least to adorn and improve your conversation, if they are rather points of curiosity. " And as many of the terms of science are such, as you cannot have met with in your common reading, and may therefore be unacquainted with, I think it would be well for you to have a good dictionary at hand, to consult immediately when you meet with a word you do not comprehend the precise meaning of. This may at first seem troublesome and interrupting •, but it is a trouble that will daily diminish, as you will daily find less and less occasion for your dictionary, as you become more and more acquainted with the terms ; and in the mean time you will read with more satisfaction, because with more understanding. " When any point occurs in which you would be glad to have further information than your book aifords you, I beg you would not in the least appre- hend that I should think it a trouble to receive and answer your questions. It will be a pleasure, and no trouble. For, though I may not be able, out of my own little stock of knowledge, to afford you what you A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. 231 require, I can easily direct you to the books where it may most readily be found." Near the end of August, 1762, Franklin returned to America after an absence from his country of five years. He remained there about two years and then went back to England to serve the colony of Pennsyl- vania again as their agent. Not long after his return he wrote to one of his Eno-lish friends the foUowins: letter, which gives an account of his two years in America. " You require my history from the time I set sail for America. I left England about the end of August, 1762, in company with ten sail of merchant-ships, un- der a convoy of a man-of-war. We had a pleasant pas- sage to Madeira, where we were kindly received and entertained, our nation being then in high honor with the Portuguese, on account of the protection we were then affording them against the united invasions of France and Spain, It is a fertile island, and the different heights and situations among its mountains afford such temperaments of air that all the fruits of northern and southern countries are produced there, — corn, grapes, apples, peaches, oranges, lemons, plan- tains, bananas, etc. Here we furnished ourselves with fresh provisions, and refreshments of all kinds ; and, after a few days, proceeded on our voyage,' running southward until we got into the trade-winds, and then with them westward, till we drew near the coast of America. The weather was so favorable that there were few days in which we could not visit from ship to ship, dining with each other, and on board of the man-of-war ; which made the time pass agreeably, much more so than when one goes in a single ship ; for this was like travelling in a moving village, with all one's neighbors about one. 232 A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. " On the 1st of November I arrived safe and well at my own home, after an absence of near six years, found my wife and daughter well, the latter grown quite a woman, with many amiable accomplishments acquired in my absence, and my friends as hearty and affectionate as ever, with whom my house was filled for many days, to congratulate me on my returUo I had been chosen yearly during my absence to repre- sent the city of Philadelphia in our Provincial Assem- bly ; and, on my appearance in the House, they voted me three thousand pounds sterling for my services in England, and their thanks, delivered by the Speaker. In February following, my son arrived with my new daughter ; for, with my consent and approbation, he married, soon after I left England, a very agreeable West India lady, with whom he is very happy. I ac- comiDanied him to' his government, where he met with the kindest reception from the people of all ranks, and has lived with them ever since in the greatest har- mony. A river only parts that province and ours, and his residence is within seventeen miles of me, so that we frequently see each other.^ " In the spring of 1763, I set out on a tour through all the northern colonies to inspect and regulate the post-offices in the several provinces. In this jour- ney I spent the summer, travelled about sixteen hundred miles, and did not get home till the begin- ning of November. The Assembly sitting through the following winter, and warm disputes arising be- tween them and the governor, I became wholly en= 1 William Franklin liad been made governor of New Jersey. The English government hoped by this means to secure the loyalty of the father, but only made sure of the son, who was a Tory in the coming revolution. A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. 233 gaged in public affairs; for, besides my duty as an Assemblyman, I had another trust to execute, that of being one of the commissioners appointed by law to dispose of the public money appropriated to the rais- ing and paying an army to act against the Indians, and defend the frontiers. And then, in December, we had two insurrections of the back inhabitants of our province, by whom twenty poor Indians were mur- dered, that had, from the first settlement of the prov- ince, lived among us, under the protection of our government. This gave me a good deal of employ- ment ; for, as the rioters threatened further mischief, and their actions seemed io be approved by an ever- acting party, I wrote a pamphlet entitled A JYarra- tive, etc} (which I think I sent to you), to strengthen the hands of our weak government, by rendering the proceedings of the rioters unpopular and odious. This had a good effect ; and afterwards, when a great body of them, with arms, marched toward the capital, in de- fiance of the government, with an avowed resolution to put to death one hundred and forty Indian con- verts then under its protection, I formed an associa- tion, at the governor's request, for his and their de- fence, we having no militia. Near one thousand of the citizens accordingly took arms. Governor Penn made my house for some time his headquarters, and did everything by my advice ; so that for about forty- eight hours I was a very great man, as I had been once some years before, in a time of public danger.^ " But the fighting face we put on, and the reason- ings we used with the insurgents (for I went, at the request of the governor and council, with three others, 1 A Narrative of the Late Massacres. 2 That is, when he rendered great assistance to General Braddock. 234 A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. to meet and discourse with them), having turned them back and restored quiet to the city, I became a less Qian than ever : for I had, by this transaction, made myself many enemies among the populace ; and the governor (with whose family our public disputes hnd. long placed me in an unfriendly light, and the services I had lately rendered him not being of the kind that make a man acceptable), thinking it a favorable op- portunity, joined the whole weight of the proprietary interest to get me out of the Assembly, which was accordingly effected at the last election, by a major- ity of about twenty-five in four thousand voters. " The House, however, when they met in October, approved of the resolutions taken, while I was Speaker, of petitioning the crown for a change of government, and requested me to return to England, to prosecute that petition ; which service I accordingly undertook, and embarked at the beginning of November last, being accompanied to the ship, sixteen miles, by a cavalcade of three hundred of my friends, who filled our sails with their good wishes, and I arrived in thirty days at London. Here I have been ever since, engaged in that and other public affairs relating to America which are like to continue some time longer upon my hands ; but I promise you, that when I am quit of these, I will enofao'e in no other ; and that, as soon as I have recovered the ease and leisure I hope for, the task you require of me, of finishing my A^^t of Virtue^ shall be performed." Franklin's ease and leisure were long in coming. The difficulties between England and her American colonies began from this time to grow more serious. No sooner had the colonies been rid of their fear of the French than they saw that the mother country meant A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. 235 to treat them as if they always were to be children. They were not to be allowed to manufacture anything for themselves, but must buy everything they needed of England. England, moreover, had incurred a heavy debt by her war with France, and meant, if possible, to make America pay a good share of the debt. But for years there had been a standing quarrel between the colonies and the governors whom the king of England appointed over them. The people in the colonies were willing to support the representatives of the crown, but they stoutly refused to be taxed by the English parliament. They would lay their own taxes in their own assemblies, but they denied that Parliament had the right to lay these taxes. Franklin busied himself by letters to the newspapers, and by conference with important people, with the task of showing English- men how Americans felt and reasoned. He watched affairs with great closeness and saw that the colonies were growing stronger and more resolute. He was proud of the persistence with which they had stood up for their rights. When the Stamp Act was repealed, he wrote to his wife : " As the Stamp Act is at length repealed, I am willing you should have a new gown, which you may suppose I did not send sooner, as I knew you would not like to be finer than your neighbors, unless in a gown of your own spinning. Had the trade between the two countries totally ceased, it was a comfort to me to recollect that I had once been clothed from head to foot in woollen and linen of my wife's manufac- ture, that I never was prouder of any dress in my life, and that she and her daughter might do it again if it was necessary. I told the Parliament that it was my opinion, before the old clothes of the Americans were 236 A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. worn out they might have new ones of their own mak- ing. I have sent you a fine piece of Pompadour satin, fourteen yards, cost eleven shillings a yard, a silk negligee and a petticoat of brocaded lutestring for my dear Sally, with two dozen gloves, four bottles of lav- ender water, and two little reels. The reels are to screw on the edge of the table, when she would wind silk or thread. The skein is to be put over them, and winds better than if held in two hands. ''There is also a gimcrack corkscrew, which you must get some brother gimcrack to show you the use of. In the chest is a parcel of books for my friend Mr. Coleman, and another for Cousin Colbert. Pray did he receive those I sent him before ? I send you also a box with three fine cheeses. Perhaps a bit of them may be left when I come home. Mrs. Stevenson has been very diligent and serviceable in getting those things together for you, and presents her best respects, as does her daughter, to both you and Sally. There are two boxes included in your bill of lading for Billy." For ten years Franklin remained in England, where he was agent, not only for Pennsylvania, but for Massa- chusetts, New Jersey and Georgia. Everybody looked to him for advice ; and when committees of Parliament wished to make inquiry about America they were pretty sure to send for Dr. Franldin, as he was gen- erally called. Indeed, the English government, seeing how important a man he was, flattered him and tried to make him support them in the dispute with Amer- ica, which was growing more serious every year. They had made his son governor of New Jersey, as we have seen, and offered large inducements to Franklin, but he remained steadfast to the colonies ; and at last A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. 237 the English government, unable to cajole him, turned about, took his office of postmaster-general from him, and showed plainly that they regarded him as an enemy. It was useless for Franklin to remain longer in Eng= land, and affairs had come to such a pass that he was needed in America. He had tried his best to bring about a reconciliation between England and her colo- nies, but since all was in vain, he was ready to cast in his lot with his country. Accordingly he returned to America in May, 1775. He reached Philadelphia one evening, and the very next morning was unanimously chosen by the Assembly of Pennsylvania a delegate to the Continental Congress, which was then sitting in the city. How earnestly he threw himself into the Ameri- can cause may be seen by a letter which he wrote, July 5, 1775, to an Englishman, a printer, who had been one of his oldest and best friends in London : — " Mr. Strahan : You are a member of Parlia- ment, and one of that majority which has doomed my country to destruction. You have begun to burn our towns and murder our people. Look upon your hands ; they are stained with the blood of your relations! You and I were long friends ; you are now my enemy, and I am yours." To others he wrote in a different strain. Many pa- triots were uncertain how the contest would end, and Dr. Franklin, no doubt, had many hours of trouble; but he had a cheerfulness and a hopeful way of writ- ing and speaking which went very far toward keeping his countrymen in good spirits. " Tell our dear, good friend. Dr. Price, who some- times has his doubts and despondencies about our firm- ness," he wrote to an English acquaintance, "that 238 A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. America is determined and unanimous, a very few Tories and placemen excepted, who will probably soon export themselves. Britain, at the expense of three millions, has killed one hundred and fifty Yankees this campaign, which is twenty thousand pounds a head; and at Bunker's Hill she gained a mile of ground, half of which she lost again by our taking post on Ploughed Hill. During the same time sixty thousand children have been born in America. From these data his mathematical head will easily calculate the time and expense necessary to kill us all, and con- quer our whole territory." Congress, in 1776, appointed Dr. Franklin one of three commissioners to Canada, whither they went in hopes of prevailing on that country so recently hostile to Great Britain, to join the colonies in their revolt ; but the errand was of no avail, for the settlements in Canada were made up for the most part of poor and ignorant French peasants, who had no thought of any- thing beyond the farms on which they lived, and had not been trained, as the English colonists had been, in self-government. Franklin returned to Philadel- phia in time to take part in the discussions which led to the Declaration of Independence. Some of the members of Congress were disposed to criticise the document, and to propose changes in the form. Thomas Jefferson, the chief author of the Dec= laration, was very uneasy under these amendments, and Franklin, who was sitting by him, noticed his vex- ation, and said to him : "I have made it a rule, whenever in my power, to avoid becoming the draftsman of papers to be reviewed by a public body. I took my lesson from an incident which I will relate to you. When I was a journey A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. 239 man printer, one of my companions, an apprenticed hatter, having served out his time, was about to open shop for himself. His first concern was to have a handsome sign-board, with a proper inscription. He composed it in these words : John Thompson^ Hatter^^ makes and sells hats for ready money., with a figure of a hat subjoined. But he thought he would submit it to his friends for their amendments. The first he showed it to thought the word hatter tautologous, be- cause followed by the words makes hats, which showed he was a hatter. It was struck out. The next observed that the word makes might as well be omitted, be- cause his customers would not care who made the hats ; if good and to their mind they would buy, by whomsoever made. He struck it out. A third said he thought the words /or ready money were useless, as it was not the custom of the place to sell on credit. Every one who purchased expected to pay. They were parted with, and the inscription now stood, John Thompson sells hats. ' Sells hats ? ' says his next friend ; ' why, nobody will expect you to give them away. What, then, is the use of that word ? ' It was stricken out, and hats followed, the rather as there was one painted on the board. So his inscription was ultimately reduced to John Thompson., with the figure of a hat subjoined." When war had fairly begun, and the colonies, by their Declaration of Independence, had finally sepa= rated from England, it became very important to make friends with other European powers. The Declaration was a protest to the world against the injustice of England, and an argument why the states should be a nation governing itself. But if a nation, then it must take its place among other nations, and send ambas- 240 A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. sadors to tliera. Besides, America had so long been dependent on England, and England had so steadily discouraged and forbidden all manufactures in her col- onies, that the country stood in need of many things, as guns and means of carrying on the war ; there was little money in the land, for the merchants could no longer sell to their customers in England. So Con- gress set about sending men to France and Spain and Holland in order that the United States might make friends with those countries, and receive aid and bor- row money for carrying on the war. It was especially important to send a representative to France, for France was an enemy to England and could be of the greatest service to the new nation. It was very clear who was the best man to send : Dr. Franklin was chosen unanimously. He is said to have turned to a friend, when the result was announced, saying : "I am old and good for nothing ; but as the store-keepers say of their remnants of cloth, ' I am but a fag end, you may have me for what you please.' " Franklin was seventy years old when he went to France near the end of the year 1776, and there he re- mained until the war was over and peace was signed. He was now a very famous man, and as many of the French people were enthusiastic friends of America, they took every opportunity of honoring Franklin. The French men of science welcomed him among them, and wherever he went he was received with the greatest distinction. He established himself at Passy, a suburb of Paris, and not only minded American affairs, but made philosophical experiments and kept up a lively correspondence with his old friends in Eng- land and America. " You are too early, hussy ^^"^ he wrote good-naturedly A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE, 241 to one of his English correspondents, " as well as too saucy, in calling me rebel ; you should wait for the event which will determine whether it is a rebellion or only a 7'evolution. ... I know you wish you could see me ; but, as you cannot, I will describe myself to you. Figure me in your mind as jolly as formerly r, and as strong and hearty, only a few years older ; very plainly dressed, wearing my thin, gray, straight hair, that peeps out under my only coiffure,, a fine fur cap which comes down my forehead almost to my spectacles. Think how this must appear among the powdered heads of Paris ! I wish every lady and gentleman in France would only be so obliging as to follow my fashion, comb their own heads as I do mine, dismiss their /r/- seurs,, and pay me half the money they paid to them.'* It was a hard task that Franklin had to perform in France. His countrymen came to him when they were in trouble. He had to watch the French gov- ernment tp see that they did not use the Americans for their own advantage. He had to borrow money for his government, and at last, when the war was over, he, with the other commissioners, needed to exercise the greatest wisdom to secure for the United States favora- ble terms. He felt his growing age. His wife had died several years before, and he had lost much of his property, but he never seemed to lose the cheerful spirit which he carried through life. He wrote to his old friend Mary Stevenson, now Mrs. Hewson : " At length we are at peace. God be praised, and long, very long, may it continue. All wars are follies, very expensive, and very mischievous ones. When will mankind be convinced of this, and agree to settle their differences by arbitration ? Were they to do it, even by the cast of a die, it would be better than by 242 A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. fighting and destroying each other. ... In looking forward, twenty-five years seem a long period, but, in looking back, how short ! Could you imagine that it is now full a quarter of a century since we were first acquainted? It was in 1757. During the greatest part of the time I lived in the same house with my dear deceased friend, your mother ; of course you and I conversed with each other much and often. It is to all our honors that in all that time we never had among us the smallest misunderstanding. Our friend- ship has been all clear sunshine, without the least cloud in its hemisphere. Let me conclude by saying to you, what I have had too frequent occasions to say to my other remaining old friends : ' The fewer we be- come, the more let us love one another.' " It was some time before the treaty of peace was finally ratified and Franldin remained in France. He wished to go home. He was old and feeble and tired of cares, but he was obliged to remain until Congress should recall him. Meanwhile he watched events in America from a distance, and made shrewd comments on affairs there. In one of his letters to his daughter he makes this criticism on the American eagle : " For my own part, I wish the bald eagle had not been chosen as the representative of our country ; he is a bird of bad moral character ; he does not get his living honestly ; you may have seen him perched on some dead tree, where, too lazy to fish for himself, he watches the labor of the fishing-hawk ; and when that diligent bird has at length taken a fish, and is bear- ing it to his nest for the support of his mate and young ones, the bald eagle pursues him, and takes it from him. With all this injustice he is never in good case ; but, like those among men who live by sharp A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. 243 ing and robbing, he is generally poor, and often very lousy. Besides he is a rank coward ; the little king- bird, not bigger than a sparrow, attacks him boldly and drives him out of the district. He is, therefore, by no means a proper emblem for the brave and honest Cincinnati ^ of America, who have driven all the king-birds from our country." At last he was able to return to America, and in the fall of 1785 he was again in Philadelphia. His countrymen received him with enthusiasm, and he was at once made president of the State of Pennsylvania, as the governor was then called. But he had had enough of public life, and he seemed to like better to spend his remaining years in the quiet occupations of an old man. He lived to see the country adopt the Constitution under wdiich it has grown strong, and to welcome George Washington to the office of first President. " My malady," he writes to the President, " renders my sitting up to write rather painful to me; but I cannot let my son-in-law, Mr. Bache, part for New York without congratulating you by him on the recov- ery of your health, so precious to us all, and on the growing strength of our new government under your administration. For my own personal ease, I should have died two years ago ; but though those years have been spent in excruciating pain, I am pleased that I have lived them, since they have brought me to see our present situation. I am now finishing my eighty- fourth year, and probably with it my career in this life ; but whatever state of existence I am placed in hereafter, if I retain any memory of what has passed ^ The order of the Cincinnati was then forming, and Franklin crit- icised it as unrepublican. 244 A SKETCH OF FRANKLIN'S LIFE. here, I shall with it retain the esteem, respect, and affection with which I have long been, my dear friend, yours most sincerely." Franklin died April 17, 1790, aged eighty-four years and three months. In 1728, when he was twenty-three years of age, and a printer, he composed the following epitaph, which was not, however, placed on his monument : The Body OF BENJAMIN FRANKLIN Printer (Like the cover of an old book Its contents torn out And stript of its lettering and gilding) Lies here, food for worms. But the work shall not be lost For it will [as he believed] appear once more In a new and more elegant edition Revised and corrected hy The Author. a APPENDIX. The following outline of an autobiograjjhy was prepared by Franklin, apparently before beginning the work. The first paragraph covers the printed portion. The second intimates what topics the author would have taken up had he been able to finish his work. It would be an interesting task for a student to pick out from his letters what Franklin did say under the several heads in the second, paragraph. My writing. Mrs. Dogood's letters. Differences arise be- tween my Brother and me (his temper and mine) ; their cause in general. His Newspaper. The Prosecution he suffered. My Examination. Vote of Assembly. His manner of evading it. Whereby I became free. My attempt to get employ with other Printers. He prevents me. Our frequent pleadings be- fore our Father. The final Breach. My Inducements to quit Boston. Manner of coming to a Resolution. My leaving him and going to New York (return to eating flesh) ; thence to Pennsylvania. The journey, and its events on the Bay at Am- boy. The road. Meet with Dr. Brown. His character. His great work. At Burlington. The Good Woman. On the River. My Arrival at Philadelphia. First Meal and first Sleep. Money left. Employment. Lodging. First acquain- tance with my afterward Wife. With J. Ralph. With Keimer. Their characters. Osborne. Watson, The Governor takes notice of me. The Occasion and Manner. His character. Offers to set me up. My return to Boston. Voyage and acci- dents. Reception. My Father dislikes the proposal. I return to New York and Philadelphia. Governor Burnet. J. Collins. The money for Vernon. The Governor's Deceit. Collins not finding employment goes to Barbados much in my Debt. Ralph and I go to England. Disappointment of Governor's Letters. Colonel French his Friend. Cornwallis's Letters. Cabbin. Denham. Hamilton. Arrival in England. Get 246 APPENDIX. employment. Ralph not. He is an expense to me. Adventures in England. Write a Pamphlet and print 100. Schemes. Lyons. Dr. Pemberton. My diligence, and yet poor through Ralph. My Landlady. Her character. Wygate. Wilkes. Gibber. Plays. Books I borrowed. Preachers I heard. Red- mayne. At Watts's. Temperance. Ghost. Conduct and Influence among the Men. Persuaded by Mr. Denham to re- turn with him to Philadelphia and be his clerk. Our voyage and arrival. My resolutions in Writing. My Sickness. His Death. r<5und D. R. married. Go to work again with Keimer. Terms. His ill usage of me. My Resentment. Saying of Decow. My Friends at Burlington. Agreement with H. Meredith to set up in Partnership. Do so. Success with the Assembly. Hamilton's Friendship. Se well's History. Gazette. Paper money. Webb. Writing Busy Body. Breintnal. God- frey. His Character. Suit against us. Offer of my Friends, Coleman and Grace. Continue the Business, and M. goes to Carolina. Pamphlet on Paper Money. Gazette from Keimer. Junto credit ; its plan. Marry. Library erected. Manner of conducting the project. Its plan and utility. Children. Almanac. The use I made of it. Great industry. Constant study. Father's Remark and Advice upon Diligence. Carolina Partnership. Learn French and German. Journey to Boston after ten years. Affection of my Brother. His Death, and leaving me his Son. Art of Virtue. Occasion. City Watch amended. Post-office. Spotswood. Bradford's Behavior. Clerk of Assembly. Lose one of my Sons. Project of subordi- nate Juntos. Write occasionally in the papers. Success in Busi- ness. Fire companies. Engines. Go again to Boston in 1743. See Dr. Spence. Whitefield. My connection with him. His generosity to me. My returns. Church Differences. My part in them. Propose a College. Not then prosecuted. Propose and establish a Philosophical Society. War. Electricity. My first knowledge of it. Partnership with D. Hall, &c. Dispute in Assembly upon Defence. Project for it. Plain Truth. Its success. Ten thousand Men raised and disciplined. Lotteries. Battery built. New Castle. My influence in the Council. Colors, Devices, and Mottos. Ladies' Military Watch. Qua- kers chosen of the Common Council. Put in the Commission of the peace. Logan fond of me. His Library. Appointed Postmaster-General. Chosen Assemblyman. Commissioner to \ APPENDIX. 247 treat with Indians at Carlisle and at Easton. Project and establish Academy. Pamphlet on it. Journey to Boston. At Albany. Plan of union of the colonies. Copy of it. Remarks upon it. It fails, and how. Journey to Boston in 1754. Dis- putes about it in our Assembly. My part in them. New Gov- ernor. Disputes with him. His character and sayings to me. Chosen Alderman. Project of Hospital. My share in it. Its success. Boxes. Made a Commissioner of the Treasury. My commission to defend the frontier counties. Raise Men and build Forts. Militia Law of my drawing. Made Colonel. Parade of my Officers. OfPence to Proprietor. Assistance to Boston Ambassadors. Journey with Shirley, &c. Meet with Braddock. Assistance to him. To the Officers of his Army. Furnish him with Forage. His concessions to me and character of me. Success of my Electrical Experiments. Medal sent me. Present Royal Society, and Speech of President. Denny's Arrival and Courtship to me. His character. My service to the Army in the affair of Quarters. Disputes about the Propri- etor's Taxes continued. Project for paving the City. I am sent to England. Negotiation there. Canada delenda est. My Pam- phlet. Its reception and effect. Projects drawn from me con- cerning the Conquest. Acquaintance made and their services to me — Mrs. S. M. Small, Sir John P., Mr. Wood, Sargent Strahan, and others. Their characters^- Doctorate from Edin- burgh, St. Andrew's. Doctorate from Oxford. Journey to Scotland. Lord Leicester, Mr. Prat. De Grey. Jackson. State of Affairs in England. Delays. Eventful Journey into Holland and Flanders. Agency from Maryland. Son's appoint- ment. My Return. Allowance and thanks. Journey to Bos- ton. John Penn, Governor. My conduct toward him. The Paxton Murders. My Pamphlet. Rioters march to Philadel- phia. Governor retires to my House. My conduct. Sent out to the Insurgents. Turn them back. Little thanks. Dis- putes revived. Resolutions against continuing under Proprie- tary Government. Another Pamphlet. Cool thoughts. Sent again to England with Petition, Negotiation there. Lord H. His character. Agencies from New Jersey, Georgia, Massachusetts. Journey into Germany, 1766. Civilities received there. Gottingen Observations. Ditto into France in 1767. Ditto in 1769. Entertainment there at the Academy. Intro- duced to the King and the Mesdames, Mad. Victoria and Mrs. 248 APPENDIX. Lamagnon. Due de Chaulnes, M. Beaumont, Le Roy, D'Alibard, Nollet. See Journals. Holland. Reprint my papers and add many. Books presented to me from many authors. My Book translated into French. Lightning Kite. Various Discoveries. My manner of prosecuting that Study. King of Denmark invites me to dinner. Recollect my Father's Proverb. Stamp Act. My opposition to it. Recommendation of J. Hughes. Amendment of it. Examination in Parliament. Ref)utation it gave me. Caressed by Ministry. Charles Town- send's* Act. Opposition to it. Stoves and chimney-plates. Armonica. Acquaintance with Ambassadors. Russian Intima- tion. Writing in newspapers. Glasses from Germany. Grant of Land in Nova Scotia. Sicknesses. Letters to America returned hither. The consequences. Insurance Office. My character. Costs me nothing to be civil to inferiors ; a good deal to be submissive to superiors, &c., &c. Farce of Perpetual Motion. Writing for Jersey Assembly. Hutchinson's letters. Temple. Suit in Chancery. Abuse before the Privy Council. Lord Hillsborough's character and conduct. Lord Dartmouth. Negotiation to prevent the War. Return to America. Bishop of St. Asaph. Congress. Assembly. Committee of Safety. Chevaux-de-frise. Sent to Boston, to the Camp. To Canada, to Lord Howe. To France. Treaty, &c. INDEX. Academy, founding an, 149-152. Adams, Matthew, 20. Alexander, James, 1G6. Allen, Judge, of New Jersey, 77. Allen, William, 140. Amboy, 32, 33. American Philosophical Society, the, 138 and note. Amherst, Lord, 209. Argument, 21, 25, 26, 49. Art of Virtue, The, a proposed book. 111, 112, 234. Bache, Richard, 243. Baird, Dr., of Philadelphia and Scot- land, 83. Battery, securing a, 139-145. Beatty, Rev. Mr., 192, 193. Beer-drinking, 61-63. Bethlehem, Pa., 189, 190, 193-195. Bible, concealment of a, 11, 12. Bond, the two Doctors, 185, 186. Bond, Dr. Thomas, establishes a hospital in Philadelphia with Franklin's help, 154-157. Bonnell, Captain, 209, 210. Boston, Franklin's life in, 12-30 ; a short visit to, 41-43 ; 199. Braddock, General Edward, 173-184. Bradford, Andrew, 37, 38, 83, 84, 86, 91, 127. Bradford, William, 31, 37, 38. Breintnal, Joseph, 81, 82, 84, 90. Brockden, Charles, 94, 96. Brown, Dr., 33. Buffon, Georges Louis Leclerc, Count de, 201. Bunyan, John, 19, 31, 32. Burlington, N. J., 33, 34, 76, 77. Burnet, Governor, 45. Bustill, Samuel, 77. Cambridge, England, 227. Canada, its importance to Great Britain, 223, 228, 229 ; commissioners sent to, 238. Canton, John, 203. Carlisle, Pa., 153, 154. Cave, publisher of The Gentleman'' s Mag- azine, 200. Charles, Mr., London Agent for the Province of Pennsylvania, 217, 221. Cincinnati, the order of the, 243 and note. Clapham, Colonel, 193. Clifton, John, 160. Clinton, Governor) 140. Coleman, William, 82 ; his kindness to Franklin, 87. Collins, John, 21, 30, 39, 43, 45-47, 78. Collinson, Peter, 199, 200, 217. Cooper, Joseph, 77. Ci-aven Street, London, 162. Croghan, George, 180. Dalibard, Thomas Frangois, translates Franklin's papers on electricity, 201 ; proves the truth of Franklin's theory as to lightning, 202. Declaration of Independence, the, 238, 239. Decow, Isaac, 77. Deism, 77, 78. Denham, Mr., a Quaker merchant of Phil- adelphia, 55-57, 66 ; employs Franklin as a clerk, 67 ; 70 ; dies, 71. Denny, Captain William, Governor of Pennsylvania, 171, 198 ; his first inter- course with Franklin, 203-205; 206, 208 ; passes an act of the Assembly taxing the proprietary estate, 220 ; is removed from oflflce, 222. Dissertation on Liberty and Necessity, Pleasure and Pain, A, 59. Dunbar, Colonel, 179, 182, 184, 185, 197, 198. • Dunkers, the, 146. Eagle, bald, 242, 243. Ecton, Northamptonshire, 9, 227, 228. Electricity, 199-203. Falmouth, 216. Fawkener, Sir Everard, 197. Fire department, the foundation of a, 129, 130 : 142, 143. Fireplace, the Pennsylvania, 147, 148. Folger, Peter, grandfather of Franklin, 12, 13. Fort Duquesne, Battle of, 181-183. Fort George, 209. Fothergill, Dr. John, 161, 200, 217, 218. France, Franklin in, 240-243. Francis, Mr., attorney-general", 149. 250 INDEX. Franklin, Benjamin, uncle of Benjamin, 10, 11, 14. Franklin, Abiah (Folger), mother of Ben- jamin, 12, 17. Franklin, Benjamin, ancestry and pa- rentage, 9-13 ; birth, 12 and note ; schooling, 13, 14 ; learning his father's trade of tallow-chandler, 14-18 ; an early instance of misdirected public spirit, 15 ; his indifference in regard to his food, 16, 17 ; fondness for reading, 19, 20 ; becomes an apprentice in his brother James's printing-office, 19, 20 ; writes and sells ballads, 20 ; practices prose-writing, 20-23 ; becomes a vege- tarian, 23, 24 ; his studies, 24, 25 ; writes for the New England C our ant, 27, 28; his disputes with his brother James, 28-30 ; a new arrangement with his brother, 29 ; asserts his free- dom and goes to New York, 29, 30 ; the journey from New York to Philadel- phia, 31-35 ; first day in Philadelphia, 35-37 ; finds employment and lodgings, 37-39 ; urged by the governor to set up a printing business in Philadelphia, 40, 41 ; goes home with a letter from the governor to his father, 41, 42 ; his father refusing, on account of his youth, to set him up in business, he returns to Philadelphia, 42-45 ; rela- tions with Collins, 46, 47 ; promises of assistance from the governor, 47, 48 ; vegetarianism and argument, 48-51 ; be- comes attached to Miss Deborah Read, 50 ; his acquaintances in Philadelpliia, 50-53 ; on the governor's assurances of financial assistance he sails for London j to buy an outfit for his printing-office, 53-55 ; arrival in London and disclos- ure of Governor Keith's faithlessness, 56, 57 ; finds employment at Palmer's printing-house, 58, 59 ; makes acquain- tances, 59, 60 ; breaks with his friend James Ralph, 61 ; enters Watts's print- ing-house, 61 ; his temperate habits, 61-63 ; his lodgings, 63-65 ; his swim- ming powers, 65-68 ; enters the em- ployment of Mr. Denham, a Philadel- phia merchant, and sails for America, 67, 68 ; as a merchant's clerk in Phila- delphia, 70 ; very ill of pleurisy, 71 ; by the death of Mr. Denham he is thrown out of his situation, and he again enters the printing-house of his old em- ployer, Keimer, 71 ; is discharged by Keimer without cause, but is after- wards reengaged, 74-76 ; agrees to a partnership with Hugh Meredith in a printing business, 75 ; makes friends in New Jersey, 76, 77 ; morality and religion, 77-79 ; leaves Keimer and starts business with Meredith, 79, 80 ; forms a debating club called the Junto, 80-82 ; industry in business, 82, 83 ; starts a newspaper, The Pennsylvania Gazette, 83, 84; increasing business, 85, 86 ; his partnership with Meredith is dissolved, and with the assistance of friends he continues the business alone, ( 86-88 ; advocates an increase of the pa- per currency, 88, 89 ; growing business, 89-91 ; courtship and marriage, 92-94 ; establishes the first subscription library in America, 94-98 ; assisted by the in- dustry and frugality of his wife, 99; his religious beliefs, 99-101 ; his plan of moral improvement, 101-114 ; his pro- ject of founding an international so- ciety or sect for the practice of virtue, 115-117 ; publication and success of Poor Eichard^s Almanac, 118-119 ; his manner of conductmg his newspaper, 119 ; sends one of his journeymen to South Carolina under a partnership arrangement, 120 ; his relations with Rev. Mr. Hemphill, 121 ; learning lan- guages, 122, 123 ; visits Boston and Newport, 124 ; loses his little boy, 124 ; brings about the enlargement of the Junto's usefulness by the formation of subordinate clubs, 125, 126 ; chosen clerk of the General Assembly of Pennsylvania, 126 ; turns an enemy into a friend, 126, 127 ; is made post- master at Philadelphia, 127 ; accom- plishes the reform of the city watch, 128 ; through his instrumentality a fire department is organized, 129, 130 ; his acquaintance with the Rev. George Whitefield, 133, 134 ; increasing pros- perity, 136 ; forms partnerships in other colonies, 137 ; starts a movement for an academy, 138 ; establishes the Ameri- can Philosophical Society, 138 ; his successful efforts in behalf of the pub- lic defence, 138-145; his rule as to public office, 141 ; invents the Frank- lin stove, or Pennsylvania fireplace, 147, 148 ; founds an academy, which afterwfirds became the University of Philadelphia and finally the University of Pennsylvania, 149-152 ; takes Mr. David Hall into partnership to man- age his business, 151 ; elected to mem- bership in the Assembly and other offices, 152, 153 ; furthers Dr. Thomas Bond's plans for a hospital in Phila- delphia, 154-157 ; advice to a solicitor of subscriptions, 157, 158 ; his share in bringing about the paving, cleaning, and lighting of Philadelphia streets, 159-161 ; his project for the clean- ing of London streets, 161-164 ; post- master-general for America jointly with Mr. William Hunter, 165 ; takes a journey to New England, where he receives the degree of Master of Arts from Harvard College, 165, 166; ap- pointed one of the commissioners to arrange an alliance with the Six Nations, 166 ; his plan for a union of the colonies, 166-168 ; his pleasant re- lations with Governor Morris, 169, 170; INDEX. 251 his services in procuring money from the Assembly to be used by the gov- ernment of Massachusetta in an attack j upon the French, 172, 173 ; procures transport wagons and supplies for Gen- eral Braddock's expedition against Fort Duquesne, 173-180 ; his unheeded j warning to Braddock, 180, 181 ; recom- i mendatory letters from Braddock, | 184 ; partially successful efforts to se- cure the return of servants which had been enlisted in the army, 184 ; diflQ- culties with the owners of transport : wagons, 185 ; forebodings as to the outcome of the expedition, 185, 18G ; ; appointed on a commission to spend an i appropriation for the defence of the | Province, 188 ; promotes the formation j of a militia, 188, 195 ; raises troops and commands an expedition to build a line of forts against the Indians, 188- i 193 ; colonel in the militia, 195, 196 ; j incurs the enmity of the proprietor of : the Province, 196, 197 ; his relations with Governor Morris, 197, 198 ; his j electrical experiments and discoveries, 199-203; chosen a member of the \ Royal Society, 203 ; receives a medal from the Royal Society, 203 ; his first j meeting and subsequent relations with j Governor Denny, 203-205 ; appointed ; agent of the Province of Pennsylvania j to present and support its petition to the crown against the Penn family, 205 ; his relations with General Lord i Loudoun, 206-212 ; delayed in starting I for London and on the voyage by Lord ] Loudoun's indecision and procrastina- tion, 207-209 ; unsuccessful efforts to secure reimbursement for money ad- vanced to buy provisions, etc., for the army, 211, 212 ; events of the voyage, 212-216 ; lands at Falmouth and pro- ceeds to London, 216 ; visits Dr. Foth- ergill and Mr. Peter Collinsou, 217; his conversation with Lord Granville, 217, 218 ; his negotiations with the proprietaries, 218-223 ; his stay in England, 223-231 ; makes purchases for his wife, 224-226 ; makes friends in England, 227 ; visits his ancestral j home, 227, 228 ; his ideas as to the im- I portance of America to England, 228, I 229 ; advice to Mary Stevenson as to reading, 229, 230 : returns to America, 231, 232; makes a tour through the i northern colonies to inspect and regu- j late the postal system, 232 ; his services | during the riots of the " Paxton Boys " j against the converted Indians, 233 ; a short period of unpopularitj', 234 ; again sent to England as agent for the Province, 234 ; his services to the col- onies, 234-237 ; makes purchases for his wife, 235, 236 ; returns to America, 237 ; unanimously chosen a delegate to the Continental Congress, 237 ; letter to Mr. William Strahan, 237 ; letter to another English acquaintance, 237 ; goes to Canada as one of three commis- sioners to solicit assistance, 238 ; takes part in the discussions leading to the Declaration of Independence, 238, 239 ; represents the United States in France, 240-242; his personal appearance at this time, 241 ; one of the peace com- mission, 241, 242 ; a letter to Mrs. Hewson, 241 ; a letter to his daughter, 242 ; returns to America and is made president of the State of Pennsylvania, 243 ; last years, 243 ; death, 244 ; his epitaph, 244. Franklin, Mrs. Benjamin, her married life, 94 ; her death, 94 n., 241 ; her in- dustry and frugality, 99 ; 223 ; Frank- lin's letters to, 224, 227, 235 ; 232. See Read, Miss Deborah. Franklin, James, brother of Benjamin, 19, 23, 24 ; publishes the New England Courant, 26, 27 ; his treatment of his brother Benjamin, 28 ; trouble with the authorities, 28, 29 ; makes another arrangement witli Benjamin, 29 ; Ben- jamin leaves him, 30 ; 42 ; reconcilia- tion with Benjamin, 124. Franklin, John, brother of Benjamin, 18, 43. Franklin, John, uncle of Benjamin, 9,10. Franklin, Josiah, father of Benjamin, 10, 11 ; emigrates to New England, 12 ; his family, 12 ; 13-15 ; his person and character, 15, 16 ; his grave, 17 ; 18- 23, 28, 30, 42, 43. Franklin, Samuel, first cousin of Benja- min, 18. Franklin, Samuel, second cousin of Ben- jamin, 10. Franklin, Sarah, daughter of Benjamin, 226, 227, 232, 236 ; a letter from her father, 242. Franklin, Thomas, grandfather of Benja- min, 9, 10. Franklin, Thomas, uncle of Benjamin, 10, 227, 228. Franklin, William, son of Benjamin, ap- pointed clerk to the General Assembly of Pennsylvania, 153; 176, 188, 216, 223-225 ; his marriage and appointment as governor of New Jersey, 2.32 n. Franklin family, the, 9-12. Franklin stove, the, 147, 148. French, Colonel, of Newcastle, 40, 55. Georgia, settlement of, 132, 133. Gnadenhut, 188-194. Godfrey, Thomas, 79, 81, 92, 93. Godfrey, Mrs. Thomas, 92, 93. Gordon, Major, Governor of Pennsyl- vania, 70. Grace, Robert, 82; his kindness to Franklin, 87 ; manufactures the Frank- lin stove, 147. Granville, Lord, 217, 218. 252 INDEX, Halifax, 209. Hall, David, taken into partnership with Franklin, 151. Hamilton, Andrew, 55, 57, 86, 89. Hamilton, Governor James, 55, 166, 168, 169. Hanbury, John, 217. Harry, David, 72, 91. Hemphill, Rev. Mr., 121, 122. Hewson, Mrs. (formerly Miss Mary Stevenson), a letter from Franklin, 241. Holmes, Captain Robert, 39-42. House, George, 79. Hume, David, 184. Humility, 104, 112-114. Hunter, WilUam, 165. Indians, a treaty with, 153 ; their fond- ness for rum, 153, 154; conference with the chiefs of the Six Nations, 166, 167 ; in the French and Indian War, 180-183, 188-192, 209; massacres of converted, 233. Innis, a Philadelphia messenger, 208. Jefferson, Thomas, 238. John Thompson, Hatter, Franklin's an- ecdote, 238, 239. Junto, the, organization of, 80-82 ; 88, 89, 94, 95, 113, 119 ; foundation of sub- ordinate clubs, 125, 126; 128, 129, 138 n., 149. Keimer, Samuel, the printer, 37-41, 48 ; his arguments with Franklin, 49 ; pro- poses founding a new sect, 49 ; as a vegetarian, 49, 50 ; 70 ; engages Frank- lin to manage his printing-house, 71 ; 72, 73 ; picks a quarrel with Franklin and discharges him, 74 ; his financial condition, 75 ; reengages Franklin, 75, 76 ; 82-84 ; fails and goes to Bar- badoes, 90, 91. Keith, Sir William, Governor of Penn- sylvania, 40-43 ; proposes to set Frank- lin up as a prmter, 47, 48 ; his post- poned promises to Franklin, 53, 54 ; his faithlessness discovered, 56, 57; 70, 78. Kennedy, Captain, 213, 215. Kennedy, Mr., 166. King of Denmark, the, 98. Kinnersley, Ebenezer, 199, 200. Kite, Franklin's experiment with a, 202. Lamps, street, 160, 161. Lawrence, Colonel, 139, 140. Le Roy, Jean Baptiste, 202. Libraries, subscription, 94-98. Library, the Philadelphia, the founding of, 94-98. Logan, James, 143, 144. London, Franklin's life as a journeyman printer in, 56-68 ; lighting and clean- ing of the streets in, 161-164 ; Frank- lin as colonial agent in, 216-231, 234- 237. Lor, M. de, 202. Lotteries, 142 and note. Loudoun, Lord, 205-212. Louisburg, 209. Lutwidge, Captain, 213. Lyons, a surgeon, 59. Macclesfield, Lord, 203. Madeira, 231. Mandeville, Dr., 59. Mansfield, Lord, 221. Maugridge, William, 81. Meredith, senior, 86, 87. Meredith, Hugh , 71 , 74 ; arranges a part- nership with Franklin in a printing business, 75 ; 76, 81, 85 ; his partner- ship with Franklin having been dis- solved, he settles in North Carolina, 87, 88. Mickle, Samuel, 80. Militia, organization of a, 138, 139, 188, 195. Mitchel, Dr., 200. Money, paper, 88-90. Morality, 77-79, 101-114. Moravians, their opinions as to bearing arms, 189 ; their manner of life, 194, 195. Morris, Governor Robert Hunter, his appointment, 168 ; his disputes with the Assembly and his personal friend- ship with Franklin, 169, 170, 197, 198 ; 172 ; vetoes money-bills of Assembly, 187 ; 193. Morris, James, 142, 143. New England Courmxi., the, 27-29. Newspapers, libel in, 119, 120. New York, Franklin in, 31. Nollet, Abb^, 201, 202. Norris, Isaac, Speaker of the Penusyl- vania House, 153, 166. Order, 103, 104, 107-110. Orme, Captain, 183. Osborne, Charles, his acquaintance with Franklm, 51-53. Palmer, Mr., the London printer, 58, 59. Paris, Ferdinand John, 219, 221. Parsons, William, 81. Partnerships, 137. " Paxton Boys," the riots of the, 233. Pearson, Isaac, 77. Pemberton, Dr., 59. Pembroke, Lord, 216. Penn, John, grandson of William, 166 ; Governor of Pennsylvania, 233, 234. Penn, Thomas, son of William and chief proprietor of Pemisylvauia, his hos- tility to Franklin, 196, 197 ; 204, 218. See Proprietors of Pennsylvania. Penn, William, anecdote of, 143, 144. Penn family. See Proprietors of Penn- sylvania. INDEX. 253 Pennsylvania Gazette, The, Franklin's newspaper, 84, 85, 119, 122, 136. Peters, Secretary Richard, 166. Philadelphia, Franklin's life in, 34-54, 70-207, 231-234, 237-240, 243, 244. Philosopliical Society, the American, 138. Pilgrim's Progress, 19, 31, 32. Poor Richard's Almanac, publication of, 118 ; its success and its influence for good, 118, 119. V Potts, Stephen, 71, 72, 81. Povvuall, Governor Thomas, 172. Presbyterian minister, a, 100, 101. Pride, 112-114. Proprietors of Pennsylvania, the (Thomas and Richard Penn), disputes of the Pro- vince with, 170, 171, 204-207, 217-223. Quakers, their attitude towards offensive and defensive war, 138, 141-147. Quincy, Col. Josiah, grandfather of the Josiah Quincy who was first mayor of Boston, 172, 173. Riilph, James, his acquaintance with Franklin in Philadelphia, 51-53 ; Pope's allusion to, 53 and note ; sails for England in company with Franklin, 54 ; life in London with Franklin, 57- 60 ; becomes a country schoolmaster. 60 ; breaks with Franklin, 61 ; 68, 78 ; his later reputation as a writer, 205. Read, John, Franklin lodged at his house, 39 ; 57. Read, Miss Deborah, her first sight of Franklin, 36, 39 ; Franklin becomes attached to, 50 ; 54, 58 ; her unhappy marriage with one Rogers, 70 ; 78 ; marries Franklin, 93, 94. ^^ee Frank- lin, Mrs. Benjamin. Reading, 230. Recluse, a female, 64, 65. Religion, 77-79, 99-101, 116, 131. Riddlesden, an attorney, 56, 57. RoUs, episode of the, 35. Rose, Aquila, 31, 38. Rum, its effect on the Indians, 153, 154. Scull, Nicholas, 81. i Self-examination, 101-114. ' Ships, speed in, as affected by building, rigging, lading, and sailing, 212-214. Shirley, William, Governor of Massachu- setts and commander-in-chief of the British forces in America at the begin- i I ning of the French and Indian War, 167, 185, 210, 211. j Sloane, Sir Hans, 60 and note. : Small-pox, 124 and note. I Spangenberg, a Moravian bishop, 189. Spence, Dr., 199. Stevenson, Mrs. Margaret, 224, 225, 227, 236, 242. Stevenson, Miss Mary, 224 ; Franklin's advice to, 229, 230 ; 236. See Hewson, Mrs. Stonehenge, 216. Stove, the Franklin, 147, 148. Strahan, William, Franklin's famous letter to, 237. Streets, paving, cleaning, and lighting of, 159-164. Syng, Mr., 145. Taylor, Abram, 140. Tennent, Rev. Gilbert, 157, 158. Thomas, Governor, 138, 145, 147. University of Pennsylvania, establish- ment of the, 149-152. University of Philadelphia, establish- ment of the, 149-152. Vanity, 8. "Vegetarianism, 23, 24, 48-50. Vernon, Mr., 43, 86 ; Franklin's debt to, 45-48, 73, 78, 86. Virtues, the cultivation of, 102-114. Washington, George, letter from Frank- lin to, 243. j Watch, the city, of Philadelphia, 128. Watson, Joseph, his acquaintance with I Franklin, 51-53. i Watson, Sir William, physician, botanist, and electrician, 203. Watts, the printer, 61, 62. I Webb, George, 72, 73, 81, 83, 84. ! Welfare, Michael, 146. Wharf, building a, 15. Whitefield, Rev. George, one of the founders of Methodism. 131-136. Wilcox, a^London bookseller, 59. Wilton, England, 216. Wolfe, General James, 209. Women, the education of, 120, 121. Wright, Dr., 202. Wygate, Franklin's acquaintance with, 65, 66. Wyndham, Sir William, 67, 68. With Introductions, Notes, Historical Sketches, and Biographical Sketches, Each regular single number, paper, 15 cents. 1. Longfellow's Evangeline.** XX 2. Longfellow's Courtship of Miles Standish ; Elizabeth ** 3. 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