benjamin franklin essays

The Papers of Benjamin Franklin

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The Silence Dogood Essays By Benjamin Franklin

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Benjamin Franklin was sixteen years old and working as an apprentice in the Boston print shop of his older brother James when, in April 1722, he began writing a series of essays to be published in the New-England Courant (which his brother published) under the pseudonym of "Silence Dogood." In his Autobiography , Benjamin remembered slipping these essays, written in disguised handwriting, under the door of the Courant's office; he assumed (probably correctly) that James would refuse to print an essay from him if he simply asked or submitted it under his own name. James published the essays, which became very popular among the newspaper's readers. Benjamin kept his authorship of the series a secret, even from his brother, until after he finished writing them in October 1722, at which point James printed an advertisement asking for "Silence Dogood" to come forth. Benjamin confessed that he was the author, which seems to have annoyed his older brother. It was not too long after that that Benjamin left his brother's shop--breaking his apprenticeship--and moved to Philadelphia.

The Silence Dogood essays are written in the persona of a middle-aged woman, but the title character is very clearly indebted to Mr. Spectator, the avatar of Addison and Steele's Spectator series, published a decade earlier. It is testimony to how widely influential the Spectator was that even in colonial America, teenaged boys were reading it and taking it as a model for their own writing. In the Autobiography , Franklin remembers how much he loved the Spectator , and how he first came across it at the age of sixteen: " an odd volume of the Spectator fell into my hands. This was a publication I had never seen. I bought the volume, and read it again and again. I was enchanted with it, thought the style excellent, and wished it were in my power to imitate it. With this view I selected some of the papers, made short summaries of the sense of each period, and put them for a few days aside. I then, without looking at the book, endeavoured to restore the essays to their true form, and to express each thought at length, as it was in the original, employing the most appropriate words that occurred to my mind. I afterwards compared my Spectator with the original; I perceived some faults, which I corrected ." If the Spectator gave Franklin a model for his prose style, so too did it give him a persona to inhabit; the "Silence" in Silence Dogood's name clearly alludes to the taciturn Mr. Spectator as invented by Addison and Steele. The surname "Dogood" also alludes to a famous writer, in this case a colonial writer: the prolific Boston cleric Cotton Mather, whose 1710 collection Bonifacius: or, Essays to Do Good , advocating the reader to undertake charitable works, Franklin also remembered as a book that had a great impact on him as a young man. The startling thing about the Silence Dogood essays (in addition to the fact that they were written by a sixteen-year-old), is that Franklin adopts the persona of a woman , a persona that enables him adopt, but also gently mock, the kinds of sentiments expressed by authority figures like Mather. Franklin would continue to use personae, male and female, throughout his career, the most famous of these being the Poor Richard of his Almanack. And there's a sense in which the "Benjamin Franklin" of the Autobiography and of history was also a persona, a role that Franklin played on the public stage of the trans-Atlantic world.

There were fourteen Silence Dogood essays in all, published every two weeks in the pages of the New England Courant , for which, as we have seen, James Franklin was the publisher. The New England Courant was the first independently-published newspaper in colonial America; that is, it operated independently of government authority. So much so that the colonial government in Massachusetts frequently attempted to censor the newspaper and jailed James Franklin several times when he published articles that were thought to defame public officials (Cotton Mather, for example). During these periods, Benjamin was listed as the official publisher of the newspaper. It was finally closed for good in 1726. Benjamin had long since moved on, and was at this point finishing a stint as a journeyman printer in London and preparing to return to Philadelphia, where he opened a print shop of his own.

It may not be improper in the first place to inform your Readers, that I intend once a Fortnight fortnight to present them, by the Help of this Paper, with a short Epistle epistle , which I presume will add somewhat to their Entertainment.

And since it is observed, that the Generality of People, now a days, are unwilling either to commend or dispraise dispraise what they read, until they are in some measure informed who or what the Author of it is, whether he be poor or rich , old or young , a Schollar or a Leather Apron Man leatherapron , &c etc and give their Opinion of the Performance, according to the Knowledge which they have of the Author's Circumstances, it may not be amiss to begin with a short Account of my past Life and present Condition, that the Reader may not be at a Loss to judge whether or no whether my Lucubrations lucubrations are worth his reading.

At the time of my Birth, my Parents were on Ship-board in their Way from London to N. England nengland . My Entrance into this troublesome World was attended with the Death of my Father, a Misfortune, which tho' I was not then capable of knowing, I shall never be able to forget; for as he, poor Man, stood upon the Deck rejoycing at my Birth, a merciless Wave entred the Ship, and in one Moment carry'd him beyond Reprieve. Thus, was the first Day which I saw, the last that was seen by my Father; and thus was my disconsolate disconsolate Mother at once made both a Parent and a Widow .

When we arrived at Boston (which was not long after) I was put to Nurse in a Country Place, at a small Distance from the Town, where I went to School, and past my Infancy and Childhood in Vanity and Idleness, until I was bound out Apprentice apprentice , that I might no longer be a Charge to my Indigent indigent Mother, who was put to hard Shifts for a Living.

My Master was a Country Minister, a pious good-natur'd young Man, and a Batchelor: he labour'd with all his Might to instil vertuous and godly Principles into my tender Soul, well knowing that it was the most suitable Time to make deep and lasting Impressions on the Mind, while it was yet untainted with Vice, free and unbiass'd. He endeavour'd that I might be instructed in all that Knowledge and Learning which is necessary for our Sex, and deny'd me no Accomplishment that could possibly be attained in a Country Place; such as all Sorts of Needle-Work, Writing, Arithmetick, &c. and observing that I took a more than ordinary Delight in reading ingenious Books literacy , he gave me the free Use of his Library, which tho' it was but small, yet it was well chose, to inform the Understanding rightly, and enable the Mind to frame great and noble Ideas.

Before I had liv'd quite two Years with this Reverend Gentleman, my indulgent Mother departed this Life, leaving me as it were by my self, having no Relation on Earth within my Knowledge.

I will not abuse your Patience with a tedious Recital of all the frivolous Accidents of my Life, that happened from this Time until I arrived to Years of Discretion discretion , only inform you that I liv'd a chearful Country Life, spending my leisure Time either in some innocent Diversion with the neighbouring Females, or in some shady Retirement, with the best of Company, Books . Thus I past away the Time with a Mixture of Profit and Pleasure, having no affliction but what was imaginary, and created in my own Fancy; as nothing is more common with us Women, than to be grieving for nothing, when we have nothing else to grieve for.

As I would not engross too much of your Paper at once, I will defer the Remainder of my Story until my next Letter; in the mean time desiring your Readers to exercise their Patience, and bear with my Humours now and then, because I shall trouble them but seldom. I am not insensible of the Impossibility of pleasing all, but I would not willingly displease any; and for those who will take Offence were were none is intended, they are beneath the Notice of Your Humble Servant,

SILENCE DOGOOD.

Histories of Lives are seldom entertaining, unless they contain something either admirable or exemplar: And since there is little or nothing of this Nature in my own Adventures, I will not tire your Readers with tedious Particulars of no Consequence, but will briefly, and in as few Words as possible, relate the most material Occurrences of my Life, and according to my Promise, confine all to this Letter.

My Reverend master who had hitherto remained a Batchelor, (after much meditation on the Eighteenth verse of the Second Chapter of Genesis genesis ,) took up a Resolution to marry; and having made several unsuccessful fruitless Attempts on the more topping Sort of our Sex topsex , and being tir'd with making troublesome Journeys and Visits to no Purpose, he began unexpectedly to cast a loving Eye upon Me, whom he had brought up cleverly to his Hand.

There is certainly scarce any Part of a Man's Life in which he appears more silly and ridiculous, than when he makes his first Onset in Courtship. The aukward Manner in which my Master first discover'd his Intentions, made me, in spite of my Reverence to his Person, burst out into an unmannerly Laughter: However, having ask'd his Pardon, and with much ado compos'd my Countenance, I promis'd him I would take his Proposal into serious Consideration, and speedily give him an Answer.

As he had been a great Benefactor (and in a Manner a Father to me) I could not well deny his Request, when I once perceived he was in earnest. Whether it was Love, or Gratitude, or Pride, or all Three that made me consent, I know not; but it is certain, he found it no hard Matter, by the Help of his Rhetorick, to conquer my Heart, and perswade me to marry him.

This unexpected Match was very astonishing to all the Country round about, and served to furnish them with Discourse for a long Time after; some approving it, others disliking it, as they were led by their various Fancies and Inclinations.

We lived happily together in the Heighth of conjugal Love and mutual Endearments, for near Seven Years, in which Time we added Two likely Girls and a Boy to the Family of the Dogoods: But alas! When my Sun was in its meridian Altitude meridian , inexorable unrelenting Death, as if he had envy'd my Happiness and Tranquility, and resolv'd to make me entirely miserable by the Loss of so good an Husband, hastened his Flight to the Heavenly World, by a sudden unexpected Departure from this thisworld .

I have now remained in a State of Widowhood for several Years, but it is a State I never much admir'd, and I am apt to fancy that I could be easily perswaded to marry again, provided I was sure of a good-humour'd, sober, agreeable Companion: But one, even with these few good Qualities, being hard to find, I have lately relinquish'd all Thoughts of that Nature.

At present I pass away my leisure Hours in Conversation, either with my honest Neighbour Rusticus and his Family, or with the ingenious Minister of our Town, who now lodges at my House, and by whose Assistance I intend now and then to beautify my Writings with a Sentence or two in the learned Languages, which will not only be fashionable, and pleasing to those who do not understand it, but will likewise be very ornamental.

I shall conclude this with my own Character, which (one would think) I should be best able to give. Know then , That I am an Enemy to Vice, and a Friend to Vertue. I am one of an extensive Charity, and a great Forgiver of private Injuries: A hearty Lover of the Clergy and all good Men, and a mortal Enemy to arbitrary Government and unlimited Power. I am naturally very jealous for the Rights and Liberties of my Country; and the least appearance of an Incroachment on those invaluable Priviledges, is apt to make my Blood boil exceedingly. I have likewise a natural Inclination to observe and reprove the Faults of others, at which I have an excellent Faculty. I speak this by Way of Warning to all such whose Offences shall come under my Cognizance, for I never intend to wrap my Talent in a Napkin. To be brief; I am courteous and affable, good humour'd (unless I am first provok'd,) and handsome, and sometimes witty, but always, Sir, Your Friend and Humble Servant,

It is undoubtedly the Duty of all Persons to serve the Country they live in, according to their Abilities; yet I sincerely acknowledge, that I have hitherto been very deficient in this Particular; whether it was for want of Will or Opportunity, I will not at present stand to determine: Let it suffice, that I now take up a Resolution, to do for the future all that lies in my Way for the Service of my Countrymen.

I have from my Youth been indefatigably indefatigably studious to gain and treasure up in my Mind all useful and desireable Knowledge, especially such as tends to improve the Mind, and enlarge the Understanding: And as I have found it very beneficial to me, I am not without Hopes, that communicating my small Stock in this Manner, by Peace-meal peacemeal > to the Publick, may be at least in some Measure useful.

I am very sensible that it is impossible for me, or indeed any one Writer to please all Readers at once. Various Persons have different Sentiments; and that which is pleasant and delightful to one, gives another a Disgust. He that would (in this Way of Writing) please all, is under a Necessity to make his Themes almost as numerous as his Letters. He must one while be merry and diverting, then more solid and serious; one while sharp and satyrical, then (to mollify mollify that) be sober and religious; at one Time let the Subject be Politicks, then let the next Theme be Love: Thus will every one, one Time or other find some thing agreeable to his own Fancy, and in his Turn be delighted.

According to this Method I intend to proceed, bestowing now and then a few gentle Reproofs reproof on those who deserve them, not forgetting at the same time to applaud those whose Actions merit Commendation. And here I must not forget to invite the ingenious Part of your Readers, particularly those of my own Sex to enter into a Correspondence with me, assuring them, that their Condescension in this Particular shall be received as a Favour, and accordingly acknowledged.

I think I have now finish'd the Foundation, and I intend in my next to begin to raise the Building. Having nothing more to write at present, I must make the usual excuse in such Cases, of being in haste , assuring you that I speak from my Heart when I call my self, The most humble and obedient of all the Servants your Merits have acquir'd,

Discoursing the other Day at Dinner with my Reverend Boarder, formerly mention'd, (whom for Distinction sake we will call by the Name of Clericus,) concerning the Education of Children, I ask'd his Advice about my young Son William, whether or no I had best bestow upon him Academical Learning, or (as our Phrase is) bring him up at our College : He perswaded me to do it by all Means, using many weighty Arguments with me, and answering all the Objections that I could form against it; telling me withal, that he did not doubt but that the Lad would take his Learning very well, and not idle away his Time as too many there now-a-days do. These Words of Clericus gave me a Curiosity to inquire a little more strictly into the present Circumstances of that famous Seminary seminary of Learning; but the Information which he gave me, was neither pleasant, nor such as I expected.

As soon as Dinner was over, I took a solitary Walk into my Orchard, still ruminating on Clericus's Discourse with much Consideration, until I came to my usual Place of Retirement under the Great Apple-Tree ; where having seated my self, and carelessly laid my Head on a verdant verdant Bank, I fell by Degrees into a soft and undisturbed Slumber. My waking Thoughts remained with me in my Sleep, and before I awak'd again, I dreamt the following Dream.

I fancy'd I was travelling over pleasant and delightful Fields and Meadows, and thro' many small Country Towns and Villages; and as I pass'd along, all Places resounded with the Fame of the Temple of Learning: Every Peasant, who had wherewithal, was preparing to send one of his Children at least to this famous Place; and in this Case most of them consulted their own Purses instead of their Childrens Capacities: So that I observed, a great many, yea, the most part of those who were travelling thither, were little better than Dunces and Blockheads. Alas! alas!

At length I entred upon a spacious Plain, in the Midst of which was erected a large and stately Edifice: It was to this that a great Company of Youths from all Parts of the Country were going; so stepping in among the Crowd, I passed on with them, and presently arrived at the Gate.

The Passage was kept by two sturdy Porters porter named Riches and Poverty , and the latter obstinately refused to give Entrance to any who had not first gain'd the Favour of the former; so that I observed, many who came even to the very Gate, were obliged to travel back again as ignorant as they came, for want of this necessary Qualification. However, as a Spectator spectator I gain'd Admittance, and with the rest entred directly into the Temple.

In the Middle of the great Hall stood a stately and magnificent Throne, which was ascended to by two high and difficult Steps. On the Top of it sat Learning in awful State; she was apparelled wholly in Black, and surrounded almost on every Side with innumerable Volumes in all Languages. She seem'd very busily employ'd in writing something on half a Sheet of Paper, and upon Enquiry, I understood she was preparing a Paper, call'd, The New-England Courant . On her Right Hand sat English , with a pleasant smiling Countenance, and handsomely attir'd; and on her left were seated several Antique Figures with their Faces vail'd. I was considerably puzzl'd to guess who they were, until one informed me, (who stood beside me,) that those Figures on her left Hand were Latin , Greek , Hebrew , &c. and that they were very much reserv'd, and seldom or never unvail'd their Faces here, and then to few or none, tho' most of those who have in this Place acquir'd so much Learning as to distinguish them from English , pretended to an intimate Acquaintance with them. I then enquir'd of him, what could be the Reason why they continued vail'd, in this Place especially: He pointed to the Foot of the Throne, where I saw Idleness , attended with Ignorance , and these (he informed me) were they, who first vail'd them, and still kept them so.

Now I observed, that the whole Tribe who entred into the Temple with me, began to climb the Throne; but the Work proving troublesome and difficult to most of them, they withdrew their Hands from the Plow, and contented themselves to sit at the Foot, with Madam Idleness and her Maid Ignorance , until those who were assisted by Diligence and a docible docible Temper, had well nigh nigh got up the first Step: But the Time drawing nigh in which they could no way avoid ascending, they were fain fain to crave the Assistance of those who had got up before them, and who, for the Reward perhaps of a Pint of Milk , or a Piece of Plumb-Cake cake , lent the Lubbers lubber a helping Hand, and sat them in the Eye of the World, upon a Level with themselves.

The other Step being in the same Manner ascended, and the usual Ceremonies at an End, every Beetle-Scull seem'd well satisfy'd with his own Portion of Learning, tho' perhaps he was e'en just as ignorant as ever. And now the Time of their Departure being come, they march'd out of Doors to make Room for another Company, who waited for Entrance: And I, having seen all that was to be seen, quitted the hall likewise, and went to make my Observations on those who were just gone out before me.

Some I perceiv'd took to Merchandizing merch , others to Travelling, some to one Thing, some to another, and some to Nothing; and many of them from henceforth, for want of Patrimony patrimony , liv'd as poor as Church Mice churchmice , being unable to dig, and asham'd to beg, and to live by their Wits it was impossible. But the most Part of the Crowd went along a large beaten Path, which led to a Temple at the further End of the Plain, call'd, The Temple of Theology theology /hi>. The Business of those who were employ'd in this Temple being laborious and painful, I wonder'd exceedingly to see so many go towards it; but while I was pondering this Matter in my Mind, I spy'd Pecunia pecunia behind a Curtain, beckoning to them with her Hand, which Sight immediately satisfy'd me for whose Sake it was, that a great Part of them (I will not say all) travel'd that Road. In this Temple I saw nothing worth mentioning, except the ambitious and fraudulent Contrivances of Plagius plagius , who (notwithstanding he had been severely reprehended for such Practices before) was diligently transcribing some eloquent Paragraphs out of Tillotson's Works tillotson , &c., to embellish his own.

Now I bethought my self in my Sleep, that it was Time to be at Home, and as I fancy'd I was travelling back thither, I reflected in my Mind on the extream Folly of those Parents, who, blind to their Childrens Dulness, and insensible of the Solidity of their Skulls, because they think their Purses can afford it, will needs send them to the Temple of Learning, where, for want of a suitable Genius, they learn little more than how to carry themselves handsomely, and enter a Room genteely genteel , (which might as well be acquir'd at a Dancing-School,) and from whence they return, after Abundance of Trouble and Charge, as great Blockheads as ever, only more proud and self-conceited.

While I was in the midst of these unpleasant Reflections, Clericus (who with a Book in his Hand was walking under the Trees) accidentally awak'd me; to him I related my Dream with all its Particulars, and he, without much Study, presently interpreted it, assuring me, That it was a lively Representation of Harvard College, Etcetera . I remain, Sir, Your Humble Servant,

I shall here present your Readers with a Letter from one, who informs me that I have begun at the wrong End of my Business, and that I ought to begin at Home, and censure the Vices and Follies of my own Sex, before I venture to meddle with your's: Nevertheless, I am resolved to dedicate this Speculation to the Fair Tribe, and endeavour to show, that Mr. Ephraim charges Women with being particularly guilty of Pride, Idleness, &c. wrongfully, inasmuch as the Men have not only as great a Share in those Vices as the Women, but are likewise in a great Measure the Cause of that which the Women are guilty of. I think it will be best to produce my Antagonist, before I encounter him.

"My Design in troubling you with this Letter is, to desire you would begin with your own Sex first: Let the first Volley of your Resentments be directed against Female Vice; let Female Idleness, Ignorance and Folly, (which are Vices more peculiar to your Sex than to our's,) be the Subject of your Satyrs satyr , but more especially Female Pride, which I think is intollerable. Here is a large Field that wants Cultivation, and which I believe you are able (if willing) to improve with Advantage; and when you have once reformed the Women, you will find it a much easier Task to reform the Men, because Women are the prime Causes of a great many Male Enormities maleenormity . This is all at present from Your Friendly Wellwisher,

Ephraim Censorious ephraim

After Thanks to my Correspondent for his Kindness in cutting out Work for me, I must assure him, that I find it a very difficult Matter to reprove reprove Women separate from the Men; for what Vice is there in which the Men have not as great a Share as the Women? and in some have they not a far greater, as in Drunkenness, Swearing, &c.? And if they have, then it follows, that when a Vice is to be reproved, Men, who are most culpable, deserve the most Reprehension, and certainly therefore, ought to have it. But we will wave this Point at present, and proceed to a particular Consideration of what my Correspondent calls Female Vice .

As for Idleness, if I should Quaere quaere , Where are the greatest Number of its Votaries votary to be found, with us or the Men? it might I believe be easily and truly answer'd, With the latter . For notwithstanding the Men are commonly complaining how hard they are forc'd to labour, only to maintain their Wives in Pomp pomp and Idleness, yet if you go among the Women, you will learn, that they have always more Work upon their Hands than they are able to do; and that a Woman's Work is never done , &c. But however, Suppose we should grant for once, that we are generally more idle than the Men, (without making any Allowance for the Weakness of the Sex ,) I desire to know whose Fault it is? Are not the Men to blame for their Folly in maintaining us in Idleness? Who is there that can be handsomely Supported in Affluence, Ease and Pleasure by another, that will chuse rather to earn his Bread by the Sweat of his own Brows? And if a Man will be so fond and so foolish, as to labour hard himself for a Livelihood, and suffer his Wife in the mean Time to sit in Ease and Idleness, let him not blame her if she does so, for it is in a great Measure his own Fault.

And now for the Ignorance and Folly which he reproaches reproach us with, let us see (if we are Fools and Ignoramus's) whose is the Fault, the Men's or our's. An ingenious Writer, having this Subject in Hand, has the following Words, wherein he lays the Fault wholly on the Men, for not allowing Women the Advantages of Education.

"I have (says he) often thought of it as one of the most barbarous Customs in the World, considering us as a civiliz'd and Christian Country, that we deny the Advantages of Learning to Women. We reproach the Sex every Day with Folly and Impertinence, while I am confident, had they the Advantages of Education equal to us, they would be guilty of less than our selves. One would wonder indeed how it should happen that Women are conversible conversible at all, since they are only beholding to natural Parts for all their Knowledge. Their Youth is spent to teach them to stitch and sew, or make Baubles baubles : They are taught to read indeed, and perhaps to write their Names, or so; and that is the Heighth of a Womans Education. And I would but ask any who slight the Sex for their Understanding, What is a Man (a Gentleman, I mean) good for that is taught no more? If Knowledge and Understanding had been useless Additions to the Sex, God Almighty would never have given them Capacities, for he made nothing Needless. What has the Woman done to forfeit the Priviledge of being taught? Does she plague us with her Pride and Impertinence impertinence ? Why did we not let her learn, that she might have had more Wit? Shall we upbraid upbraid Women with Folly, when 'tis only the Error of this inhumane Custom that hindred them being made wiser."

So much for Female Ignorance and Folly, and now let us a little consider the Pride which my Correspondent thinks is intollerable . By this Expression of his, one would think he is some dejected Swain swain , tyranniz'd over by some cruel haughty Nymph nymph , who (perhaps he thinks) has no more Reason to be proud than himself. Alas-a-day! What shall we say in this Case! Why truly, if Women are proud, it is certainly owing to the Men still; for if they will be such Simpletons as to humble themselves at their Feet, and fill their credulous credulous Ears with extravagant Praises of their Wit, Beauty, and other Accomplishments (perhaps where there are none too,) and when Women are by this Means perswaded that they are Something more than humane, what Wonder is it, if they carry themselves haughtily, and live extravagantly. Notwithstanding, I believe there are more Instances of extravagant Pride to be found among Men than among Women, and this Fault is certainly more hainous in the former than in the latter.

Upon the whole, I conclude, that it will be impossible to lash any Vice, of which the Men are not equally guilty with the Women, and consequently deserve an equal (if not a greater) Share in the Censure. However, I exhort exhort both to amend, where both are culpable culpable , otherwise they may expect to be severely handled by Sir, Your Humble Servant,

SILENCE DOGOOD

N.B. Mrs. Dogood has lately left her Seat in the Country, and come to Boston, where she intends to tarry tarry for the Summer Season, in order to compleat her Observations of the present reigning Vices of the Town.

Among the many reigning Vices of the Town which may at any Time come under my Consideration and Reprehension, there is none which I am more inclin'd to expose than that of Pride . It is acknowledg'd by all to be a Vice the most hateful to God and Man. Even those who nourish it in themselves, hate to see it in others. The proud Man aspires after Nothing less than an unlimited Superiority over his Fellow-Creatures. He has made himself a King in Soliloquy S soliloquy ; fancies himself conquering the World; and the Inhabitants thereof consulting on proper Methods to acknowledge his Merit. I speak it to my Shame, I my self was a Queen from the Fourteenth to the Eighteenth Year of my Age, and govern'd the World all the Time of my being govern'd by my Master. But this speculative Pride may be the Subject of another Letter: I shall at present confine my Thoughts to what we call Pride of Apparel . This Sort of Pride has been growing upon us ever since we parted with our Homespun Cloaths for Fourteen Penny Stuffs penny , &c. And the Pride of Apparel has begot begot and nourish'd in us a Pride of Heart , which portends portend the Ruin of Church and State. Pride goeth before Destruction, and a haughty Spirit before a Fall : And I remember my late Reverend Husband would often say upon this Text, That a Fall was the natural Consequence , as well as Punishment of Pride. Daily Experience is sufficient to evince evince the Truth of this Observation. Persons of small Fortune under the Dominion of this Vice, seldom consider their Inability to maintain themselves in it, but strive to imitate their Superiors in Estate, or Equals in Folly, until one Misfortune comes upon the Neck of another, and every Step they take is a Step backwards. By striving to appear rich they become really poor, and deprive themselves of that Pity and Charity which is due to the humble poor Man, who is made so more immediately by Providence.

This Pride of Apparel will appear the more foolish, if we consider, that those airy Mortals, who have no other Way of making themselves considerable but by gorgeous Apparel, draw after them Crowds of Imitators, who hate each other while they endeavour after a Similitude of Manners. They destroy by Example, and envy one another's Destruction.

I cannot dismiss this Subject without some Observations on a particular Fashion now reigning among my own Sex, the most immodest and inconvenient of any the Art of Woman has invented, namely, that of Hoop-Petticoats hoop . By these they are incommoded incommoded in their General and Particular Calling, and therefore they cannot answer the Ends of either necessary or ornamental Apparel. These monstrous topsy-turvy Mortar-Pieces mortar , are neither fit for the Church, the Hall, or the Kitchen; and if a Number of them were well mounted on Noddles-Island noddles , they would look more like Engines of War for bombarding the Town, than Ornaments of the Fair Sex. An honest Neighbour of mine, happening to be in Town some time since on a publick Day, inform'd me, that he saw four Gentlewomen with their Hoops half mounted in a Balcony, as they withdrew to the Wall, to the great Terror of the Militia, who (he thinks) might attribute their irregular Volleys to the formidable Appearance of the Ladies Petticoats.

I assure you, Sir, I have but little Hopes of perswading my Sex, by this Letter, utterly to relinquish the extravagant Foolery, and Indication of Immodesty, in this monstrous Garb of their's; but I would at least desire them to lessen the Circumference of their Hoops, and leave it with them to consider, Whether they, who pay no Rates or Taxes, ought to take up more Room in the King's High-Way, than the Men, who yearly contribute to the Support of the Government. I am, Sir, Your Humble Servant,

It has been the Complaint of many Ingenious Foreigners, who have travell'd amongst us, That good Poetry is not to be expected in New-England . I am apt to Fancy, the Reason is, not because our Countreymen are altogether void of a Poetical Genius, nor yet because we have not those Advantages of Education which other Countries have, but purely because we do not afford that Praise and Encouragement which is merited, when any thing extraordinary of this Kind is produc'd among us: Upon which Consideration I have determined, when I meet with a Good Piece of New-England Poetry, to give it a suitable Encomium encomium , and thereby endeavour to discover to the World some of its Beautys, in order to encourage the Author to go on, and bless the World with more, and more Excellent Productions.

There has lately appear'd among us a most Excellent Piece of Poetry, entituled, An Elegy upon the much Lamented Death of Mrs. Mehitebell Kitel, Wife of Mr. John Kitel of Salem, &c . It may justly be said in its Praise, without Flattery to the Author, that it is the most Extraordinary Piece that ever was wrote in New-England. The Language is so soft and Easy, the Expression so moving and pathetick, but above all, the Verse and Numbers so Charming and Natural, that it is almost beyond Comparison,

I find no English Author, Ancient or Modern, whose Elegies may be compar'd with this, in respect to the Elegance of Stile, or Smoothness of Rhime; and for the affecting Part, I will leave your Readers to judge, if ever they read any Lines, that would sooner make them draw their Breath and Sigh, if not shed Tears, than these following.

In another Place,

But the Threefold Appellation appellation in the first Line

must not pass unobserved. That Line in the celebrated Watts,

is nothing Comparable to it. The latter only mentions three Qualifications of one Person who was deceased, which therefore could raise Grief and Compassion but for One . Whereas the former, ( our most excellent Poet ) gives his Reader a Sort of an Idea of the Death of Three Persons , viz.

which is Three Times as great a Loss as the Death of One , and consequently must raise Three Times as much Grief and Compassion in the Reader.

I should be very much straitned for Room, if I should attempt to discover even half the Excellencies of this Elegy which are obvious to me. Yet I cannot omit one Observation, which is, that the Author has (to his Honour) invented a new Species of Poetry, which wants a Name, and was never before known. His Muse scorns to be confin'd to the old Measures and Limits, or to observe the dull Rules of Criticks;

Now 'tis Pity that such an Excellent Piece should not be dignify'd with a particular Name; and seeing it cannot justly be called, either Epic , Sapphic , Lyric , or Pindaric greekstyle , nor any other Name yet invented, I presume it may, (in Honour and Remembrance of the Dead) be called the Kitelic kitelic . Thus much in the Praise of Kitelic Poetry .

It is certain, that those Elegies which are of our own Growth, (and our Soil seldom produces any other sort of Poetry) are by far the greatest part, wretchedly Dull and Ridiculous. Now since it is imagin'd by many, that our Poets are honest, well-meaning Fellows, who do their best, and that if they had but some Instructions how to govern Fancy with Judgment, they would make indifferent good Elegies; I shall here subjoin subjoin a Receipt receipt for that purpose, which was left me as a Legacy, (among other valuable Rarities) by my Reverend Husband. It is as follows,

For the Title of your Elegy . Of these you may have enough ready made to your Hands; but if you should chuse to make it your self, you must be sure not to omit the Words Aetatis Suae aetatis , which will Beautify it exceedingly.

For the Subject of your Elegy . Take one of your Neighbours who has lately departed this Life; it is no great matter at what Age the Party dy'd, but it will be best if he went away suddenly, being Kill'd , Drown'd , or Froze to Death .

Having chose the Person, take all his Virtues, Excellencies, &c. and if he have not enough, you may borrow some to make up a sufficient Quantity: To these add his last Words, dying Expressions, &c. if they are to be had; mix all these together, and be sure you strain them well. Then season all with a Handful or two of Melancholly Expressions, such as, Dreadful , Deadly , cruel cold Death , unhappy Fate , weeping Eyes , &c. Have mixed all these Ingredients well, put them into the empty Scull scull of some young Harvard ; (but in Case you have ne'er a One at Hand, you may use your own,) there let them Ferment for the Space of a Fortnight, and by that Time they will be incorporated into a Body, which take out, and having prepared a sufficient Quantity of double Rhimes, such as, Power , Flower ; Quiver , Shiver ; Grieve us , Leave us ; tell you , excel you ; Expeditions , Physicians ; Fatigue him , Intrigue him ; &c. you must spread all upon Paper, and if you can procure a Scrap of Latin to put at the End, it will garnish it mightily; then having affixed your Name at the Bottom, with a Moestus Composuit moestus , you will have an Excellent Elegy.

N.B. notabene This Receipt will serve when a Female is the Subject of your Elegy, provided you borrow a greater Quantity of Virtues, Excellencies, &c. Sir, Your Servant,

Silence Dogood

p.s. I shall make no other Answer to Hypercarpus's Criticism on my last Letter hypercarpus than this, Mater me genuit, peperit mox filia matrem. mater .

I prefer the following Abstract from the London Journal to any Thing of my own, and therefore shall present it to your Readers this week without any further Preface.

"Without Freedom of Thought, there can be no such Thing as Wisdom; and no such Thing as publick Liberty, without Freedom of Speech; which is the Right of every Man, as far as by it, he does not hurt or controul the Right of another: And this is the only Check it ought to suffer, and the only Bounds it ought to know.

"This sacred Privilege is so essential to free Goverments, that the Security of Property, and the Freedom of Speech always go together; and in those wretched Countries where a Man cannot call his Tongue his own, he can scarce call any Thing else his own. Whoever would overthrow the Liberty of a Nation, must begin by subduing the Freeness of Speech; a Thing terrible to Publick Traytors.

"This Secret was so well known to the Court of King Charles the First charles , that his wicked Ministry procured a Proclamation, to forbid the People to talk of Parliaments, which those Traytors had laid aside. To assert the undoubted Right of the Subject, and defend his Majesty's legal Prerogative, was called Disaffection disaffection , and punished as Sedition sedition . Nay, People were forbid to talk of Religion in their Families: For the Priests had combined with the Ministers to cook up Tyranny, and suppress Truth and the Law, while the late King James james , when Duke of York, went avowedly to Mass, Men were fined, imprisoned and undone, for saying he was a Papist papist : And that King Charles the Second charlesii might live more securely a Papist, there was an Act of Parliament made, declaring it Treason to say that he was one.

"That Men ought to speak well of their Governours is true, while their Governours deserve to be well spoken of; but to do publick Mischief, without hearing of it, is only the Prerogative and Felicity felicity of Tyranny: A free People will be shewing that they are so , by their Freedom of Speech.

"The Administration of Government, is nothing else but the Attendance of the Trustees of the People upon the Interest and Affairs of the People: And as it is the Part and Business of the People, for whose Sake alone all publick Matters are, or ought to be transacted, to see whether they be well or ill transacted; so it is the Interest, and ought to be the Ambition, of all honest Magistrates, to have their Deeds openly examined, and publickly scann'd: Only the wicked Governours of Men dread what is said of them; Audivit Tiberius probra queis lacerabitur, atque perculsus est audivit . The publick Censure was true, else he had not felt it bitter.

Freedom of Speech is ever the Symptom, as well as the Effect of a good Government. In old Rome, all was left to the Judgment and Pleasure of the People, who examined the publick Proceedings with such Discretion, and censured those who administred them with such Equity and Mildness, that in the space of Three Hundred Years, not five publick Ministers suffered unjustly. Indeed whenever the Commons proceeded to Violence, the great Ones had been the Agressors.

"Guilt only dreads Liberty of Speech, which drags it out of its lurking Holes, and exposes its Deformity and Horrour to Daylight." Horatius, Valerius valerius , Cincinnatus cincinnatus , and other vertuous and undesigning Magistrates of the Roman Commonwealth, had nothing to fear from Liberty of Speech. Their virtuous Administration, the more it was examin'd, the more it brightned and gain'd by Enquiry. When Valerius in particular, was accused upon some slight grounds of affecting the Diadem diadem ; he, who was the first Minister of Rome, does not accuse the People for examining his Conduct, but approved his Innocence in a Speech to them; and gave such Satisfaction to them, and gained such Popularity to himself, that they gave him a new Name; inde cognomen factum Publicolae est cognomen ; to denote that he was their Favourite and their Friend. Latae deinde leges — Ante omnes de provocatione Adversus Magistratus Ad Populum, Livii, lib. 2. Cap. 8. livytrans

"But Things afterwards took another Turn. Rome, with the Loss of its Liberty, lost also its Freedom of Speech; then Mens Words began to be feared and watched; and then first began the poysonous Race of Informers , banished indeed under the righteous Administration of Titus, Narva, Trajan, Aurelius, &c. but encouraged and enriched under the vile Ministry of Sejanus, Tigillinus, Pallas, and Cleander: Queri libet, quod in secreta nostra non inquirant principes, nisi quos Odimus , says Pliny to Trajan plinytrans .

"The best Princes have ever encouraged and promoted Freedom of Speech; they know that upright Measures would defend themselves, and that all upright Men would defend them. Tacitus tacitus , speaking of the Reign of some of the Princes abovemention'd, says with Extasy, Rara Temporum felicitate, ubi sentire quae velis, & quae sentias dicere licet A blessed Time when you might think what you would, and speak what you thought.

"I doubt not but old Spencer and his Son, who were the Chief Ministers and Betrayers of Edward the Second edwardii , would have been very glad to have stopped the Mouths of all the honest Men in England. They dreaded to be called Traytors , because they were Traytors . And I dare say, Queen Elizabeth's Walsingham walsingham , who deserved no Reproaches, feared none. Misrepresentation of publick Measures is easily overthrown, by representing publick Measures truly; when they are honest, they ought to be publickly known, that they may be publickly commended; but if they are knavish knavish or pernicious pernicious , they ought to be publickly exposed, in order to be publickly detested." Yours, &c.,

It has been for some Time a Question with me, Whether a Commonwealth suffers more by hypocritical Pretenders to Religion, or by the openly Profane profane ? But some late Thoughts of this Nature, have inclined me to think, that the Hypocrite is the most dangerous Person of the Two, especially if he sustains a Post in the Government, and we consider his Conduct as it regards the Publick. The first Artifice artifice of a State Hypocrite is, by a few savoury Expressions which cost him Nothing, to betray the best Men in his Country into an Opinion of his Goodness; and if the Country wherein he lives is noted for the Purity of Religion, he the more easily gains his End, and consequently may more justly be expos'd and detested. A notoriously profane Person in a private Capacity, ruins himself, and perhaps forwards the Destruction of a few of his Equals; but a publick Hypocrite every day deceives his betters, and makes them the Ignorant Trumpeters trumpeters of his supposed Godliness: They take him for a Saint, and pass him for one, without considering that they are (as it were) the Instruments of publick Mischief out of Conscience, and ruin their Country for God's sake.

This Political Description of a Hypocrite, may (for ought I know) be taken for a new Doctrine by some of your Readers; but let them consider, that a little Religion, and a little Honesty, goes a great way in Courts . 'Tis not inconsistent with Charity to distrust a Religious Man in Power, tho' he may be a good Man; he has many Temptations "to propagate publick Destruction for Personal Advantages and Security": And if his Natural Temper be covetous, and his Actions often contradict his pious Discourse, we may with great Reason conclude, that he has some other Design in his Religion besides barely getting to Heaven. But the most dangerous Hypocrite in a Common-Wealth, is one who leaves the Gospel for the sake of the Law : A Man compounded of Law and Gospel, is able to cheat a whole Country with his Religion, and then destroy them under Colour of Law colour : And here the Clergy are in great Danger of being deceiv'd, and the People of being deceiv'd by the Clergy, until the Monster arrives to such Power and Wealth, that he is out of the reach of both, and can oppress the People without their own blind Assistance. And it is a sad Observation, that when the People too late see their Error, yet the Clergy still persist in their Encomiums encomium2 on the Hypocrite; and when he happens to die for the Good of his Country , without leaving behind him the Memory of one good Action , he shall be sure to have his Funeral Sermon stuff'd with Pious Expressions which he dropt at such a Time, and at such a Place, and on such an Occasion; than which nothing can be more prejudicial to the Interest of Religion, nor indeed to the Memory of the Person deceas'd. The Reason of this Blindness in the Clergy is, because they are honourably supported (as they ought to be) by their People, and see nor feel nothing of the Oppression which is obvious and burdensome to every one else.

But this Subject raises in me an Indignation indignation not to be born; and if we have had, or are like to have any Instances of this Nature in New England, we cannot better manifest our Love to Religion and the Country, than by setting the Deceivers in a true Light, and undeceiving the Deceived, however such Discoveries may be represented by the ignorant or designing Enemies of our Peace and Safety.

I shall conclude with a Paragraph or two from an ingenious Political Writer in the London Journal , the better to convince your Readers, that Publick Destruction may be easily carry'd on by hypocritical Pretenders to Religion .

"A raging Passion for immoderate Gain had made Men universally and intensely hard-hearted: They were every where devouring one another. And yet the Directors and their Accomplices, who were the acting Instruments of all this outrageous Madness and Mischief, set up for wonderful pious Persons, while they were defying Almighty God, and plundering Men; and they set apart a Fund of Subscriptions for charitable Uses; that is, they mercilessly made a whole People Beggars, and charitably supported a few necessitous and worthless Favourites. I doubt not, but if the Villany had gone on with Success, they would have had their Names handed down to Posterity with Encomiums; as the Names of other publick Robbers have been! We have Historians and Ode Makers now living, very proper for such a Task. It is certain, that most People did, at one Time, believe the Directors to be great and worthy Persons . And an honest Country Clergyman told me last Summer, upon the Road, that Sir John was an excellent publick-spirited Person, for that he had beautified his Chancel chancel .

"Upon the whole we must not judge of one another by their best Actions; since the worst Men do some Good, and all Men make fine Professions: But we must judge of Men by the whole of their Conduct, and the Effects of it. Thorough Honesty requires great and long Proof, since many a Man, long thought honest, has at length proved a Knave knave . And it is from judging without Proof, or false Proof, that Mankind continue Unhappy." I am, Sir, Your humble Servant,

Discoursing lately with an intimate Friend of mine of the lamentable Condition of Widows, he put into my Hands a Book, wherein the ingenious Author proposes (I think) a certain Method for their Relief. I have often thought of some such Project for their Benefit my self, and intended to communicate my Thoughts to the Publick; but to prefer my own Proposals to what follows, would be rather an Argument of Vanity in me than Good Will to the many Hundreds of my Fellow-Sufferers now in New-England.

“We have (says he) abundance of Women, who have been Bred well, and Liv’d well, Ruin’d in a few Years, and perhaps, left Young, with a House full of Children, and nothing to Support them; which falls generally upon the Wives of the Inferior Clergy, or of Shopkeepers and Artificers artificer .

“They marry Wives with perhaps £300 to £1000 Portion portion , and can settle no Jointure jointure upon them; either they are Extravagant and Idle, and Waste it, or Trade decays, or Losses, or a Thousand Contingences happen to bring a Tradesman to Poverty, and he Breaks; the Poor Young Woman, it may be, has Three or Four Children, and is driven to a thousand shifts, while he lies in the Mint mint or Fryars fryar under the Dilemma of a Statute of Bankrupt; but if he Dies, then she is absolutely Undone, unless she has Friends to go to.

“Suppose an Office to be Erected, to be call’d An Office of Ensurance for Widows , upon the following Conditions;

“Two thousand Women, or their Husbands for them, Enter their Names into a Register to be kept for that purpose, with the Names, Age, and Trade of their Husbands, with the Place of their abode, Paying at the Time of their Entring 5 s britcash . down with 1 s . 4 d . per Quarter, which is to the setting up and support of an Office with Clerks, and all proper Officers for the same; for there is no maintaining such without Charge ; they receive every one of them a Certificate, Seal’d by the Secretary of the Office, and Sign’d by the Governors, for the Articles hereafter mentioned.

“If any one of the Women becomes a Widow, at any Time after Six Months from the Date of her Subscription, upon due Notice given, and Claim made at the Office in form, as shall be directed, she shall receive within Six Months after such Claim made, the Sum of £500 in Money, without any Deductions, saving some small Fees to the Officers, which the Trustees must settle, that they may be known.

“In Consideration of this, every Woman so Subscribing, Obliges her self to Pay as often as any Member of the Society becomes a Widow, the due Proportion or Share allotted to her to Pay, towards the £500 for the said Widow, provided her Share does not exceed the Sum of 5 s .

“No Seamen or Soldiers Wives to be accepted into such a Proposal as this, on the Account before mention’d, because the Contingences of their Lives are not equal to others, unless they will admit this general Exception, supposing they do not Die out of the Kingdom.

“It might also be an Exception, That if the Widow, that Claim’d, had really, bona fide bonafide ,left her by her Husband to her own use, clear of all Debts and Legacies, £2000 she shou’d have no Claim; the Intent being to Aid the Poor, not add to the Rich. But there lies a great many Objections against such an Article: As

“One Exception must be made; and that is, Either very unequal Matches, as when a Woman of Nineteen Marries an old Man of Seventy; or Women who have infirm infirm Husbands, I mean known and publickly so. To remedy which, Two things are to be done.

“One grand Objection against this Proposal, is, How you will oblige People to pay either their Subscription, or their Quarteridge quarteridge .

“To this I answer, By no Compulsion (tho’ that might be perform’d too) but altogether voluntary; only with this Argument to move it, that if they do not continue their Payments, they lose the Benefit of their past Contributions.

“I know it lies as a fair Objection against such a Project as this, That the number of Claims are so uncertain, That no Body knows what they engage in, when they Subscribe, for so many may die Annually out of Two Thousand, as may perhaps make my Payment £20 or 25 per Ann perannum ., and if a Woman happen to Pay that for Twenty Years, though she receives the £500 at last she is a great Loser; but if she dies before her Husband, she has lessened his Estate considerably, and brought a great Loss upon him.

“ First , I say to this, That I wou’d have such a Proposal as this be so fair and easy, that if any Person who had Subscrib’d found the Payments too high, and the Claims fall too often, it shou’d be at their Liberty at any Time, upon Notice given, to be released and stand Oblig’d no longer; and if so, Volenti non fit Injuria violenti ; every one knows best what their own Circumstances will bear.

“In the next Place, because Death is a Contingency, no Man can directly Calculate, and all that Subscribe must take the Hazard; yet that a Prejudice against this Notion may not be built on wrong Grounds, let’s examine a little the Probable hazard, and see how many shall die Annually out of 2000 Subscribers, accounting by the common proportion of Burials, to the number of the Living.

“Sir William Petty in his Political Arithmetick , by a very Ingenious Calculation, brings the Account of Burials in London, to be 1 in 40 Annually, and proves it by all the proper Rules of proportion’d Computation; and I’le take my Scheme from thence. If then One in Forty of all the People in England should Die, that supposes Fifty to Die every Year out of our Two Thousand Subscribers; and for a Woman to Contribute 5 s . to every one, would certainly be to agree to Pay £12 10 s . per Ann . upon her Husband’s Life, to receive £500 when he Di’d, and lose it if she Di’d first; and yet this wou’d not be a hazard beyond reason too great for the Gain.

“But I shall offer some Reasons to prove this to be impossible in our Case; First, Sir William Petty allows the City of London to contain about a Million of People, and our Yearly Bill of Mortality never yet amounted to 25000 in the most Sickly Years we have had, Plague Years excepted, sometimes but to 20000, which is but One in Fifty: Now it is to be consider’d here, that Children and Ancient People make up, one time with another, at least one third of our Bills of Mortality; and our Assurances lies upon none but the Midling Age of the People, which is the only age wherein Life is any thing steady; and if that be allow’d, there cannot Die by his Computation, above One in Eighty of such People, every Year; but because I would be sure to leave Room for Casualty, I’le allow one in Fifty shall Die out of our Number Subscrib’d.

“Secondly, It must be allow’d, that our Payments falling due only on the Death of Husbands, this One in Fifty must not be reckoned upon the Two thousand; for ’tis to be suppos’d at least as many Women shall die as Men, and then there is nothing to Pay; so that One in Fifty upon One Thousand, is the most that I can suppose shall claim the Contribution in a Year, which is Twenty Claims a Year at 5 s . each, and is £5 per Ann . and if a Woman pays this for Twenty Year, and claims at last, she is Gainer enough, and no extraordinary Loser if she never claims at all: And I verily believe any Office might undertake to demand at all Adventures not above £6 per Ann . and secure the Subscriber £500 in case she come to claim as a Widow.”

I would leave this to the Consideration of all who are concern’d for their own or their Neighbour’s Temporal temporal Happiness; and I am humbly of Opinion, that the Country is ripe for many such Friendly Societies , whereby every Man might help another, without any Disservice to himself. We have many charitable Gentlemen who Yearly give liberally to the Poor, and where can they better bestow their Charity than on those who become so by Providence, and for ought they know on themselves. But above all, the Clergy have the most need of coming into some such Project as this. They as well as poor Men (according to the Proverb) generally abound in Children; and how many Clergymen in the Country are forc’d to labour in their Fields, to keep themselves in a Condition above Want? How then shall they be able to leave any thing to their forsaken, dejected, and almost forgotten Wives and Children. For my own Part, I have nothing left to live on, but Contentment and a few Cows; and tho’ I cannot expect to be reliev’d by this Project, yet it would be no small Satisfaction to me to see it put in Practice for the Benefit of others. I am, Sir, &c.

From a natural Compassion to my Fellow-Creatures, I have sometimes been betray'd into Tears at the Sight of an Object of Charity, who by a bear [sic] sic Relation of his Circumstances, seem'd to demand the Assistance of those about him. The following Petition represents in so lively a Manner the forlorn State of a Virgin well stricken in Years and Repentance, that I cannot forbear publishing it at this Time, with some Advice to the Petitioner.

To Mrs. Silence Dogood.

"1. That your Petitioner being puff'd up in her younger Years with a numerous Train of Humble Servants, had the Vanity to think, that her extraordinary Wit and Beauty would continually recommend her to the Esteem of the Gallants gallant ; and therefore as soon as it came to be publickly known that any Gentleman address'd her, he was immediately discarded.

"2. That several of your Petitioners Humble Servants, who upon their being rejected by her, were, to all Apperance in a dying Condition, have since recover'd their Health, and been several Years married, to the great Surprize and Grief of your Petitioner, who parted with them upon no other Conditions, but that they should die or run distracted for her, as several of them faithfully promis'd to do.

"3. That your Petitioner finding her self disappointed in and neglected by her former Adorers, and no new Offers appearing for some Years past, she has been industriously contracting Acquaintance with several Families in Town and Country, where any young Gentlemen or Widowers have resided, and endeavour'd to appear as conversable as possible before them: She has likewise been a strict Observer of the Fashion, and always appear'd well dress'd. And the better to restore her decay'd Beauty, she has consum'd above Fifty Pound's Worth fiftylb of the most approved Cosmeticks . But all won't do.

"Your Petitioner therefore most humbly prays, That you would be pleased to form a Project for the Relief of all those penitent penitent Mortals of the fair Sex, that are like to be punish'd with their Virginity until old Age, for the Pride and Insolence of their Youth.

"And your Petitioner (as in Duty bound) shall ever pray, &c.

Margaret Aftercast"

Were I endow'd with the Faculty of Match-making, it should be improv'd for the Benefit of Mrs. Margaret, and others in her Condition: But since my extream Modesty and Taciturnity taciturn , forbids an Attempt of this Nature, I would advise them to relieve themselves in a Method of Friendly Society ; and that already publish'd for Widows, I conceive would be a very proper Proposal for them, whereby every single Woman, upon full Proof given of her continuing a Virgin for the Space of Eighteen Years, (dating her Virginity from the Age of Twelve,) should be entituled to £500 in ready Cash.

But then it will be necessary to make the following Exceptions.

1. That no Woman shall be admitted into the Society after she is Twenty Five Years old, who has made a Practice of entertaining and discarding Humble Servants, without sufficient Reason for so doing, until she has manifested her Repentance in Writing under her Hand.

2. No Member of the Society who has declar'd before two credible Witnesses, That it is well known she has refus'd several good Offers since the Time of her Subscribing , shall be entituled to the £500 when she comes of Age; that is to say, Thirty Years .

3. No Woman, who after claiming and receiving, has had the good Fortune to marry, shall entertain any Company with Encomiums encomium3 on her Husband, above the Space of one Hour at a Time, upon Pain of returning one half the Money into the Office, for the first Offence; and upon the second Offence to return the Remainder. I am, Sir, Your Humble Servant,

It is no unprofitable tho' unpleasant Pursuit, diligently to inspect and consider the Manners and Conversation of Men, who, insensible of the greatest Enjoyments of humane Life, abandon themselves to Vice from a false Notion of Pleasure and good Fellowship . A true and natural Representation of any Enormity, is often the best Argument against it and Means of removing it, when the most severe Reprehensions alone, are found ineffectual.

I would in this letter improve the little Observation I have made on the Vice of Drunkeness , the better to reclaim the good Fellows who usually pay the Devotions of the Evening to Bacchus bacchus .

I doubt not but moderate Drinking has been improv'd for the Diffusion of Knowledge among the ingenious Part of Mankind, who want the Talent of a ready Utterance, in order to discover the Conceptions of their Minds in an entertaining and intelligible Manner. 'Tis true, drinking does not improve our Faculties, but it enables us to use them; and therefore I conclude, that much Study and Experience, and a little Liquor, are of absolute Necessity for some Tempers, in order to make them accomplish'd Orators. Dic. Ponder discovers an excellent Judgment when he is inspir'd with a Glass or two of Claret claret , but he passes for a Fool among those of small Observation, who never saw him the better for Drink. And here it will not be improper to observe, That the moderate Use of Liquor, and a well plac'd and well regulated Anger, often produce this same Effect; and some who cannot ordinarily talk but in broken Sentences and false Grammar, do in the Heat of Passion express themselves with as much Eloquence as Warmth. Hence it is that my own Sex are generally the most eloquent, because the most passionate. "It has been said in the Praise of some Men, (says an ingenious Author,) that they could talk whole Hours together upon any thing; but it must be owned to the Honour of the other Sex, that there are many among them who can talk whole Hours together upon Nothing. I have known a Woman branch out into a long extempore extempore Dissertation on the Edging of a Petticoat edging , and chide chide her Servant for breaking a China Cup, in all the Figures of Rhetorick."

But after all it must be consider'd, that no Pleasure can give Satisfaction or prove advantageous to a reasonable Mind , which is not attended with the Restraints of Reason . Enjoyment is not to be found by Excess in any sensual Gratification; but on the contrary, the immoderate Cravings of the Voluptuary voluptuary , are always succeeded with Loathing and a palled palled Appetite. What Pleasure can the Drunkard have in the Reflection, that, while in his Cups, he retain'd only the Shape of a Man, and acted the Part of a Beast; or that from reasonable Discourse a few Minutes before, he descended to Impertinence impertinence2 and Nonsense?

I cannot pretend to account for the different Effects of Liquor on Persons of different Dispositions, who are guilty of Excess in the Use of it. 'Tis strange to see Men of a regular Conversation become rakish rakish and profane when intoxicated with Drink, and yet more surprizing to observe, that some who appear to be the most profligate profligate Wretches when sober, become mighty religious in their Cups, and will then, and at no other Time address their Maker, but when they are destitute of Reason, and actually affronting affront him. Some shrink in the Wetting wetting , and others swell to such an unusual Bulk in their Imaginations, that they can in an Instant understand all Arts and Sciences, by the liberal Education of a little vivifying vivifying Punch , or a sufficient Quantity of other exhilerating Liquor.

And as the Effects of Liquor are various, so are the Characters given to its Devourers. It argues some Shame in the Drunkards themselves, in that they have invented numberless Words and Phrases to cover their Folly, whose proper Significations are harmless, or have no Signification at all. They are seldom known to be drunk , tho' they are very often boozey, cogey, tipsey, fox'd, merry, mellow, fuddl'd, groatable, Confoundedly cut, See two Moons, are Among the Philistines, In a very good Humour, See the Sun, or, The Sun has shone upon them; they Clip the King's English, are Almost froze, Feavourish, In their Altitudes, Pretty well enter'd , &c drunk . In short, every Day produces some new Word or Phrase which might be added to the Vocabulary of the Tiplers tipler : But I have chose to mention these few, because if at any Time a Man of Sobriety and Temperance happens to cut himself confoundedly , or is almost froze , or feavourish , or accidentally sees the Sun , &c. he may escape the Imputation imputation of being drunk , when his Misfortune comes to be related. I am Sir, Your Humble Servant,

In Persons of a contemplative Disposition, the most indifferent Things provoke the Exercise of the Imagination; and the Satisfactions which often arise to them thereby, are a certain Relief to the Labour of the Mind (when it has been intensely fix'd on more substantial Subjects) as well as to that of the Body.

In one of the late pleasant Moon-light Evenings, I so far indulg'd in my self the Humour of the Town in walking abroad, as to continue from my Lodgings two or three Hours later than usual, and was pleas'd beyond Expectation before my Return. Here I found various Company to observe, and various Discourse to attend to. I met indeed with the common Fate of Listeners , (who hear no good of themselves ,) but from a Consciousness of my Innocence, receiv'd it with a Satisfaction beyond what the Love of Flattery and the Daubings daubing of a Parasite could produce. The Company who rally'd me were about Twenty in Number, of both Sexes; and tho' the Confusion of Tongues (like that of Babel) which always happens among so many impetuous impetuous Talkers, render'd their Discourse not so intelligible as I could wish, I learnt thus much, That one of the Females pretended to know me, from some Discourse she had heard at a certain House before the Publication of one of my Letters; adding, That I was a Person of an ill Character, and kept a criminal Correspondence with a Gentleman who assisted me in Writing . One of the Gallants gallant2 clear'd me of this random Charge, by saying, That tho' I wrote in the Character of a Woman, he knew me to be a Man; But , continu'd he, he has more need of endeavouring a Reformation in himself, than spending his Wit in satyrizing others .

I had no sooner left this Set of Ramblers rambler , but I met a Crowd of Tarpolins tarpolins and their Doxies doxies , link'd to each other by the Arms, who ran (by their own Account) after the Rate of Six Knots an Hour knot , and bent their Course towards the Common. Their eager and amorous Emotions of Body, occasion'd by taking their Mistresses in Tow , they call'd wild Steerage steerage : And as a Pair of them happen'd to trip and come to the Ground, the Company were call'd upon to bring to , for that Jack and Betty were founder'd . But this Fleet were not less comical or irregular in their Progress than a Company of Females I soon after came up with, who, by throwing their Heads to the Right and Left, at every one who pass'd by them, I concluded came out with no other Design than to revive the Spirit of Love in Disappointed Batchelors, and expose themselves to Sale to the first Bidder.

But it would take up too much Room in your Paper to mention all the Occasions of Diversion I met with in this Night's Ramble ramble . As it grew later, I observed, that many pensive Youths with down Looks and a slow Pace, would be ever now and then crying out on the Cruelty of their Mistresses; others with a more rapid Pace and chearful Air, would be swinging their Canes and clapping their Cheeks, and whispering at certain Intervals, I'm certain I shall have her! This is more than I expected! How charmingly she talks! &c.

Upon the whole I conclude, That our Night-Walkers are a Set of People, who contribute very much to the Health and Satisfaction of those who have been fatigu'd with Business or Study, and occasionally observe their pretty Gestures and Impertinencies impertinence3 . But among Men of Business, the Shoemakers , and other Dealers in Leather, are doubly oblig'd to them, inasmuch as they exceedingly promote the Consumption of their Ware: And I have heard of a Shoemaker , who being ask'd by a noted Rambler, Whether he could tell how long her Shoes would last ; very prettily answer'd, That he knew how many Days she might wear them, but not how many Nights; because they were then put to a more violent and irregular Service than when she employ'd her self in the common Affairs of the House . I am, Sir, Your Humble Servant,

It often happens, that the most zealous Advocates for any Cause find themselves disappointed in the first Appearance of Success in the Propagation of their Opinion; and the Disappointment appears unavoidable, when their easy Proselytes proselyte too suddenly start into Extreams, and are immediately fill'd with Arguments to invalidate their former Practice. This creates a Suspicion in the more considerate Part of Mankind, that those who are thus given to Change , neither fear God , nor honour the King . In Matters of Religion, he that alters his Opinion on a religious Account , must certainly go thro' much Reading, hear many Arguments on both Sides, and undergo many Struggles in his Conscience, before he can come to a full Resolution: Secular Interest will indeed make quick Work with an immoral Man, especially if, notwithstanding the Alteration of his Opinion, he can with any Appearance of Credit retain his Immorality. But, by this Turn of Thought I would not be suspected of Uncharitableness to those Clergymen at Connecticut, who have lately embrac'd the Establish'd Religion of our Nation, some of whom I hear made their Professions with a Seriousness becoming their Order: However, since they have deny'd the Validity of Ordination by the Hands of Presbyters , and consequently their Power of Administring the Sacraments , &c. we may justly expect a suitable Manifestation of their Repentance for invading the Priests Office, and living so long in a Corah-like corah Rebellion. All I would endeavour to shew is, That an indiscreet Zeal for spreading an Opinion, hurts the Cause of the Zealot. There are too many blind Zealots among every Denomination of Christians; and he that propagates the Gospel among Rakes rake and Beaus beau without reforming them in their Morals, is every whit as ridiculous and impolitick as a Statesman who makes Tools of Ideots and Tale-Bearers gossip .

Much to my present Purpose are the Words of two Ingenious Authors of the Church of England, tho' in all Probability they were tainted with Whiggish whiggish Principles; and with these I shall conclude this Letter.

"I would (says one) have every zealous Man examine his Heart thoroughly, and, I believe, he will often find that what he calls a Zeal for his Religion, is either Pride, Interest or Ill-nature. A Man who differs from another in Opinion sets himself above him in his own Judgment, and in several Particulars pretends to be the wiser Person. This is a great Provocation to the Proud Man, and gives a keen Edge to what he calls his Zeal. And that this is the Case very often, we may observe from the Behaviour of some of the most Zealous for Orthodoxy, who have often great Friendships and Intimacies with vicious immoral Men, provided they do but agree with them in the same Scheme of Belief. The Reason is, because the vicious Believer gives the Precedency to the virtuous Man, and allows the good Christian to be the worthier Person, at the same Time that he cannot come up to his Perfections. This we find exemplified in that trite Passage which we see quoted in almost every System of Ethicks, tho' upon another Occasion;

--Video meliore proboque Deteriora sequor-- ovidtrans

On the contrary, it is certain if our Zeal were true and genuine, we should be much more angry with a Sinner than a Heretick heretic , since there are several Cases which may excuse the latter before his great Judge, but none which can excuse the former."

"I have (says another) found by Experience, that it is impossible to talk distinctly without defining the Words of which we make use. There is not a Term in our Language which wants Explanation so much as the Word Church . One would think when People utter it, they should have in their Minds Ideas of Virtue and Religion; but that important Monosyllable drags all the other Words in the Language after it, and it is made use of to express both Praise and Blame, according to the Character of him who speaks it. By this means it happens, that no one knows what his Neighbour means when he says such a one is for or against the Church. It has happen'd that he who is seen every Day at Church, has not been counted in the Eye of the World a Churchman; and he who is very zealous to oblige every one to frequent it but himself, has been a very good Son of the Church. This Praepossession Praepossession is the best Handle imaginable for Politicians to make use of, for managing the Loves and Hatreds of Mankind to the Purposes to which they would lead them. But this is not a Thing for Fools to meddle with, for they only bring Disesteem disesteem upon those whom they attempt to serve, when they unskilfully pronounce Terms of Art. I have observed great Evils arise from this Practice, and not only the Cause of Piety, but also the secular Interest of Clergymen, has extreamly suffered by the general unexplained Signification of the Word Church ." I am, Sir, Your Humble Servant.

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The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

This public domain content is presented by the Independence Hall Association , a nonprofit organization in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, founded in 1942. Publishing electronically as ushistory.org. On the Internet since July 4, 1995.

Part of: The Works of Benjamin Franklin, in 12 vols. The Works of Benjamin Franklin, Vol. II Letters and Misc. Writings 1735-1753

• Benjamin Franklin (author)
• John Bigelow (editor)

Volume 2 of a 12 volume collection of the works of Franklin edited by the New York lawyer and politician John Bigelow. Vol. 2 contains a essays and letters written between 1735 and 1753.

• EBook PDF This text-based PDF or EBook was created from the HTML version of this book and is part of the Portable Library of Liberty.
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The Works of Benjamin Franklin, including the Private as well as the Official and Scientific Correspondence, together with the Unmutilated and Correct Version of the Autobiography, compiled and edited by John Bigelow (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1904). The Federal Edition in 12 volumes. Vol. II (Letters and Misc. Writings 1735-1753).

The text is in the public domain.

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Colonies, Slavery & Abolition

• Benjamin Franklin and Slavery

Like many other American Founders, Benjamin Franklin was an active participant in the slave trade and is known to have benefited financially from it for much of his early life. However, it was during his time in London that Franklin’s views changed significantly. By the 1780s he was a vocal abolitionist writing a famous public address condemning slavery and urging Congress to act.

When Benjamin Franklin arrived in London in 1757, he had with him two enslaved Africans that lived and worked at 36 Craven Street.

At  Benjamin Franklin House , we aim to tell the stories of all the individuals that lived here. In this section, we will not only explore the history of Franklin’s involvement in slavery but also shine a light on the enslaved people that worked in his Philadelphia household and the lives of Peter and King who accompanied him to Britain to live and work in London during the 18th century.

Franklin and Slavery (1735-1757)

It is important to first note that many details chronicling Benjamin Franklin’s involvement in slavery, such as his purchase and sale of slaves, are logged fleetingly in the massive amounts of documents he left behind. Subsequently, it was also more common for northern slaveholders to not record slave births, deaths, and marriages since slaveholding was not as prominent in production processes as it was in the plantation South. However, we do know that Franklin was a slave owner and benefited from the institution.

The Franklin household owned enslaved people as early as 1735 until 1790, and was reported to have purchased at least seven individuals: Joseph, Jemima, Peter, King, Othello, George & Bob. [1]

In addition to ownership, Franklin also made financial gain by advertising the sale of enslaved people and publishing notices of runaways in his newspaper the Pennsylvania Gazette. Franklin’s relationship with slavery was complicated even during this early period, as he also published Quaker antislavery adverts.

Unfortunately, little is known about the lives of Franklin’s enslaved people, with their existence only documented in surviving tax and financial records. With the limited information available, we can only speculate on the details surrounding each individual’s time in the Franklin household.

To learn more about the lives of the enslaved people that we know were a part of Franklin’s Philadelphia household, CLICK HERE .

The stories of  Peter and King , the two slaves that came to London in 1757, are somewhat better preserved as Franklin includes mentions of them in several of the letters that he wrote to his wife Deborah whilst away. To learn more about them,  CLICK HERE .

Franklin in London (1757-1775)

When Benjamin Franklin went to London on behalf of the Pennsylvania assembly in 1757, his son William accompanied him. In addition, they brought along two enslaved Africans, named Peter and King. Peter acted as a personal servant to Franklin, and King served William in the same capacity. Both lived on Craven Street and were known to have earned a small salary.

It is believed that Peter and King, despite being enslaved by Franklin, still engaged in London society and European customs, explored the city, and accompanied the father and son pair on their various travels around the country. Peter remained with Franklin from their arrival until their departure in 1762. King, on the other hand, ran away sometime in 1758. He was then found living in Suffolk two years later, having been taken in by a Christian woman that taught him to read and write.

In the latter half of the 18th century, England had a population of around 15,000 black people. They lived mostly in major port cities, like London, Liverpool, and Bristol, but also in market towns across the country. The majority worked in domestic service, both paid and unpaid.

Slavery had no legal basis in England, but the law was often misinterpreted. Black people previously enslaved in the overseas colonies were often still treated as enslaved when taken to England. Some individuals used the opportunity of being on English soil to escape and notices for ‘runaway slaves’ were often featured in newspapers during this period. The campaign in Britain to abolish slavery would not begin until the 1760s and was supported by both black and white abolitionists. The movement was characterized by a landmark judicial case in 1772, where Lord Mansfield ruled, in the case of the enslaved James Somerset, that there could be no such thing as an enslaved human living on English soil.

This pivotal decision and the abolitionist influences of John Woolman and Anthony Benezet are credited with shifting Franklin’s relationship with and sentiments towards slavery. From London, Franklin supported the cause of black education in colonial American cities and attacked slavery anonymously in the print for the first time. The fictionalized ‘Conversations between an Englishman, a Scotchman, and an American,’ published in 1770, critiqued the institution and global slave trade.

Franklin in Paris (1776-1785)

During this period, whilst acting as the United States Ambassador to France, Franklin remained publicly silent on the issue of slavery and was believed to have been unwilling to take a firm stance while in Paris. There, however, Franklin was particularly influenced by Enlightenment figure Condorcet’s  Reflections on Negro Slavery , which was published in 1781 during the height of Franklin’s salon popularity.

Franklin took a semi-public stance on slavery when circulating ‘A Thought Concerning the Sugar Islands’ in 1782. In the article, Franklin denounced the numerous armed conflicts in Africa, the number of lives lost during these conflicts, the harsh conditions of transatlantic transportation, and the “numbers that die under the severities of slavery” [2] itself. Given such brutality and violence, Franklin contended that even a morsel of sugar was tainted with blood. Almost 8 years spent with antislavery French thinkers, dedicated abolitionist friends, and other philosophes  are credited with encouraging Franklin’s eventual open censure of slavery and the continual shift of Franklin’s personal views.

Franklin and Abolitionism (1785-1790)

Following his time in Paris, Franklin returned to Philadelphia until his death in 1790. It was during this final period of his life that Franklin publicly condemned slavery.

At eighty-one years old in 1787, he became the President of the Philadelphia Society for the Relief of Free Negroes Unlawfully Held in Bondage, which was also often referred to as the Abolition Society. The Abolition Society, which was formed by a group of abolitionist Quakers and Anthony Benezet in 1774, concentrated not only on abolishing slavery but also on helping enslaved people transition to a life of liberty. The organization was the first in America and encouraged the formation of abolitionist societies in other colonies.

In 1787, weeks before the start of the Constitutional Convention, Franklin signed a public antislavery appeal, which stated that “the Creator of the world” had made “of one flesh, all the children of men” [3]. It was believed that Franklin, like many revolutionary leaders, supported the idea that a nation built on the promise of inalienable rights acquired at birth could not remain true while enabling slavery.

In 1789 he wrote and published several essays supporting the abolition of slavery, including an Address to the public, dated November 9 th of that same year. In the address, the former slave owner wrote that the institution was an “atrocious debasement of human nature” [4] and called for adequate resources to support emancipated people in society, such as education and employment. Furthermore, Franklin’s last public act was to petition Congress on behalf of the society, requesting that they “cut the cancer of slavery out of the American body politic,” and grant liberty “to those unhappy men who alone in this land of freedom are degraded into perpetual bondage.” The first Congress was also asked to “devise means for removing the Inconsistency from the Character of the American People,” and to “promote mercy and justice toward this distressed Race” [5]. This petition calling for the abolition of slavery and an end to the slave trade was signed on February 3, 1790, just over two months before Franklin’s death.

The petition was then introduced to the House and Senate on February 12 th  and 15 th , 1790, respectively. It was immediately denounced by pro-slavery congressmen and ignited a heated debate in both branches of Congress. The House referred the petition to a select committee for further consideration, while the Senate took no action. On March 5 th , 1790, the committee decided that the Constitution restrains Congress from prohibiting the importation or emancipation of slaves until 1808 and then tabled the petition. Despite such results, Franklin’s final efforts still cement his transformation from master of slaves to outspoken abolitionist [6].

Contributors

A special thank you to our team of volunteer researchers whose diligent work in researching Franklin and slavery allowed us to create this page.

• Emma O’Kane
• Grace Sorenson
• David Walter

[1] Gary Nash, “Franklin and Slavery,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 150, no. 4 (2006): 620.

[2] Gary Nash, “Franklin and Slavery,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 150, no. 4 (2006): 630.

[3] Gary Nash, “Franklin and Slavery,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 150, no. 4 (2006): 635.

[4] VanJessica Gladney, “Benjamin Franklin and Slave Ownership,” Penn and Slavery Project, Accessed 15 February 2023, https://pennandslaveryproject.org/exhibits/show/slaveownership/earlytrustees/benfrank

[5] National Archives and Records Administration, “Benjamin Franklin’s Anti-Slavery Petitions to Congress,” accessed 15 February 2023, https://www.archives.gov/legislative/features/franklin

[6] Gary Nash, “Franklin and Slavery,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 150, no. 4 (2006): 635.

Bibliography

Benjamin Franklin Historical Society. “Slavery and the Abolition Society.” Benjamin Franklin Historical Society. Accessed 15 February 2023 http://www.benjamin-franklin-history.org/slavery-abolition-society/

Gladney, VanJessica. “Benjamin Franklin and Slave Ownership.” Penn and Slavery Project. Accessed 15 February 2023, https://pennandslaveryproject.org/exhibits/show/slaveownership/earlytrustees/benfrank

Hayes, Kevin. “New Light on Peter and King, the Two Slaves Benjamin Franklin Brought to England.” The Author. Oxford University Press, 2013.

Historic England. “Black Lives in England.” Historic England. Accessed 15 February 2023, https://historicengland.org.uk/research/inclusive-heritage/the-slave-trade-and-abolition/sites-of-memory/black-lives-in-england/

Nash, Gary B. “Franklin and Slavery.” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 150, no. 4 (2006): 618–35, http://www.jstor.org/stable/4599029.

National Archives. “Benjamin Franklin’s Anti-Slavery Petitions to Congress.” National Archives and Records Administration, accessed 15 February 2023, https://www.archives.gov/legislative/features/franklin

Further Reading

Brands, H.W. The First American: The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin: The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin. New York: Doubleday, 2000.

Fisher, Sydney. The True Benjamin Franklin: An Illuminating Look into the Life of One of Our Greatest Founding Fathers.

Franklin, Benjamin. The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2004.

Goodwin, George. Benjamin Franklin in London: The British Life of America’s Founding Father. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2016.

Isaacson, Walter. Benjamin Franklin: An American Life. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2004.

Waldstreicher, David. Runaway America: Benjamin Franklin, Slavery, and the American Revolution. New York: Hill and Wang, 2004.

Wood, Gordon. The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin. New York: Penguin Books, 2005.

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Collection Benjamin Franklin Papers

A chronology of key events in the life of Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790), statesman, publisher, scientist, and diplomat.

Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790)

1706, jan. 17, 1730, sept. 1, 1743, sept., 1774, dec. 19, 1776, mar.-may, 1778, feb. 6, 1778, sept., 1783, sept. 3, 1785, sept., 1787, may-sept., 1790, apr. 17.

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Benjamin Franklin

By: History.com Editors

Updated: June 25, 2024 | Original: November 9, 2009

One of the leading figures of early American history, Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) was a statesman, author, publisher, scientist, inventor and diplomat. Born into a Boston family of modest means, Franklin had little formal education. He went on to start a successful printing business in Philadelphia and grew wealthy. Franklin was deeply active in public affairs in his adopted city, where he helped launch a lending library, hospital and college and garnered acclaim for his experiments with electricity, among other projects. During the American Revolution , he served in the Second Continental Congress and helped draft the Declaration of Independence in 1776. He also negotiated the 1783 Treaty of Paris that ended the Revolutionary War (1775-83). In 1787, in his final significant act of public service, he was a delegate to the convention that produced the U.S. Constitution .

Benjamin Franklin’s Early Years

Benjamin Franklin was born on January 17, 1706, in colonial Boston. His father, Josiah Franklin (1657-1745), a native of England, was a candle and soap maker who married twice and had 17 children. Franklin’s mother was Abiah Folger (1667-1752) of Nantucket, Massachusetts , Josiah’s second wife. Franklin was the eighth of Abiah and Josiah’s 10 offspring.

Did you know? Benjamin Franklin is the only Founding Father  to have signed all four of the key documents establishing the U.S.: the Declaration of Independence (1776), the Treaty of Alliance with France (1778), the Treaty of Paris establishing peace with Great Britain (1783) and the U.S. Constitution (1787).

Franklin’s formal education was limited and ended when he was 10; however, he was an avid reader and taught himself to become a skilled writer. In 1718, at age 12, he was apprenticed to his older brother James, a Boston printer. By age 16, Franklin was contributing essays (under the pseudonym Silence Dogood) to a newspaper published by his brother. At age 17, Franklin ran away from his apprenticeship to Philadelphia, where he found work as a printer. In late 1724, he traveled to London, England, and again found employment in the printing business.

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Benjamin Franklin: Printer and Publisher

Benjamin Franklin returned to Philadelphia in 1726, and two years later opened a printing shop. The business became highly successful producing a range of materials, including government pamphlets, books and currency. In 1729, Franklin became the owner and publisher of a colonial newspaper, the Pennsylvania Gazette , which proved popular—and to which he contributed much of the content, often using pseudonyms. Franklin achieved fame and further financial success with “Poor Richard’s Almanack,” which he published every year from 1733 to 1758. The almanac became known for its witty sayings, which often had to do with the importance of diligence and frugality, such as “Early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.”

In 1730, Franklin began living with Deborah Read (c. 1705-74), the daughter of his former Philadelphia landlady, as his common-law wife. Read’s first husband had abandoned her; however, due to bigamy laws, she and Franklin could not have an official wedding ceremony. Franklin and Read had a son, Francis Folger Franklin (1732-36), who died of smallpox at age 4, and a daughter, Sarah Franklin Bache (1743-1808). Franklin had another son, William Franklin (c. 1730-1813), who was born out of wedlock. William Franklin served as the last colonial governor of New Jersey , from 1763 to 1776, and remained loyal to the British during the American Revolution . He died in exile in England.

Benjamin Franklin and Philadelphia

As Franklin’s printing business prospered, he became increasingly involved in civic affairs. Starting in the 1730s, he helped establish a number of community organizations in Philadelphia, including a lending library (it was founded in 1731, a time when books weren’t widely available in the colonies, and remained the largest U.S. public library until the 1850s), the city’s first fire company , a police patrol and the American Philosophical Society , a group devoted to the sciences and other scholarly pursuits. 

Franklin also organized the Pennsylvania militia, raised funds to build a city hospital and spearheaded a program to pave and light city streets. Additionally, Franklin was instrumental in the creation of the Academy of Philadelphia, a college which opened in 1751 and became known as the University of Pennsylvania in 1791.

Franklin also was a key figure in the colonial postal system. In 1737, the British appointed him postmaster of Philadelphia, and he went on to become, in 1753, joint postmaster general for all the American colonies. In this role he instituted various measures to improve mail service; however, the British dismissed him from the job in 1774 because he was deemed too sympathetic to colonial interests. In July 1775, the Continental Congress appointed Franklin the first postmaster general of the United States, giving him authority over all post offices from Massachusetts to Georgia . He held this position until November 1776, when he was succeeded by his son-in-law. (The first U.S. postage stamps, issued on July 1, 1847, featured images of Benjamin Franklin and George Washington .)

Benjamin Franklin's Inventions

In 1748, Franklin, then 42 years old, had expanded his printing business throughout the colonies and become successful enough to stop working. Retirement allowed him to concentrate on public service and also pursue more fully his longtime interest in science. In the 1740s, he conducted experiments that contributed to the understanding of electricity, and invented the lightning rod, which protected buildings from fires caused by lightning. In 1752, he conducted his famous kite experiment and demonstrated that lightning is electricity. Franklin also coined a number of electricity-related terms, including battery, charge and conductor.

In addition to electricity, Franklin studied a number of other topics, including ocean currents, meteorology, causes of the common cold and refrigeration. He developed the Franklin stove, which provided more heat while using less fuel than other stoves, and bifocal eyeglasses, which allow for distance and reading use. In the early 1760s, Franklin invented a musical instrument called the glass armonica. Composers such as Ludwig Beethoven (1770-1827) and Wolfgang Mozart (1756-91) wrote music for Franklin’s armonica; however, by the early part of the 19th century, the once-popular instrument had largely fallen out of use.

Benjamin Franklin and the American Revolution

In 1754, at a meeting of colonial representatives in Albany, New York , Franklin proposed a plan for uniting the colonies under a national congress. Although his Albany Plan was rejected, it helped lay the groundwork for the Articles of Confederation , which became the first constitution of the United States when ratified in 1781.

In 1757, Franklin traveled to London as a representative of the Pennsylvania Assembly, to which he was elected in 1751. Over several years, he worked to settle a tax dispute and other issues involving descendants of William Penn (1644-1718), the owners of the colony of Pennsylvania. After a brief period back in the U.S., Franklin lived primarily in London until 1775. While he was abroad, the British government began, in the mid-1760s, to impose a series of regulatory measures to assert greater control over its American colonies. In 1766, Franklin testified in the British Parliament against the Stamp Act of 1765, which required that all legal documents, newspapers, books, playing cards and other printed materials in the American colonies carry a tax stamp. Although the Stamp Act was repealed in 1766, additional regulatory measures followed, leading to ever-increasing anti-British sentiment and eventual armed uprising in the American colonies .

Franklin returned to Philadelphia in May 1775, shortly after the Revolutionary War (1775-83) had begun, and was selected to serve as a delegate to the Second Continental Congress, America’s governing body at the time. In 1776, he was part of the five-member committee that helped draft the Declaration of Independence , in which the 13 American colonies declared their freedom from British rule. That same year, Congress sent Franklin to France to enlist that nation’s help with the Revolutionary War. In February 1778, the French signed a military alliance with America and went on to provide soldiers, supplies and money that proved critical to America’s victory in the war.

As minister to France starting in 1778, Franklin helped negotiate and draft the 1783  Treaty of Paris that ended the Revolutionary War.

Benjamin Franklin’s Later Years

In 1785, Franklin left France and returned once again to Philadelphia. In 1787, he was a Pennsylvania delegate to the Constitutional Convention. (The 81-year-old Franklin was the convention’s oldest delegate.) At the end of the convention, in September 1787, he urged his fellow delegates to support the heavily debated new document. The U.S. Constitution was ratified by the required nine states in June 1788, and George Washington (1732-99) was inaugurated as America’s first president in April 1789.

Franklin died a year later, at age 84, on April 17, 1790, in Philadelphia. Following a funeral that was attended by an estimated 20,000 people, he was buried in Philadelphia’s Christ Church cemetery. In his will, he left money to Boston and Philadelphia, which was later used to establish a trade school and a science museum and fund scholarships and other community projects.

More than 200 years after his death, Franklin remains one of the most celebrated figures in U.S. history. His image appears on the $100 bill, and towns, schools and businesses across America are named for him.

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In 1781, Benjamin Franklin wrote an essay about farting

by Joseph Stromberg

In 1781, Benjamin Franklin decided to write about a truly important scientific topic: flatulence.

“It is universally well known, that in digesting our common food, there is created or produced in the bowels of human creatures, a great quantity of wind,” Franklin wrote in an essay variously known as “To the Royal Academy of Farting” or simply “ Fart Proudly .” “That the permitting this Air to escape and mix with the Atmosphere, is usually offensive to the Company, from the fetid Smell that accompanies it.”

Franklin’s reason for taking up the topic of farting? To urge the Royal Academy of Brussels, which had put out a call for scientific papers, to take up the goal of discovering “some Drug wholesome & not disagreable, to be mix’d with our common Food, or Sauces, that shall render the natural Discharges of Wind from our Bodies, not only inoffensive, but agreable as Perfumes.”

franklin wanted scientists to figure out how to make farts smell good

In other words, statesman, author, scientist, and inventor Benjamin Franklin wanted scientists to focus on creating a medicine that would make farts smell good.

Of course, the whole essay ( which you can read here ) was somewhat tongue-in-cheek. Franklin — who was living in Paris at the time — was frustrated by the impracticality of most questions taken up by the scientific establishment, so he wrote this essay in response, but didn’t actually send it to the Royal Academy. Instead, he sent copies to a few friends, including British chemist Joseph Priestley and philosopher Richard Price .

Franklin's dream is still unrealized: we don't have a medicine that makes farts smell good, though we do have drugs (like Beano) that cut down on gas production . Research has also found that foods which contain hydrogen sulfide — like beans, onions, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, broccoli, and dairy — disproportionately contribute to farts smelling bad.

In the essay, after making a few shrewd body-odor-related observations (namely, that asparagus makes urine smell bad , and turpentine makes it smell good ), Franklin asserted that the value of a medicine that makes farts smell good would trump many of science’s biggest achievements. “What Comfort can the Vortices of Descartes give to a Man who has Whirlwinds in his Bowels!” he exclaimed.

Finally, he concluded with a few puns — declaring that when it comes to practicality, the discoveries of Aristotle, Newton, Descartes, and others are “scarcely worth a FART-HING.”

For more on farting: 9 surprising facts about flatulence you may not know

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Remarks concerning the savages of north america, [before 7 january 1784], remarks concerning the savages of north america.

Printed at Passy, [1784]; AD (draft): Library of Congress; two copies: Library of Congress; incomplete press copy of copy: American Philosophical Society

In the fall and winter of 1783–84, when Franklin’s diplomatic responsibilities were at an ebb, he was confined to his house by painful ailments, and he was hoping for permission to leave France, he seems to have spent much of his time reflecting on the differences among peoples and nations, and considering how to characterize the nation he had helped to create. During these dark months he labored over three remarkably different pieces that, in various ways, contrasted America—or what he wanted America to be—with the culture of Old World Europe. All three were translated into French, but he circulated only two, in the form of printed pamphlets: “Remarks concerning the Savages of North America” and “Information to Those Who Would Remove to America” (published at the end of this volume). The third piece, written in the form of a private letter to his daughter, was suppressed on the advice of the abbé Morellet. Its critique of the French aristocracy was too blunt. 8

Neither of the two printed essays can be dated with any precision. “Remarks” had to have been written well before January 7, when the duc de La Rochefoucauld sent Franklin his French translation. (His cover letter is below.) The only other clue to the timing of its composition is a tenuous one: a crude pencil sketch on the verso of page 6 of the draft, depicting a manned hot-air balloon tethered to the ground with ropes. If contemporary with the draft, the drawing indicates that Franklin was working on “Remarks” during Montgolfier’s first manned balloon trials in October. 9

“Remarks” and “Information,” which were both produced in English and French editions, were not printed until sometime around March. 1 This was the period when Franklin was printing, as keepsakes for his friends, the shorter jeu d’esprits that he had written over the years of his residence at Passy and now gathered under the title “Bagatelles.” “Remarks” and “Information” were included in that collection. 2 Unlike the other bagatelles, however, which were only distributed to his circle of intimates, Franklin intended “Information,” and probably also “Remarks,” for a wider audience.

The first surviving references to these pamphlets are to the English versions. “Information” was ready by March 9, when Franklin sent a copy to Congress. 3 On March 10, the abbé Morellet sent both “Information” and “Remarks” to Lord Shelburne. 4 In May, without Franklin’s knowledge, John Stockdale in London published the pair as Two Tracts … by Dr. Benjamin Franklin, thereby attaching his name to pieces that had been issued anonymously. 5 Two months later, a Passy imprint of “Remarks” was given to Birmingham printers Pearson and Rollason, probably by Joseph Priestley. They reissued it with a prefatory “Advertisement” that attributed the essay to Franklin. A reviewer concurred that the style was certainly his. 6 In the fall of 1784 Jacques-Pierre Brissot de Warville translated the pieces and published them in his Journal du Licée de Londres. Although the pamphlets were “sans date & sans nom d’Auteur,” he wrote, they had surely come from the pen of “le politique profond & le Phisicien célèbre dont s’honore l’Amérique.” 7

Franklin’s French edition of “Information,” entitled “Avis à ceux qui voudraient s’en aller en Amérique,” was printed by early March, around the same time as the English; see the headnote to that piece. The earliest reference to his French edition of “Remarks” is a month later: when Mme Brillon requested a copy of “Avis,” he sent her both “Avis” and “Remarques sur la politesse des sauvages de l’Amérique septentrionale.” 8 His note to her of April 8 constitutes the sole surviving record of his having given “Remarks,” in either French or English, to anyone. That same month, however, the French version appeared in the Correspondance littéraire, where the editor noted that it had been translated from Franklin’s English by the duc de La Rochefoucauld. 9

Three manuscript versions of Franklins’ text survive, all undated: 10 his eleven-page draft and two contemporary copies of it made by Benjamin Franklin Bache. One of the copies is nearly perfect; this may have been the one given to the translator. The other (from which the press copy was made) 1 has several mistakes that Franklin corrected. He also made further revisions. The printed text includes those revisions, as well as two final wording changes that were not marked on this copy. They are noted in annotation, below.

We reproduce the text as printed on the Passy press because it reflects Franklin’s final revisions, and because it was the version that he made public. It is marred, however, by innumerable discrepancies that were introduced by the compositor: changes in punctuation, the rendering of contractions and ampersands, the use of italics, and the use of hyphens. The compositor was almost certainly Moritz Meyer, a Saxon printer with only a rudimentary knowledge of English, who worked for Franklin from December, 1783, until May, 1784. 2 That the compositor was a nonnative speaker is suggested by the nature of the occasional misspellings. That Franklin himself did not set the type is indicated by, among other things, the hyphenization of “North-America” throughout “Remarks” and “Information.” Franklin never hyphenated this name, nor was it hyphenated in any of Benny Bache’s copies. In our own title line, above, we render the name of this piece as Franklin did.

“Remarks” is in some ways the most enigmatic of the pamphlets Franklin printed at Passy. Whereas his purpose in distributing “Information” is well documented, his papers are silent as to “Remarks.” We have scant evidence of where he sent it, have found no acknowledgments of its receipt, and, with the one exception noted below, have found no reactions to it by any of his friends.

An unidentified British reader of Two Tracts took “Remarks” to be a “ludicrous” attempt to neutralize the stories of Indian savagery that were deterring potential emigrants from settling the American frontier, as recommended in “Information to Those Who Would Remove to America.” 3 The doctor’s good friend Cabanis, on the other hand, writing an appreciation of Franklin after his death, saw “Remarks” as an expression of the American minister’s belief in simplicity as the root of happiness, a belief that had been informed by firsthand observations of Indian tribes. Franklin viewed the Indians’ “mœurs” as superior to “les nôtres” in several ways, wrote Cabanis; living under the freedom they enjoyed had brought them greater happiness than that of “nations civilisées.” 4 These reactions reflected two common stereotypes of America. Both of these contemporaries failed to see in the essay what seems so evident to modern readers, the satire on the parochialism and hypocrisy of every nation’s view of itself and others.

[before January 7, 1784]

REMARKS CONCERNING THE SAVAGES OF NORTH-AMERICA.

Savages we call them, because their manners differ from ours, which we think the Perfection of Civility; they think the same of theirs.

Perhaps if we could examine the manners of different Nations with Impartiality, we should find no People so rude as to be without Rules of Politeness; nor any so polite as not to have some remains of Rudeness.

The Indian Men, when young, are Hunters and Warriors; when old, Counsellors; for all their Government is by the Counsel or Advice of the Sages; there is no Force, there are no Prisons, no Officers to compel Obedience, or inflict Punishment. Hence they generally study Oratory; the best Speaker having the most Influence. The Indian Women till the Ground, dress the Food, nurse and bring up the Children, & preserve & hand down to Posterity the Memory of Public Transactions. These Employments of Men and Women are accounted natural and honorable. Having few Artificial Wants, they have abundance of Leisure for Improvement by Conversation. Our laborious manner of Life compared with theirs, they esteem slavish and base; and the Learning on which we value ourselves; they regard as frivolous and useless. An Instance of this occurred at the Treaty of Lancaster in Pennsylvania, Anno 1744, between the Government of Virginia & the Six Nations. 5 After the principal Business was settled, the Commissioners from Virginia acquainted the Indians by a Speech, that there was at Williamsburg a College with a Fund for Educating Indian Youth, and that if the Chiefs of the Six-Nations 6 would send down half a dozen of their sons 7 to that College, the Government would take Care that they should be well provided for, and instructed in all the Learning of the white People. It is one of the Indian Rules of Politeness not to answer a public Proposition the same day that it is made; they think it would be treating it as a light Matter; and that they show it Respect by taking time to consider it, as of a Matter important. They therefore deferred their Answer till the day following; when their Speaker began by expressing their deep Sense of the Kindness of the Virginia Government, in making them that Offer; for we know, says he, that you highly esteem the kind of Learning taught in those Colleges, and that the Maintenance of our Young Men while with you, would be very expensive to you. We are convinced therefore that you mean to do us Good by your Proposal, and we thank you heartily. But you who are wise must know, that different Nations have different Conceptions of things; and you will therefore not take it amiss, if our Ideas of this Kind of Education happen not to be the same with yours. We have had some Experience of it: Several of our Young People were formerly brought up at the Colleges of the Northern Provinces; they were instructed in all your Sciences; but when they came back to us they were bad Runners, ignorant of every means of living in the Woods, unable to bear either Cold or Hunger, knew neither how to build a Cabin, take a Deer, or kill an Enemy, spoke our Language imperfectly; were therefore neither fit for Hunters, Warriors, or Counsellors; they were totally good for nothing. We are however not the less obliged by your kind Offer, tho’ we decline accepting it; and to show our grateful Sense of it, if the Gentlemen of Virginia will send us a dozen of their Sons, we will take great Care of their Education, instruct them in all we know, and make Men of them.

Having frequent Occasions to hold public Councils, they have acquired great Order and Decency in conducting them. The old Men sit in the foremost Ranks, the Warriors in the next, and the Women and Children in the hindmost. The Business of the Women is to take exact notice of what passes, imprint it in their Memories, for they have no Writing, and communicate it to their Children. They are the Records of the Council, and they preserve Tradition of the Stipulations in Treaties a hundred Years back, which when we compare with our Writings we always find exact. 8 He that would speak, rises. The rest observe a profound Silence. When he has finish’d and sits down, they leave him five or six Minutes to recollect, that if he has omitted any thing he intended to say, or has any thing to add, he may rise again and deliver it. To interrupt another, even in common Conversation, is reckoned highly indecent. How different this is from the Conduct of a polite British House of Commons, where scarce a day passes without some Confusion that makes the Speaker hoarse in calling to order; and how different from the mode of Conversation in many polite Companies of Europe, where if you do not deliver your Sentence with great Rapidity, you are cut off in the middle of it by the impatient Loquacity of those you converse with, & never suffer’d to finish it.

The Politeness of these Savages in Conversation is indeed carried to excess, since it does not permit them to contradict, or deny the Truth of what is asserted in their Presence. By this means they indeed avoid Disputes, but then it becomes difficult to know their Minds, or what Impression you make upon them. The Missionaries who have attempted to convert them to Christianity, all complain of this as one of the great Difficulties of their Mission. The Indians hear with Patience the Truths of the Gospel explained to them, and give their usual Tokens of Assent and Approbation: you would think they were convinced. No such Matter. It is mere Civility.

A Suedish Minister having assembled the Chiefs of the Sasquehanah Indians, made a Sermon to them, acquainting them with the principal historical Facts on which our Religion is founded, such as the Fall of our first Parents by Eating an Apple, the Coming of Christ to repair the Mischief, his Miracles and Suffering, &c. When he had finished, an Indian Orator stood up to thank him. What you have told us, says he, is all very good. It is indeed bad to eat Apples. It is better to make them all into Cyder. We are much obliged by your Kindness in coming so far to tell us those things which you have heard from your Mothers. In return I will tell you some of those we have heard from ours.

In the Beginning our Fathers had only the Flesh of Animals to subsist on, and if their Hunting was unsuccessful, they were starving. Two of our young Hunters having killed a Deer, made a Fire in the Woods to broil some Parts of it. When they were about to satisfy their Hunger, they beheld a beautiful young Woman descend from the Clouds, and seat herself on that Hill which you see yonder among the blue Mountains. They said to each other, it is a Spirit that perhaps has smelt our broiling Venison, & wishes to eat of it: let us offer some to her. They presented her with the Tongue: She was pleased with the Taste of it, & said, your Kindness shall be rewarded. Come to this Place after thirteen Moons, and you shall find something that will be of great Benefit in nourishing you and your Children to the latest Generations. They did so, and to their Surprise found Plants they had never seen before, but which from that ancient time have been constantly cultivated among us to our great Advantage. Where her right Hand had touch’d the Ground, they found Maize; where her left Hand had touch’d it, they found Kidney-beans; and where her Backside had sat on it, they found Tobacco. 9 The good Missionary, disgusted with this idle Tale, said, what I delivered to you were sacred Truths; but what you tell me is mere Fable, Fiction & Falsehood. The Indian offended, reply’d, my Brother, it seems your Friends have not done you Justice in your Education; they have not well instructed you in the Rules of common Civility. You saw that we who understand and practise those Rules, believed all your Stories; why do you refuse to believe ours? 10

When any of them come into our Towns, our People are apt to croud round them, gaze upon them, and incommode them where they desire to be private; this they esteem great Rudeness, and the Effect of want of Instruction in the Rules of Civility and good Manners. We have, say they, as much Curiosity as you, and when you come into our Towns we wish for Opportunities of looking at you; but for this purpose we hide ourselves behind Bushes where you are to pass, and never intrude ourselves into your Company.

Their Manner of entring one anothers Villages has likewise its Rules. It is reckon’d uncivil in travelling Strangers to enter a Village abruptly, without giving Notice of their Approach. Therefore as soon as they arrive within hearing, they stop and hollow, remaining there till invited to enter. Two old Men usually come out to them, and lead them in. There is in every Village a vacant Dwelling, called the Strangers House. Here they are placed, while the old Men go round from Hut to Hut acquainting the Inhabitants that Strangers are arrived who are probably hungry and weary; and every one sends them what he can spare of Victuals and Skins to repose on. When the Strangers are refresh’d, Pipes & Tobacco are brought; and then, but not before, Conversation begins, with Enquiries who they are, whither bound, what News, &c. and it usually ends with Offers of Service, if the Strangers have Occasion of Guides or any Necessaries for continuing their Journey; and nothing is exacted for the Entertainment.

The same Hospitality, esteemed among them as a principal Virtue, is practiced by private Persons; of which Conrad Weiser, our Interpreter, gave me the following Instance. He had been naturaliz’d among the Six-Nations, and spoke well the Mohock Language. In going thro’ the Indian Country, to carry a Message from our Governor to the Council at Onondaga, he call’d at the Habitation of Canassetego, 1 an old Acquaintance, who embraced him, spread Furs for him to sit on, placed before him some boiled Beans and Venison, and mixed some Rum and Water for his Drink. When he was well refresh’d, and had lit his Pipe, Canassetego began to converse with him, ask’d how he had fared the many Years since they had seen each other, whence he then came, what occasioned the Journey, &c. &c. Conrad answered all his Questions; and when the Discourse began to flag, the Indian, to continue it, said, Conrad, you have liv’d long among the white People, and know something of their Customs; I have been sometimes at Albany, and have observed that once in seven Days, they shut up their Shops and assemble all in the great House; tell me, what is it for? what do they do there? They meet there, says Conrad, to hear & learn good things. I do not doubt, says the Indian, that they tell you so; they have told me the same; but I doubt the Truth of what they say, & I will tell you my Reasons. I went lately to Albany to sell my Skins, & buy Blankets, Knives, Powder, Rum, &c. You know I used generally to deal with Hans Hanson; but I was a little inclined this time to try some other Merchants. However I called first upon Hans, and ask’d him what he would give for Beaver; He said he could not give more than four Shillings a Pound; but, says he, I cannot talk on Business now; this is the Day when we meet together to learn good things, and I am going to the Meeting. So I thought to myself since I cannot do any Business to day, I may as well go to the Meeting too; and I went with him. There stood up a Man in black, and began to talk to the People very angrily. I did not understand what he said; but perceiving that he looked much at me, & at Hanson, I imagined he was angry at seeing me there; so I went out, sat down near the House, struck Fire & lit my Pipe; waiting till the Meeting should break up. I thought too, that the Man had mentioned something of Beaver, and I suspected it might be the Subject of their Meeting. So when they came out I accosted any [my] 2 Merchant; well Hans, says I, I hope you have agreed to give more than four Shillings a Pound. No, says he, I cannot give so much. I cannot give more than three Shillings and six Pence. I then spoke to several other Dealers, but they all sung the same Song, three & six Pence, three & six Pence. This made it clear to me that my Suspicion was right; and that whatever they pretended of Meeting to learn good things, the real Purpose was to consult, how to cheat Indians in the Price of Beaver. Consider but a little, Conrad, and you must be of my Opinion. If they met so often to learn good things, they would certainly have learnt some before this time. But they are still ignorant. You know our Practice. If a white Man in travelling thro’ our Country, enters one of our Cabins, we all treat him as I treat you; we dry him if he is wet, we warm him if he is cold, and give him Meat & Drink that he may allay his Thirst and Hunger, & we spread soft Furs for him to rest & sleep on: We demand nothing in return*. 3 But if I go into a white Man’s House at Albany, and ask for Victuals & Drink, they say, where is your Money? and if I have none, they say, Get out, you Indian Dog. You see they have not yet learnt those little good things, that we need no Meetings to be instructed in, because our Mothers taught them to us when we were Children. And therefore, it is impossible their Meetings, should be as they say for any such purpose, or have any such Effect; they are only to contrive the Cheating of Indians in the Price of Beaver.

8 .  See BF to Sarah Bache, Jan. 26 (below).

9 .  In the sketch, the basket suspended below the balloon holds a tiny figure wearing a cap, arms outstretched, evidently stoking the fire. Montgolfier conducted his first manned balloon trials in just this way: his aeronaut was lifted a short distance into the air under very controlled conditions. See the annotation of Le Roy to BF , [Oct. 19?].

1 .  Facsimiles of the English and French imprints of “Remarks concerning the Savages of North America” are in The Bagatelles from Passy (New York, 1967), pp. [157]–80.

2 .  BF wrote as much to Mme Brillon on April 8, 1784, after sending her the French versions of “Remarks” and “Information” ( APS ). Only two examples of the collected bagatelles survive, one at the Yale University Library, the other at the Bibliothèque nationale. The Yale copy contains the English and French versions of both essays. The copy at the BN contains only the French versions.

3 .  See the headnote to “Information to Those Who Would Remove to America,” [before March].

4 .  Morellet noted in his letter that this was how BF had occupied his leisure time since the peace. He added that BF was now expecting his recall: Medlin, Morellet, 1, 508.

5 .  When BF learned of the publication, he wrote to Benjamin Vaughan that he would “rather [my name] had been omitted.” At that point, he had heard only that “Information” had been published: BF to Vaughan, July 26, 1784 (Library of Congress). Two Tracts proved so popular that it went through three editions before the end of 1784.

6 .  The advertisement stated: “A gentleman who has just received from France a copy of the following ‘Remarks,’ written by Dr. Franklin, and printed by himself, for his amusement, at his own house at Passey, near Paris, having favoured the publishers with it; they re-print the same, being sensible that the most trifling miscellaneous productions of that distinguished author, will be agreeable to the public.” Paul L. Ford suggested that Joseph Priestley was the pamphlet’s source, as Pearson and Rollason published his works: Franklin Bibliography … (Brooklyn, N.Y., 1889), p. 171. The review appeared in the Monthly Review, LXXI (1784), 70.

7 .  Brissot printed “Information” (whose title he translated as “Avis à ceux qui voudroient émigrer en Amérique”) in the October issue. “Remarks” (“Remarques sur les Sauvages de l’Amérique Septentrionale”) appeared in November: Journal du Licée de Londres, I (1784), 229–42, 290–302. The short-lived journal was published monthly during 1784: Jean Sgard, ed., Dictionnaire des journaux, 1600–1789 (2 vols., Paris, 1991), II , 659–60.

8 .  Mme Brillon to BF , [April] 4, 1784; BF to Mme Brillon, April 8, 1784 (both at the APS ).

9 .  [Friedrich Melchior Baron von Grimm et al., eds.], Correspondance littéraire, philosophique et critique de Grimm et de Diderot, depuis 1753 jusqu’en 1790 (15 vols., Paris, 1829–31), XII , 93–103.

10 .  We do not publish the French text, as it was not primarily the work of BF . The degree to which he suggested alterations is impossible to gauge, as La Rochefoucauld’s manuscript is missing. It must have been at La Rochefoucauld’s suggestion, however, that “la politesse” was added to the title. For the French text, see The Bagatelles from Passy.

1 .  This press copy was taken before BF corrected and emended the text.

2 .  For Meyer, see the annotation of Rufin and Meyer to BF , Oct. 31, above. It is possible that he was assisted by BFB , whom he may have been tutoring in the arts of composition and printing. BFB printed his first broadside in late December, 1783; it is reproduced below. See also the List of Illustrations.

3 .  Public Advertiser, Oct. 7, 1784.

4 .  Cabanis himself considered this view naive: Œuvres complètes de Cabanis (5 vols., Paris, 1823–25), V , 245–6.

5 .  From here until the end of the paragraph, BF presents a fuller version of a story that he had related to Peter Collinson in a letter of May 9, 1753. Both versions differ from the official record; see IV , 482–3.

6 .  BF did not hyphenate “Six Nations,” and he added “Chiefs of the” after the fair copies were made.

7 .  BF ’s draft and both fair copies have “young Lads” here. The French translation renders this “jeunes garçons”, leading us to think that La Rochefoucauld was working from one of BFB ’s copies.

8 .  The role of women in memorizing tribal history is also related in a textual note to “The Captivity of William Henry”: XV , 152n. BF ’s possible authorship of that piece is discussed in XV , 145–8, where a similarity to “Remarks” is discussed.

9 .  This corn myth varies from the one in the “Captivity”: XV , 151–2. BF learned of it from Conrad Weiser and Lewis Evans, who marked the hill on his 1749 Map of Pensilvania, New-Jersey, New-York, And the Three Delaware Counties ( III , 392n) as “Onwgaréxnu M[ountain]. Where Indian Corn, Tobacco, Squashes, and Pompions were first found by the Natives, according to their traditions”: J. A. Leo Lemay, The Life of Benjamin Franklin (3 vols., Philadelphia, 2006–9), II , 483.

10 .  The same rhetorical question was posed in almost identical terms in “Captivity”: XV , 157.

1 .  Canassatego was a chief of the Onondaga: XV , 149n.

2 .  “Any” was a typographical error; Stockdale corrected it in his London reprint.

3 .  Note in text: “* It is remarkable that in all Ages and Countries, Hospitality has been allowed as the Virtue of those, whom the civiliz’d were pleased to call Barbarians; the Greeks celebrated the Scythians for it. The Saracens possess’d it eminently; and it is to this day the reigning Virtue of the wild Arabs. S. Paul too, in the Relation of his Voyage & Shipwreck, on the Island of Melita, says, The Barbarous People shew’d us no little Kindness; for they kindled a Fire, and received us every one, because of the present Rain & because of the Cold.”

In the draft, the quotation is identified as coming from “Acts ch. 27.” It is actually from Acts of the Apostles 28:2.

Benjamin Franklin Bache’s First Broadside

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The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

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This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfectionssuch as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed worksworldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.++++The below data was compiled from various identification fields in the bibliographic record of this title. This data is provided as an additional tool in helping to ensure edition identification: ++++ Autobiography Of Benjamin Franklin: With His Essays And Will Benjamin Franklin Belford, Clarke, 1884 Biography & Autobiography; Historical; Biography & Autobiography / Historical; Biography & Autobiography / Political.

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