BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. IN reading the life of Franklin we are constantly surprised at the versatility of his powers. He achieved an undying reputation as a man of business, as a scientist, as a writer, as a statesman, and as a diplomatist. It is impossible to give here an adequate idea of his greatness or of the debt of gratitude which we all owe him for the help he rendered our nation in times of sore need. For the events of his life the reader is referred to his Autobiography 1 classic masterpiece with which every American should be familiar. What follows is a review of Franklin's character by John T. Morse, Jr., at the end of his admirable biography of Franklin, in the American Statesmen Series: 1 a "Among illustrious Americans Franklin stands preëminent in the interest which is aroused by a study of his character, his mind and his career. One becomes attached to him, bids him farewell with regret, and feels that for such as he the longest span of life is all too short. Even though dead, he attracts a personal regard which renders easily intelligible the profound affection which so many men felt for him while living. It may be doubted whether any one man ever had so many, such constant, and such firm friends as in three different nations formed about him a veritable host. In the States and in France he was loved, and as he grew into old age he was revered, not by those who heard 1 See Riverside Literature Series, Nos. 19 and 20. of him only, but most warmly by those who best knew him. Even in England, where for years he was the arch rebel of all America, he was generally held in respect and esteem, and had many constant friends whose confidence no events could shake. . . . Moral, intellectual, and material boons he conferred in such abundance that few such benefactors of the race can be named, though one should survey all the ages. A man of a greater humanity never lived: and the quality which stood Abou Ben Adhem in good stead should suffice to save Franklin from human criticism. He not only loved his kind, but he also trusted them with an implicit confidence, reassuring if not extraordinary in an observer of his shrewdness and experience. . . . ... The "Franklin's inborn ambition was the noblest of all ambitions to be of practical use to the multitude of men. chief motive of his life was to promote the welfare of mankind. Every moment which he could snatch from enforced occupations was devoted to doing, devising, or suggesting something advantageous more or less generally to men. . . His desire was to see the community prosperous, comfortable, happy, advancing in the accumulation of money and of all physical goods, but not to the point of luxury; it was by no means the pile of dollars which was his end, and he did not care to see many men rich, but rather to see all men well to do. He was perfectly right in thinking that virtuous living has the best prospects in a well-to-do society. He gave liberally of his own means and induced others to give, and promoted in proportion to the ability of the community a surprising number of public and quasi-public enterprises; and always the fireside of the poor man was as much in his thought as the benefit of the richer circle. Fair dealing and kindliness, prudence and economy in order to procure the comforts and simpler luxuries of life, reading and knowledge. for those uses which wisdom subserves, constituted the real essence of his teaching. His inventive genius was ever at work devising methods of making daily life more agreeable, comfortable, and wholesome for all who have to live. In a word, the service of his fellow-men was his constant aim; and he so served them that those public official functions which are euphemistically called 'public services' seemed in his case almost an interruption of the more direct and far-reaching services which he was intent upon rendering to all civilized peoples. "As a patriot none surpassed him. Again it was the love of the people that induced this feeling, which grew from no theory as to forms of government, no abstractions and doctrines about the rights of man.' . . . During the struggle of the States no man was more hearty in the cause than Franklin; and the depth of feeling shown in his letters, simple and unrhetorical as they are, is impressive. All that he had he gave. What also strikes the reader of his writings is the broad national spirit which he manifested. He had an immense respect for the dignity of America; he was perhaps fortunately saved from disillusionment by his distance from home. But be this as it may, the way in which he felt and therefore genuinely talked about his nation and his country was not without its moral effect in Europe. "Intellectually there are few men who are Franklin's peers in all the ages and nations. He covered, and covered well, vast ground. The reputation of doing and knowing various unrelated things is wont to bring suspicion of perfunctoriness; but the ideal of the human intellect is an understanding to which all knowledge and all activity are germane. There have been a few, very few minds which have approximated toward this ideal, and among them Franklin's is prominent. He was one of the most distinguished scientists who have ever lived. Bancroft calls him 'the greatest diplomatist of his century.' His ingenious and useful devices and inventions were very numerous. He possessed a masterly shrewdness in business and practical affairs. He was a profound thinker and preacher in morals and on the 1 1 Bancroft, History of the United States, ix. 134. conduct of life; so that with the exception of the founders of great religions it would be difficult to name any persons who have more extensively influenced the ideas, motives, and habits of life of men. He was one of the most, perhaps the most agreeable conversationist of his age. He was a rare wit and humorist, and in an age when American humor' was still unborn, amid contemporaries who have left no trace of a jest, still less of the faintest appreciation of humor, all which he said and wrote was brilliant with both the most charming qualities of the human mind. . . . He was a man who impressed his ability upon all who met him; so that the abler the man and the more experienced in judging men, the higher did he rate Franklin when brought into direct contact with him; politicians and statesmen of Europe, distrustful and sagacious, trained readers and valuers of men, gave him the rare honor of placing confidence not only in his personal sincerity, but in his broad fairmindedness, a mental quite as much as a moral trait. ... "It is hard indeed to give full expression to a man of such scope in morals, in mind, and in affairs. He illustrates humanity in an astonishing multiplicity of ways at an infinite number of points. He, more than any other, seems to show us how many-sided our human nature is. No individual, of course, fills the entire circle; but if we can imagine a circumference which shall express humanity, we can place within it no one man who will reach out to approach it and to touch it at so many points as will Franklin. A man of active as well as universal good will, of perfect trustfulness towards all dwellers on the earth, of supreme wisdom expanding over all the interests of the race, none has earned a more kindly loyalty. By the instruction which he gave, by his discoveries, by his inventions, and by his achievements in public life he earns the distinction of having rendered to men varied and useful services excelled by no other one man; and thus he has established a claim upon the gratitude of mankind so broad that history holds few who can be his rivals." CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF THE PRINCIPAL EVENTS IN Born in Boston, Massachusetts . Is apprenticed to his brother, a printer. January 17, 1706 X 1718 Begins to write for the "New England Courant' 1719 Runs away to New York, and finally to Philadelphia Goes to England and works at his trade as a journeyman printer in London. Returns to Philadelphia. Marries Establishes the "Philadelphia Gazette” First publishes "Poor Richard's Almanac 1723 X 1725 1726 1730 1730 1732 X 1737 Establishes the Philadelphia Public Library 1742 Establishes the American Philosophical Society and the Uni versity of Philadelphia 1744 Carries on the investigations by which he proves the identity of lightning with electricity.. 1746-52 Assists in founding a hospital 1751 Is appointed Postmaster-General for the Colonies Is sent by the Assembly of the Province of Pennsylvania as an emissary to England in behalf of the colonists 1753 1757. Receives the degree of LL. D. from St Andrews, Oxford, and Is elected F. R. S., and receives the Copley Gold Medal for his papers on the nature of lightning 1775 Is elected to the Continental Congress. 1775 Signs the Declaration of Independence (having been one of the committee to draft it) 1776 Is employed in the diplomatic service of the United States, chiefly at Paris 1776-85 Is President of the Pennsylvania Supreme Council 1785-88 Is a delegate to the convention to draw up the United States |