Benjamin Franklin. A biography

Preface

The author has designed the present series of Biographies more particularly for the young. And, in pursuing his original plan along to its termination, he has set before himself the following objects, to which he invites the reader's attention :

To furnish from the pages of the world's history a few examples of true manhood, lofty purpose, and persevermg effort, such as may be safely held up either for the admiration or emulation of the youth of the present day ;

To clear away, in his treatment of these subjects, whatever mistiness and mustiness may have accumulated with time about them, presenting to the mental vision fresh and living pictures, that shall seem to be clothed with naturalness, and energy, and vitality;

To offer no less instruction to the minds, than pleasure to the imaginations of the many for whom he has taken it in hand to write ;

And, more especially, perhaps, to familiarize the youth I*

VI PREFACE.

of our day with those striking and manly characters, that have long ago made their mark, deep and lasting, on the history and fortunes of the American Continent.

The deeds of these men, it is true, are to be found abundantly recorded in Histories; but they lie so scattered along their ten thousand pages, and are so intermixed with the voluminous records of other matters, as to be practically out of the reach of the younger portion of readers, and so of the very ones for whom this series has been undertaken. These want only pictures of actual life ; and, if the author shall, in any due degree, succeed even in sketching interesting outlines^ he will feel that he is answering the very purpose that has long lain unperformed within his heart.

co:n'texts.

BENJAMIN PRANKLIN.

Chapter I. Youth And Apprenticeship

TT is uncommon for the steps of so practical a person as Dr. Franklin to be turned into such romantic paths. He could have dreamed of nothing more than a life of hard and steady labor; yet the persevering pursuit of that very labor made him the counsellor of Generals and Congresses, the representxitive of his country at foreign Courts, and worthy to be asked to sit down with kings.

He was a genuine product of American soil. His mother-wit served him better than learning, and his ready knowledge of human nature was an invaluable resource. He was shrewd and sagacious ; prudent, yet bold ; frugal, yet generous ; a student of philosophy, but a man of the world.

He took hold of whatever he did, that he might work out some tangible result. Nothing came to him by luck, but everything through labor. His instinctive modesty was only paralleled by his admirable self-possession. 'No man was ever more willing to keep himself out of sight, if by that means the cause could be helped on. He sought only stable things ; and reputation followed as a matter of course. His clearness and coolness of judgment made him widely sought after as an adviser ; and, if he offered a doubt, it was called one of '' Franklin's portents," which led men to pause and reflect a little longer.

This is by no means a summary of his varied character, but a mere hint of the sterling ore which lay beneath.

Benjamin Franklin was born in Boston, but settled in business, at last, in Philadelphia, where he established his home. His father came over from England with his first wife, in 1685, bringing three children ; four more were born to them in Boston, when his wife died, and he married again. The second wife bore him ten children, of which number Benjamin was the eighth, two girls being his juniors. The whole brood, therefore, counted seventeen : Franklin says, in his autobiography, that he remembered to have seen thirteen sitting arauncl the table at one time.

His father's name was Josiah ; he married Abiah Folger, a daughter of one of the early settlers of 'New England, whom old Cotton Mather styled "a godly and learned Englishman." His father's trade, after coming to l^ew England, was that of a tallow-chandler and soap-boiler: he had been a dyer in the old country, but found that trade too poor an one to permit him to support his family. He was an excellent man, of a firm and healthy texture of character, fond of mechanical operations, skilled in drawing, and much given to music. After the day's work was over, he used to play on his violin, accompanying it with his voice. He was possessed of a sound judgment, and would have been called into public affairs had not his large family kept him in straitened circumstances and held him all the time close to his trade. His word, however, had weight with the leading men of his church, and many persons came to consult him about their private matters. They often chose him to decide in their differences, willing to abide his just decision. Franklin says that, at the family table, he liked to have some sensible friend, or neighbor, call in to converse with him, and invariably started some topic for talk, with a view to improve the minds of the children. "By this means" — he adds — "he turned our attention to what was good, just, and prudent, in the conduct of life ; and little or no notice was ever taken of what related to the victuals on the table, whether it was well or ill dressed, in or out of season, of good or bad flavor, preferable or inferior to this or that other thing of the kind: so that I was brought up in such a perfect inattention to those matters, as to be* quite indifferent what kind of food v/as set before me."

Franklin's father lived to be eighty-nine years of age, and his mother to be eighty-five : he says he never knew either of them to have any sickness but that of which they died. They lie buried in Boston, where he erected over them a marble tablet, on which is recorded the story of their lives and virtues. The inscription on this stone is curious enough to be copied into even the briefest life of the dutiful and illustrious son. This is it :—

JosiAH Franklin

and

Abiah his wife,

Lie here interred.

They lived lovingly together in wredlock

Fifty-five years ;

And without an eftate, or any gainful employment,

By conftant labor, and honest induftry,

(With God's blessing,)

Maintained a large family comfortably.

And brought up thirteen children, and seven grandchildren

Reputably.

From this inftance, reader.

Be encouraged to diligence in thy calling,

And distrust not Providence,

He was a pious and prudent man,

She a discreet and virtuous woman.

Their youngest son.

In filial regard to their memory.

Places this ftone.

When young Benjamin was eight years old, he was sent to the grammar school, his father meaning to devote him to the service of the church. The lad was a ready learner, and made rapid progress in his classes, rising from one to another. He was kept here but about a year, however, his father's circumstances not allowing him to think of sending him to college, and was next put to a Mr. George Brownwell, who kept a famous school for writing and arithmetic. "With this teacher he soon learned to write a good hand ; hut he confesses that he made a failure in his arithmetic ! He was hut ten years old, when his father took him out of school to help him in his business of tallow-chandler and soap-boiler; and the future philosopher and statesman was, so early in life as that, cutting wicks for candles, filling moulds with melted tallow, waiting on the shop, and running of errands. He declares that he did not like the trade, and wanted to go to sea; but his father would permit no such thing. Living where the tides came and went twice each day, he spent more or less time about the water, and very soon learned to swim well, and to manage boats ; and when the least trouble threatened the young crew on the water, Franklin was set up as captain and controller.

He was generally a leader among his comrades, and admits that he sometimes led them into "scrapes;" he mentions one such, to show what spirit he was made of. " There was a salt marsh," he says, " which bounded part of the mill-pond, on the edge of which, at high water, we used to stand to fish for minnows. By mucli trampling we had made it a mere qnagmire. My proposal was to build a wharf there for iis to stand upon, and I showed my comrades a large heap of stones which were intended for a new house near the marsh, and which would very well suit our purpose. Accordingly, in the evening, when the workmen were gone home, I assembled a number of my playfellows, and we worked diligently, like so many emmets, sometimes two or three to a stone, till w^e brought them all to make a little wharf. The next morning, the workmen w^ere surprised at missing' the stones, which had formed our wharf. Inquirv was made after the authors of this transfer ; we were discovered, complained of, and corrected ly our fathers; and, though I demonstrated the utility of our work, mine convinced me that that which was not honest, could not be truly usefuV

Franklin continued with his father in the soap boiler's business for two years, arriving at his twelfth year. He disliked the trade worse than ever ; and his father began to fear lest the lad would indeed run away to sea, if his own wishes in the matter of a calling were not more regarded. 80 he took his son to walk with him all about

the town, among the joiners,, the bricklayers, the turners, the braziers, and the men of other trades and occupations, while at their work, all the time watching to see which of them all the lad might appear to prefer, and intending to let him choose any one of them, if that would only break his tendency for the sea. One happy result came of these repeated visits, if no other : when the boy became a man, he knew so much of .the several trades, and how workmen handled their tools, that he was always ready to perform trifling jobs in the house, and could construct machines for his philosophical experiments just when his intention was fresh and warm in his mind.

His father at last designed him for the cutler's trade, and placed him for a few days, as a trial, with his brother Samuel, who had been bred to the trade in London, and had recently set up in business in Boston ; but his cousin demanded so large a fee for his apprenticeship, that his father was displeased with it, and the lad was taken home again. A single circumstance at this point came in to decide the whole matter; owing to this alone, Benjamin Franklin was put in the way of becoming widely useful to his own generation, and illustrious before the world. He had a passion for reading. That was the golden key which unlocked his whole future. All the money he could earn he spent in buying books. He took especial delight in voyages. The first books he bought were Bunyan's works, in small volumes. These he afterwards sold, to get the money to buy R. Burton's "Historical Collections," in all, forty little volumes. He read the greater part of his father's library, which was made up of volumes on theology, and was of a dry, argumentative character. He said he had often regretted that at that particular time more proper books had not been thrown in his way, especially as he was not to study afterward for the ministry. He found Plutarch's Lives among his father's books, and devoured them ; many a promising lad has done it before and since, and Franklin confessed the great benefit he received from the book. He mentions, likewise, a book written by De Foe, styled an "Essay on Projects," and one, in particular, written by the famous Cotton Mather, called " An Essay to do Good." Much and lasting good it did in his case, certainly. He admitted that it gave him "a turn of thinking," and had an influence on some of the future events of his life.

Seeing how he liked books and reading, his father resolved to make liim a printer. This was the long and decisive step in his career. One son, James, was ah-eady of that trade, and had returned from England not a long time before, with press and other implements, to set up business in Boston. Benjamin admits that he liked the idea of that trade much better than his father's, although he could not yet wholly give up the sea. To make it secure as soon as possible, his father made haste to bind him to service to the elder brother. Benjamin resisted the plan for some time, but was at length persuaded, and put his own name to the legal indenture, being but twelve years old at the time of doing it. This instrument held him to serve his brother James, at the printer's trade, until he should become twenty-one years old; but, according to custom, he was to have journeyman's wages the last year. He took hold in earnest, and made such proo-ress at his new trade that he was soon of real value to his brother's business. In his new situation he was thrown in the way of procuring better books, and more of them. A friendship contracted with the booksellers' apprentices of the town enabled him, from time to time, to borrow a small volume, which he always returned soon, and clean. Other borrowers might take a useful hint from their great exemplar, and save a great deal of hard feeling. He used to sit up in his chamber, very often for the greater part of the night, reading,^ so as to return in the morning the book he had borrowed the evening before, lest it should be missed from the bookseller's shop. There was a merchant in Boston then, Matthew Adams by name, who was in the habit of calling in at the printing office of James Franklin ; he had a good store of books, and, seeing how fond the printer lad was of reading, generously invited him to come and see his library, offering to lend him whatever books he wanted to read.

He tried his hand at writing poetry about this time, and his brother rather encouraged him to continue with it ; he composed a couple of ballads, one of them called '' The Light House Tragedy," and the other a sailor's song, on the capture of one Teach, a pirate of the day, who was nicknamed "Blackbeard." Franklin himself afterward admitted that they were "wretched stuftV When they were printed, his brother sent him around town to peddle them. Of the former he sold a very large number, and he was made some^ what vain in consequence; but his father, who

2* had good hard sense, criticised his ballads without mercy, and wound up with telling him that "versemakers were generally beggars." This utterly discouraged the youth's ambition in that direction. He says he " escaped being a poet, and probably a very bad one."

All this, however, had no effect to dissuade him from his resolution to acquire skill in expressing his thoughts in good 'prose. There was a lad in town named John Collins, w^ho was a close friend of young Franklin, Both loved to argue, and were fond of disputing, although Franklin admitted when he grew wiser that it was a bad habit in a man, and very apt to spoil conversation, to sour friendship, and to disgust the company ; he afterward observed that few persons were addicted to it beside lawyers and collegians. Collins and himself became concerned in an argument about the propriety of educating females, and their natural ability for study ; his friend professing to believe the other sex intellectually inferior to ours, and Franklin maintaining the contrary. Collins rather vanquished the future philosopher with the greater flow of his words, w^hile the latter still remained unconvinced by his reasons. To place the matter on its merits solely, after they separated, franklin put down his arguments on paper, in as clear phrases as he could command, and copied and sent them to his opponent. Collins read and answered them, and Franklin replied. They had been disputing in this style to the number of three or four letters, when the lad's father chanced to come across his papers, and read them. Soon afterward, he sat down and talked with his son about what he had discovered ; he did not offer to argue the question involved, either one way or another, but he touched upon his son's style of writing, observing that, although he clearly had the advantage of his opponent in punctuation and spelling, he fell far short of him in style of expression, in clearness, and in his method of discussion.

The criticism came in good time ; it set the youth to thinking on the faults of his composition, and aroused his resolution to make himself a clear and eifective writer. He fell in with an odd volume of the British " Spectator," then, — a hajDpy coincidence indeed. It w^as the first time he had ever seen any part of those delightful essays. He bought the volume, and read it again and again with much delight. He liked its easy style of writing so well, that he resolved to try and imitate it. To this end, he began with a single number^ or essay, in the volume ; mastering the thoughts or sentiments of each sentence, and noting them clown on paper, he laid them by for a few days, and then put them in the best language of his own which he could command, and compared what he had done with what the writers of the "Spectator" had done. In this way, he was really writing up to the "Spectator" standard, the famous authors of that collection of essays furnishing him with criticisms, hints, and models, as he went along. In no other way coukl he so readily detect his own faults, or hope to correct them. This plan he pursued with industr}^ for some time, and had the satisfaction of seeing his own improvement. To gain a wider command of words, he turned some of the "Spectator's" tales into verse; and afterwards, when he had quite forgotten the "Spectator's" prose, turned them back again into prose of his own.

In order to exercise his mind in the art of methodizing and arranging his subjects as they came up for treatment, he would mix up the hints he had jotted down on paper, and some time afterward endeavor to arrange them for himself, so as to present them in the most obvious order and with the greatest force. He labored hard at his self-imposed tasks in English composition, but he was resolved to become " a tolerable English writer," and persevered until he met with success. He was helping himself to an education ; many a youth of his years refuses to do anything for his own improvement, when he has everybody to help him. The time he devoted to this kind of selfinstruction, as well as to his reading, was either at night or before going to work in the morning ; on Sundays, too, he went quietly to the printing office, preferring not to attend public worship, and there gave the day to his reading and writing exercises. His father would have expected him to attend church, if he had been living at home ; but being apprenticed to his brother, he had in a measure passed beyond the reach of parental restraints. He acknowledges that he considered going to church to be a duty, but that he could not afford time to practice it.

Time passed, the apprentice closely pursuing his studies and his work. When he was sixteen, he fell in with a book that recommended a vegetable diet, and determined to make an experiment of that style of living. His brother was not a married man, and was therefore compelled to board out his apprentices. It made trouble in the family arrangements for one apprentice to decline eating meat, and Franklin read his vegetarian work more carefully, to learn how to cook the various dishes he wanted for himself; in a short time he qualified himself to make hasty puddings and other sorts of puddings, to hoil rice and potatoes, and to cook many other simple dishes. Then he went to his brother and made the following proposal, — if the latter would give him each week only half the amount he paid for his board, he would undertake to board himself! This from a boy of sixteen ! His brother readily accepted a proposal like that; and even out of that half allowance, Franklin saved still a half, with which he purchased books. He also saved the time he otherwise would have taken in going from the office to his meals, and returning. While his brother and the rest of the apprentices were gone, he ate his frugal meal, often consisting of no more than a biscuit, or a slice of bread, or a tart, and a glass of water, and then applied himself to study until their return. He felt his head to be clearer and his apprehension much quicker, from practising this temperance. In these odd scraps of time, snatched from hh meals, he resolutely studied Arithmetic, of which he felt that lie was wretchedly ignorant, and proceeded some way into ]N"avigation. He likewise read at this time so deep a book as " Locke on Human Understanding," and another entitled *'The Art of Thinking." English Grammar he took up, too ; and an article on Logic, at the end of the book out of which he studied, led him to an acquaintance with the writings of Socrates, and especially with the mode adopted by that philosopher of arguing topics, which was by asking questions like an humble inquirer. In consequence of this acquaintance with the Greek sage, he dropped his former style of arguing with positive denial and plump dogmatism, and took to the "Socratic Method," which he followed ever after, and found it of the widest use and efficacy. Instead of arousing those with whom he did not agree to open antagonism, he put them questions which would draw them out in definitions and concessions, — they not seeing whither his questions tended, — and then obtained his victory by their own help. He thought sometimes that neither his cause nor himself was fairly entitled to such victories.

His improvement now w^as rapid and perceptible. He could not have failed to make progress, witli this thorough self-searching. About the year 1720, his brother published a newspaper, the second that had been printed in America. It was called the "IlTew England Courant." His friends tried to dissuade him from such a project, thinking that one newspaper was enough for the country ; but he persevered, and young Benjamin was employed as a carrier to the subscribers. He would first work at the t}^es, then at the press, and finally carry around the paper. Seeing that some persons whom he knew began to contribute short articles to the "Courant," the ambitious carrier conceived the bold idea of writing for its columns too. He was afraid his brother James would refuse to admit any article which he knew to be his, so he artfully disguised his hand, wrote his communication, and placed it under the door over night. In the morning it was picked up, and submitted to those who Avere in the habit of dropping in and passing judgment on the articles written. Franklin was greatly pleased to listen to their favorable criticisms, and especially to hear them guess what respectable man of the town might be the author! This unexpected success so pleased him that he resolved to begin and write for the press regularly, taking all the pains possible with his productions. lie kept his secret well until his " fund of sense," as he styled it, was exhausted, and then he made himself known to his friends as the real author about whom they had indulged so many surmises.

His brother James, however, did not seem to like it so well, and perhaps thought Ben. would be made vain by the good opinions of others; and it is recorded that with this circumstance the trouble between the two brothers began. James felt that he was the inaster of Benjamin, because the latter had been bound out to him after legal forms ; while Benjamin thought that, even if he were apprenticed to his brother, the latter should have given him kinder treatment, because he was his brother. "When they fell into disputes, — ■ which came to be pretty often, — their troubles were carried before their father, to whom each pleaded his own case ; and Benjamin having the decision made in his favor pretty often, this fact only served to widen instead of to heal the breach between them. Ben. began to feel the weight of the yoke of his apprenticeship, and to wish it lifted from his neck altogether. At any rate, the tyrannical treatment from which he then suffered, excited his hatred of tyranny from that time forward through his whole career.

About this time, or very soon after, an article in the Franklin newspaper gave great offence to the Massachusetts Assembly. James was arrested by warrant of the Speaker of the House, publicly censured by him, and then thrown into prison for a month, because he would not make known the writer of the offensive article.

Benjamin was likewise arrested and brought before the Governor's Council ; he was merely admonished by them, probably not being thought responsible for the fault, inasmuch as he was but an apprentice. While his brother James lay in prison, of course he had the management of the paper ; he confesses that he " made bold to give our rulers some rubs in it," which his brother was not at all displeased with, but which led to his being considered by others as " a youth that had a turn for libelling and satire." "When his brother w^as at length discharged, it w^as ordered by the assembly that ''James FrmiMin should no longer print the newspaper called ' The Netv England CouranV " It was talked over among the friends of the paper what was best to do ; some were for changing its name, so that ^' James Franklin"

could go on with its management; but as that course would be attended wdth some inconveniences, it was finally resolved to let the paper be continued under its old name, w^ith Benjamin Franklin as its manas^er and controller. In order to make the whole transaction legal and fair, James returned to Benjamin his indenture, with a full discharge written on the back of it, w^hich could be exhibited in case of threatened trouble. But Benjamin was nevertheless to sign new papers, binding himself to his brother for the remainder of his time ; all these w^ere to be kept private. And in this way the "^ew England Courant" was printed by Benjamin Franklin for several months ; thus was the youth launched on the open sea where he was to gain a livelihood and a name. Pretty soon a fresh quarrel broke out between the brothers. Benjamin declared he would leave, and produced his elder brother's discharge, written on the back of the original indenture, as clear proof of his right to do so. He dared his brother to show the private agreement to anybody, well knowing its worthlessness. Franklin confessed that this was clearly wrong, as taking an unfair advantage ; but he said he was provoked to it by the blows which his brother dealt out on him in one of his many fits of passion. James Franklin, however, was not at other times an ill-natured man, Benjamin says; "perhaps," added he, very candidly, " I was too saucy and provoking."

They separated at once, after that ; but James took care to go around to the other printing offices in town, and influence the masters not to give Benjamin work; and it was this single circumstance that drove him so far from his friends as 'New York, at first, and afterward to Philadelphia. He did not feel as bad about turning his back on Boston either, as he otherwise might, had he not come under the displeasure of the Government by the course of his newspaper ; and he said he feared, too, that if he stayed there longer, he would " soon bring himself into scrapes." He was looked upon by many persons already as " an infidel and an atheist," because of his disputes on religious nuxtters.

His father, however, took sides now with his elder brother, and would have kept him at home in Boston until his indenture regularly expired. This led the youth to take the resolution to run away. His friend Collins, w^ith whom he used to debate questions on paper, aided him in his purpose. Collins made an agreement for him with the captain of a sloop, bound for New York, to take him on board, saying that he was a young man of his acquaintance wbo had got into trouble with a girl of bad reputation, and who her parents insisted should marry her; in consequence of which, he could neither make his appearance in public, nor come down to his vessel except privately. To raise the money needed to defray his passage, Franklin sold some of his books, and was taken on board without the knowledge of smy one. With a favorable wind he was on the water but three days, at the end of which time he found himself in the streets of New York, three hundred* miles from home, but seventeen years of age, knowing no one in the whole place, bearing no letter of recommendation to any person, and with as little money as possible in his pocket. This was in October, in the year 1723.