BENJAMIN FRANKLIN: HIS HIGHLY USEFUL CAREER.
=250. Benjamin Franklin, one of the most Useful and Influential Men of
his Time.=--Among the many men who acted a conspicuous part as "makers of
our country," Benjamin Franklin holds a unique and interesting place.
Combined with shrewd common sense and a practical philosophy was a
genial and rare personality, which made him during his long lifetime a
most useful and influential citizen.
Franklin did not fight and win battles like Washington and Greene, but
he gained notable victories in diplomacy when the struggling colonies
sorely needed them. For over sixty years he wrote hundreds of pamphlets,
tracts, and newspaper articles, which moulded public opinion at critical
times, and also served to increase the comfort and happiness of his
fellow-men.
Most men who have attempted to write their own lives have made a sad
failure of it. This busy man of the world, with no education save that
which he was able to get in the "odds and ends" of time, told the story
of his own life in a way that has commanded the interest and admiration
of multitudes of readers for over a hundred years.
=251. Franklin's Early Life; his Genius for Useful Inventions.=--Benjamin
Franklin, the fifteenth of a family of seventeen children, was born in
Boston in 1706. His father was a poor man, who could afford his youngest
boy only about two years of schooling. When he was ten, the lad left
school to assist his father at his trade of making soap and tallow
candles.
Nothing else pleased the boy so much as a book. He had access at this
time to very few, and most of these were dull, but he read them eagerly.
He read and re-read Bunyan's _Pilgrim's Progress_ until he knew it by
heart. He disliked his father's trade and longed to do something more
agreeable. He even thought of running away to sea as one of his brothers
had done.
=252. Learns the Printer's Trade; how he learned to write Good
English.=--Finally the boy was bound out as an apprentice to his older
brother James, to learn the printer's trade. This was more to the boy's
liking, for it gave him a better chance to read. For three years young
Franklin worked hard to master the business. In a short time he could
set type as well as any of the Boston printers. He went on errands to
the bookstores, and, making friends with the clerks, he was often able
to borrow books to read. He would carry them home, sit up most of the
night reading, and return them on the next morning.
In his story of his own life, Franklin gives a most interesting account
of his finding an odd volume of Addison's _Spectator_, and how charmed
he was with the style. He would read one of Addison's essays with great
care, close the book, and then write it out in his own words. This was
carefully compared with the original, and corrected and re-corrected
until he had improved upon his first effort.
This and other similar exercises were long continued, and they gave the
ambitious boy the command of a singularly clear and interesting style.
=253. Writes for his Brother's Newspaper.=--For three years the young
printer worked steadily at his trade, without a moment of leisure except
such as he took from his sleep or from his meals. He often sat up late
and rose early, that he might have more time for study.
His brother James, for whom he worked, so prospered in his business that
he began to print in 1721 a weekly newspaper. It was young Benjamin's
duty to set the type and strike off the edition of a few hundred
papers, and then carry the little sheet to the houses of the
subscribers.
The boy read his brother's paper and soon had confidence enough in
himself to write articles for it. He did not dare to let his brother
know it, but slipped them under the door at night. They were printed and
eagerly read for some time before their authorship was known.
=254. Goes to Philadelphia; First Appearance in that City.=--Young
Franklin and his brother did not, however, get along well together. They
quarreled, and the young printer at last sold some of his books and set
sail for New York on a sloop. Unable to find work there, he was advised
to go to Philadelphia. After many hardships and mishaps, he stepped
ashore at the Quaker City one Sunday morning with one silver dollar and
about a shilling in copper in his pocket.
Franklin was at this time a sturdy youth of seventeen. He was dressed in
the peculiar fashion of the times. He wore knee breeches of buckskin,
also a huge coat, the pockets of which bulged out with his spare shirts
and stockings. He hastened to the first baker's shop and asked for
threepenny worth of bread. The baker handed him three long rolls. He
took one under each arm, and ate the third as he walked along the
streets.
A young girl happened to see him as he passed her father's house, and
she laughed aloud at the young man's comical appearance. The girl's name
was Deborah Read, and she afterwards became the wife of Franklin. Hungry
and tired, he ate his rolls, then walked down to the river for a drink
of water, and at last went into a Quaker meeting and soon fell sound
asleep.
[Illustration: FRANKLIN'S FIRST APPEARANCE IN PHILADELPHIA.]
A good Quaker helped Franklin to get work at his trade as a printer. The
young man soon proved himself a prize to his employer. He was strong,
quick, frugal, of a studious mind, and, what was a rare virtue in those
days, he never touched strong drink. Bright and sunny hours now came. He
received good wages, saved his money, and made friends everywhere.
=255. Goes to London and works at his Trade.=--One of these friends was
the governor of Pennsylvania. He advised Franklin to set up a printing
office of his own. He urged him to go to London to buy a printing
outfit, and promised him letters to people in England who, he said,
would let him have all the money he needed. The young printer trusted
too much to the pompous governor's promises and sailed for England,
hoping to find the letters in the vessel's letter bag. But the governor
had disappointed him; no such letters were ever written.
In due time Franklin found himself in the great city of London, where he
did not know a single person. He at once showed what stuff he was made
of. He quietly went to work at his trade and worked harder than ever. He
kept up his studious habits, and spent all his spare time in reading
good books.
=256. Returns to Philadelphia; successful as a Printer and
Publisher.=--After a stay of a year and a half in London, Franklin
returned to Philadelphia, and soon after set up in business for himself
as a printer. After a time he started a newspaper. He worked early and
late, attending to every detail himself. He was not ashamed to carry
material for his paper through the streets on a wheelbarrow.
Once he invited a rival in his business home to dine. Pointing to a loaf
of bread from which they had eaten, he said, "Unless you can live
cheaper than I, you cannot starve me out."
When he was twenty-four the prosperous young printer married Deborah
Read, the young woman who had laughed at him years before as he trudged
through the streets with the rolls under his arms. Deborah proved
herself a real helpmate, thrifty and industrious. Attached to the
printing office was a little shop which the young wife tended.
"Our table was plain and simple," says Franklin in his autobiography,
"our furniture of the cheapest. For instance, our breakfast was for a
long time bread and milk (no tea), and I ate it out of a twopenny
earthen porringer, with a pewter spoon." In after years the thrifty
couple indulged in some splendor, for in 1765 Mrs. Franklin, in a letter
to her husband, alludes proudly to a papered room, horsehair chairs, a
sideboard, and three carpets.
=257. His Happy, Useful, and Prosperous Career in Philadelphia.=--For
twenty years Franklin lived a prosperous life as an active business man
of the good Quaker city. He had become noted for his integrity,
sagacity, and prosperity. His newspaper became known for its sparkling
and timely editorials. The most intelligent and influential men of the
city met in his office to discuss the questions of the day.
The same year that Washington was born (1732) Franklin issued the first
number of his _Poor Richard's Almanac_, which soon gained great fame for
its wise and pithy sayings. The popularity which this little work
maintained for twenty-five years was astonishing. Its shrewd and quaint
maxims soon became household words in almost every shop and home of the
land.
Even with his increasing prosperity Franklin found time every day to
devote many hours to his books. He became proficient in French, Spanish,
Italian, and even Latin. He gave much time to music, and played with
skill upon the harp, the guitar, and the violin.
This remarkable man now began to be at the head of many kinds of public
and private enterprises, from treating with the Indians to plans for
cleaning the streets. Honors, both public and private, were heaped upon
him. He started a public library in Philadelphia, the first of its kind
in America.
He invented the famous "Franklin fireplace," which proved very popular
and is even in use to-day. The most trivial events would often suggest
to him something that would secure beneficial results.
The story is told that Franklin saw one day in a ditch the fragments of
a basket of yellow willow, in which some foreign goods had been brought
into the country. One of the twigs had sprouted. He planted it; and it
is said that it became the parent of all the yellow willows in our
country.
=258. Franklin's Famous Kite Experiment.=--Franklin was a great student of
the sciences, especially electricity. He wrote a pamphlet to prove that
lightning and electricity are the same thing. The idea was sneered at,
and people asked, "Of what use is it?" To which the genial philosopher
replied, "What is the use of a child? It may become a man!" He hit on a
plan to prove his theory.
[Illustration: FRANKLIN'S FAMOUS KITE EXPERIMENT.]
This was the famous kite experiment which he tried in 1752. He made a
kite of silk, fastened a piece of wire to the stick, and went out with
his son to fly it during a thunderstorm. At the lower end of the hempen
string was fastened a key, and below that a cord of silk, which is a
non-conductor. He held the silk cord in his hand, and when a low thunder
cloud passed, he saw that the fibres of the string rose, separated, and
stood on end, exactly as the hair does on one's head when one is charged
with electricity as he stands on an insulating stool.
When Franklin brought his knuckles near the key that he had tied to the
string, sparks came from the metal, and he felt slight shocks.
This discovery made a great sensation in the scientific world. Franklin
at once became famous, took high rank as a man of science, and was
afterwards known as "Doctor Franklin." He now invented the lightning
rod, which has been in use ever since all over the civilized world.
=259. Entrance into a Broader Public Life.=--From this time Franklin began
to occupy more important positions in public life. In 1754 he was sent
on a mission to Albany to enlist the chiefs of the powerful "Six
Nations" to become allies of the English. On this journey he drew up a
plan for the union of the colonies. It was almost like that by which
they were afterwards bound together as a nation.
During the Braddock campaign Franklin in vain warned the haughty British
general that "the Indians would surprise, on its flanks, the slender
line, nearly four miles long, which the army must make," and would "cut
it like a thread into several pieces." From his own purse Franklin
advanced for this ill-starred expedition between six and seven thousand
silver dollars.
The quarrels between the Pennsylvania Assembly and the Proprietors in
England became so bitter that Franklin was sent to England in 1757 as
the sole commissioner to make an appeal to the English government. He
was cordially received abroad and highly honored by the most eminent
scientific men of the time. He returned home after an absence of nearly
six years.
Franklin was now fifty-seven years old. He had an ample fortune, perfect
health, and a superiority to most men in personal appearance and
dignity. He hoped to withdraw from public life and give the rest of his
days to the study of science.
=260. Franklin becomes a most Useful and Sagacious Helper to the
Struggling Colonies.=--Great and momentous events, however, were at hand.
There was more important work for him to do. The struggling colonies,
already taxed almost beyond endurance to carry on the war against the
French and Indians, were allowed no representation nor voice in the
matter of taxation. Franklin, with patriotic foresight and with keen
force of logic, resisted the outrage. He declared it to be the "mother
of mischief."
In 1764 Franklin was again sent by the Assembly to England, to present
to the British court the protest of the people against "taxation without
representation."
[Illustration: FRANKLIN AT THE COURT OF FRANCE.]
From this time Franklin served the colonies in England as a most
accomplished diplomatist, a vigorous writer, and a shrewd and sagacious
agent. He failed to stop the passage of the notorious Stamp Act, but he
fought the measure so vigorously by his writings and discussions that he
aroused bitter opposition to it among the industrial classes, so that
Parliament was compelled at last to repeal the obnoxious measure.
He was once brought before the House of Parliament and sharply
questioned.
"Do you think," asked the prime minister, "the people of America would
submit to pay the stamp duty if it was changed?"
"No, never," said Franklin; "the American people will never submit to
it."
The colonists received with unbounded delight the tidings of Franklin's
masterly diplomacy and the repeal of the Stamp Act. Bells were rung,
bonfires blazed, and cannon were fired. "I never heard so much noise in
my life," wrote Franklin's daughter Sallie to him; "the very children
seem distracted."
Franklin now watched with honest shrewdness and a penetrating mind the
many attempts of the British government to tax the Americans. Other
colonies recognized his ability, and New Jersey, Georgia, and
Massachusetts appointed him as their agent.
At last, when all attempts to induce the government to change its
oppressive policy had failed and war was sure to follow, Franklin sailed
for home. He reached Philadelphia about sixteen days after the battle at
Lexington and Concord.
The morning after his arrival he was unanimously chosen a member of the
Continental Congress, which was to meet in Philadelphia on the tenth of
May. He now took a leading part in aiding his countrymen in their war
for liberty. He was one of the five men, it will be remembered, chosen
to draft the Declaration of Independence.
=261. His Remarkable Service Abroad as a Diplomatist.=--Shortly afterwards
Franklin was chosen a special ambassador to France.
"I am old and good for nothing," said the philosopher; "but, as the
storekeepers say of their remnants of cloth, 'I am but a fag end, and
you may have me for what you please.'"
Two years afterwards, by his wisdom and his thorough knowledge of
diplomacy, Franklin was chiefly instrumental in securing a treaty with
France. By this memorable compact our independence was acknowledged, and
we were recognized by France as one among the nations of the world.
The news of the treaty was received in America with unbounded joy.
General Washington drew up his little half-starved army at Valley Forge
to announce the event, and to offer prayers and thanksgiving to God.
During the next three years Franklin rendered invaluable services in
obtaining money, arms, and other means to aid his country in her life
and death struggle with England.
At last, when Great Britain gave up all hope of subduing her American
colonies, and was ready to make terms of peace, Franklin's diplomacy
triumphed. Probably no other man in America could have guided the affair
so wisely.
=262. Franklin's Last Days.=--Franklin was now an old man of
seventy-eight. He was so feeble that he could not walk, and could only
ride in a litter. Thomas Jefferson was sent over to France in 1784 as
his successor.
Upon his arrival the French prime minister said, "You replace Doctor
Franklin, I understand."
"No!" replied Jefferson, "I _succeed_ him. No man can replace him!"
The long sea voyage homeward proved very beneficial to the old
philosopher's health. He was chosen a delegate to the convention that
met in Philadelphia in 1787 to frame a new constitution. Although he was
now eighty-one years of age, he was regularly in his seat, five hours a
day, for four months.
Three years later, at his home in Philadelphia, in 1790, the "grand old
man" died, at the age of eighty-four. The whole nation mourned his loss.
No man of that period, except Washington, was held in higher esteem and
veneration the world over than was Benjamin Franklin.