Chapter V: Franklin as a Writer (3)

The _Supplement to the Boston Independent Chronicle_ is distinguished by the same sort of cool, dry mocking verisimilitude. Captain Gerrish, of the New England Militia, is supposed to write a letter in which he says that the members of a recent expedition against the Indians were struck with horror to find among the packages of peltry captured by them eight large ones containing scalps of their unhappy country-folks taken in the last three years by the Seneca Indians from the heads of inhabitants of the frontiers of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Virginia, and sent by them as a present to Colonel Haldimand, the Governor of Canada; to be forwarded by him to England. The scalps, Captain Gerrish asserts, were accompanied by a curious letter to the Governor from one, James Craufurd. Then is set forth this letter which describes with the minuteness of a mercantile invoice the contents of each of the eight packages of scalps, some of Congress soldiers, some of farmers surprised in their houses at night, some of farmers killed in their houses by day, some of farmers killed in the fields, some of women, some of boys, some of girls and some of little infants ripped from the womb. The contents of several of the packages are described as mixed lots. The letter also fully explains the Indian triumphal marks painted upon the different scalps, which were all cured, dried and stretched like the pelts of the otter or beaver on hoops. The black circle denoted that the victim had perished at night, the little red foot that he had died in defence of his life and family, the little yellow flame that he had been tortured at the stake. The hair braided in the Indian fashion meant that the victim was a mother, other tokens that the victim was a boy or a girl. A band fixed to the hoop of one of the scalps signified that the head to which it had been attached was that of a rebel clergyman. Many gruesome tokens are explained in the same systematic and businesslike manner. Along with several other passages from a speech of Conejogatchie in Council, the letter also communicates one in which the speaker declares that his people wished the scalps to be sent across the water to the great King that he might regard them and be refreshed. In concluding his own letter, Captain Gerrish states that Lieutenant Fitzgerald would have undertaken to convey the scalps to England and to hang them all up some dark night on the trees in St. James' Park, where they could be seen from the King and Queen's Palaces in the morning. But this proposal, the _Chronicle_ says, was not approved in Boston. It was proposed instead to make the scalps up in decent little packets, and to seal and direct them; one to the King containing a sample of every kind for his museum, one to the Queen, with some of women and children; the rest to be distributed among both Houses of Parliament, and a double quantity to be given to the Bishops. The relations of the _Chronicle_ to this production were, of course, as purely fictitious as every other part of it. Associated with the performance, as another publication in the _Chronicle_, is a fictitious letter, too, from Paul Jones to Sir Joseph Yorke, the English Ambassador to Holland, in which he defends himself with considerable spirit from the charge of being a pirate, and reminds Sir Joseph of the freebooting principles upon which England was waging war against America. When he read this letter, Horace Walpole wrote to the Countess of Ossory, "Have you seen in the papers an excellent letter of Paul Jones to Sir Joseph Yorke? Elle nous dit bien des verites! I doubt poor Sir Joseph cannot answer them! Dr. Franklin himself, I should think, was the author. It is certainly written by a first-rate pen, and not by a common man of war."

_The Ephemera_ was addressed to Madame Brillon, and is one of the most justly famous of all Franklin's writings. In a letter to William Carmichael, he states that the thought was partly taken from a little piece of some unknown writer, which he had met with fifty years before in a newspaper. Another proof, we might say in passing, how little disposed Franklin was to borrow from Richard Jackson, or any one else without due acknowledgment.

So dependent is every part of this paper for its effect upon the whole that to quote only a portion of it would be as futile as an effort to divide a bubble without destroying it. These are the precise words in full of this bewitching little production:

You may remember, my dear friend, that when we lately
spent that happy day in the delightful garden and sweet
society of the Moulin Joly, I stopt a little in one of
our walks, and staid some time behind the company. We
had been shown numberless skeletons of a kind of little
fly, called an ephemera, whose successive generations,
we were told, were bred and expired within the day. I
happened to see a living company of them on a leaf, who
appeared to be engaged in conversation. You know I
understand all the inferior animal tongues; my too
great application to the study of them is the best
excuse I can give for the little progress I have made
in your charming language. I listened through curiosity
to the discourse of these little creatures; but as
they, in their national vivacity, spoke three or four
together, I could make but little of their
conversation. I found, however, by some broken
expressions that I heard now and then, they were
disputing warmly on the merit of two foreign musicians,
one a _cousin_, the other a _moscheto_; in which
dispute they spent their time, seemingly as regardless
of the shortness of life as if they had been sure of
living a month. Happy people! thought I, you are
certainly under a wise, just, and mild government,
since you have no public grievances to complain of, nor
any subject of contention but the perfections and
imperfections of foreign music. I turned my head from
them to an old grey-headed one, who was single on
another leaf, and talking to himself. Being amused with
his soliloquy, I put it down in writing, in hopes it
will likewise amuse her to whom I am so much indebted
for the most pleasing of all amusements, her delicious
company and heavenly harmony.

It was [said he] the opinion of learned philosophers of
our race, who lived and flourished long before my time,
that this vast world, the Moulin Joly, could not itself
subsist more than eighteen hours; and I think there was
some foundation for that opinion, since, by the
apparent motion of the great luminary that gives life
to all nature, and which in my time has evidently
declined considerably towards the ocean at the end of
our earth, it must then finish its course, be
extinguished in the waters that surround us, and leave
the world in cold and darkness, necessarily producing
universal death and destruction. I have lived seven of
those hours, a great age, being no less than four
hundred and twenty minutes of time. How very few of us
continue so long! I have seen generations born,
flourish, and expire. My present friends are the
children and grandchildren of the friends of my youth,
who _are now_, alas, no more! And I must soon follow
them; for, by the course of nature, though still in
health, I cannot expect to live above seven or eight
minutes longer. What now avails all my toil and labor,
in amassing honey-dew on this leaf, which I cannot live
to enjoy! What the political struggles I have been
engaged in, for the good of my compatriot inhabitants
of this bush, or my philosophical studies for the
benefit of our race in general! for, in politics, what
can laws do without morals? Our present race of
ephemerae will in a course of minutes become corrupt,
like those of other and older bushes, and consequently
as wretched. And in philosophy how small our progress!
Alas! art is long, and life is short! My friends would
comfort me with the idea of a name, they say, I shall
leave behind me; and they tell me I have lived long
enough to nature and to glory. But what will fame be to
an ephemera who no longer exists? And what will become
of all history in the eighteenth hour, when the world
itself, even the whole Moulin Joly, shall come to its
end, and be buried in universal ruin?

To me, after all my eager pursuits, no solid pleasures
now remain, but the reflection of a long life spent in
meaning well, the sensible conversation of a few good
lady ephemerae, and now and then a kind smile and a tune
from the ever amiable _Brillante_.

_The Whistle_, too, was addressed to Madame Brillon and is also one of the most celebrated of Franklin's bagatelles, but is scarcely equal, we think, to the best of them.

In his opinion, Franklin said, they might all draw more good from the world than they did if they would take care not to give too much for whistles. With this foreword, he tells his story. When a child of seven years of age, his friends on a holiday filled his pocket with coppers, and, being charmed with the sound of a whistle that he met by the way in the hands of another boy, he voluntarily offered, and gave all his money for one. He then came home, and went whistling all over the house, much pleased with his whistle, but disturbing the entire family. But his brothers and sisters told him that he had given four times as much for the whistle as it was worth, put him in mind of what good things he might have bought with the rest of the money and laughed at him so much for his folly that he cried with vexation. The lesson, however, was of use to him, so that often, when he was tempted to buy some unnecessary thing, he said to himself, "_Don't give too much for the whistle_," and he saved his money. And so, when he grew up, came into the world and observed the actions of men, he thought he met with many, very many who gave too much for the whistle.

He then mentions who some of these men were, the man ambitious of court favor, the man covetous of political popularity, the miser, the slave of pleasure, the devotee of fashion, the beautiful, sweet-tempered girl, married to an ill-natured brute of a husband, and, after the mention of each, comes the running comment, "This man gives too much for his whistle," or its equivalent.

Yet [Franklin concludes], I ought to have charity for
these unhappy people, when I consider, that, with all
this wisdom of which I am boasting, there are certain
things in the world so tempting, for example, the
apples of King John, which happily are not to be
bought; for if they were put to sale by auction, I
might very easily be led to ruin myself in the
purchase, and find that I had once more given too much
for the _whistle_.

The reader has already had occasion to know what kind of fruit these apples of King John were, and in whose orchard they grew.

To realize what an indifferent poet Franklin was, and yet at the same time what a master of prose, one has but to first read his _petite chanson a boire_ beginning,

"Fair Venus calls; her voice obey,"

and then his letter to the Abbe Morellet on wine. The letter was written to repay the Abbe for some of his excellent drinking songs.

"In vino veritas," said the sage, [is the way Franklin
begins]. Before Noah, when men had nothing but water to
drink, they could not find the truth, so they went
astray, and became abominably wicked, and were justly
exterminated by the water that they were fond of
drinking. Good man Noah, seeing that this bad drink had
been the death of all his contemporaries, contracted an
aversion to it, and God to quench his thirst, created
the vine, and revealed to him the art of making wine.
With its aid, Noah discovered many and many a truth,
and, since his time, the word "divine" has been in use,
meaning originally to discover by means of wine....
Since that time, too, all excellent things, even
deities themselves, have been called divine or
divinities.

Men speak of the conversion of water into wine at the
marriage of Cana as a miracle. But this change is
worked every day by the goodness of God under our eyes.
Witness the water, that falls from the skies upon our
vineyards, and then passes into the roots of the vines
to be converted into wine, a constant proof that God
loves us, and that he is pleased to see us happy. The
miracle in question was performed merely to hasten the
operation on an occasion of sudden need that made it
indispensable.

It is true that God has also taught men how to reduce
wine to water; but what kind of water? Why
_l'eau-de-vie_.

Franklin then begs his Christian brother to be kindly and beneficent like God and not to spoil his good work. When he saw his table companion pour wine into his glass he should not hasten to pour water into it. Why should he desire to drown the truth? His neighbor was likely to know better what suited him than he. Perhaps he does not like water, perhaps he wishes only a few drops of it out of complaisance to the fashion of the day, perhaps he does not wish another to see how little he puts in his glass. Water then should be offered only to children; it was a false and annoying form of politeness to do otherwise. This the writer told the Abbe as a man of the world, and he would end as he had begun, like a good Christian, by making one very important religious observation suggested by the Holy Scriptures. While the Apostle Paul had gravely advised Timothy to put wine into his water for his health, not one of the Apostles, nor any of the Holy Fathers, had ever advised anyone to put water into wine.

The "Dialogue between Franklin and the Gout" owes its value not so much to its humor as to the knowledge that it incidentally affords us of the personal habits of the former and his intimacy with Madame Helvetius and Madame Brillon. Along with the reproaches and twinges of pain which evoke repeated Ehs! and Ohs! from Franklin, as the colloquy proceeds, the Gout contrives to communicate to us no little information on these subjects in terms in which physiology, hygiene and gallantry are each made to do duty. He tells Franklin that he, the Gout, very well knows that the quantity of meat and drink proper for a man, who takes a reasonable degree of exercise, is too much for another who never takes any. If his, Franklin's, situation in life is a sedentary one, his amusements and recreations at least should be active. He ought to walk or ride, or, if the weather prevents that, play at billiards. But, instead of gaining an appetite for breakfast by salutary exercise, he amuses himself with books, pamphlets or newspapers, which commonly are not worth the reading. Yet he eats an inordinate breakfast, four dishes of tea, with cream, and one or two buttered toasts, with slices of hung beef, which the Gout fancies are not things the most easily digested. Immediately afterwards he sits down to write at his desk or converse with persons who apply to him on business. Thus the time passes till one without any kind of bodily exercise. This might be pardoned out of regard, as Franklin said, for his sedentary condition, but what is his practice after dinner? Walking in the beautiful gardens of those friends with whom he had dined would be the choice of men of sense. His was to be fixed down to chess, where he was found engaged for two or three hours! This was his perpetual recreation, which was the least eligible of any for a sedentary man, because, instead of accelerating the motion of the fluids, the rigid attention it required helped to retard the circulation and obstruct internal secretions. Wrapped in the speculations of this wretched game, he destroyed his constitution. What could be expected from such a course of living but a body replete with stagnant humours, ready to fall a prey to all kinds of dangerous maladies, if he, the Gout, did not occasionally bring him relief by agitating those humors, and so purifying or dissipating them. If it was in some nook or alley in Paris deprived of walks that Franklin played awhile at chess after dinner, this might be excusable, but the same taste prevailed with him in Paris, at Auteuil Montmartre or Sanois, places where there were the finest, gardens and walks, a pure air, beautiful women and most agreeable and instructive conversation; all of which he might enjoy by frequenting the walks. At this point, Franklin, after some more prolonged Ehs! and Ohs!, manages to remind the Gout that it is not fair to say that he takes no exercise when he does so very often in going out to dine and returning in his carriage; but this statement the Gout brushes brusquely aside. That of all imaginable exercises, he asserts, is the most slight and insignificant, if Franklin alludes to the motion of a carriage suspended on springs. By observing the degree of heat obtained by different kinds of motion, we may form an estimate of the quantity of exercise given by each. Thus, for example, if Franklin should turn out to walk in winter with cold feet, in an hour's time he would be in a glow all over; if he should ride on horseback, the same effect would scarcely be perceived by four hours' round trotting, but, if he should loll in a carriage, such as he had mentioned, he might travel all day, and gladly enter the last inn to warm his feet by a fire.[58] Providence has appointed few to roll in carriages, while it has given to all a pair of legs, which are machines infinitely more commodious and serviceable. He should observe, when he walked, that all his weight was alternately thrown from one leg to the other; this occasions a great pressure upon the vessels of the foot, and repels their contents. When relieved by the weight being thrown on the other foot, the vessels of the first are allowed to replenish, and, by a return of this weight, this repulsion again succeeds; thus accelerating the circulation of the blood, with the result that the cheeks are ruddy and the health established.

Behold [the Gout is then artfully made to say], your
fair friend at Auteuil (Madame Helvetius); a lady who
received from bounteous nature more really useful
science, than half a dozen such pretenders to
philosophy as you have been able to extract from all
your books. When she honours you with a visit, it is on
foot. She walks all hours of the day, and leaves
indolence, and its concomitant maladies, to be endured
by her horses. In this see at once the preservative of
her health and personal charms.

Nor does the Gout go off before he is with equal art made to say a flattering word about the Brillons.

You know [he declares], M. Brillon's gardens, and what
fine walks they contain; you know the handsome flight
of an hundred steps, which lead from the terrace above
to the lawn below. You have been in the practice of
visiting this amiable family twice a week, after
dinner, and it is a maxim of your own, that "a man may
take as much exercise in walking a mile, up and down
stairs, as in ten on level ground." What an opportunity
was here for you to have had exercise in both these
ways. Did you embrace it, and how often?

Franklin is bound to admit that he cannot immediately answer the question, and the Gout answers it for him. "Not once," he says, and then goes on to chide Franklin with the fact that, during the summer, he is in the habit of going to M. Brillon's at six o'clock and contenting himself with the view from his terrace, tea and the chess-board, though the charming lady, with her lovely children and friends, are eager to walk with him, and entertain him with their agreeable conversation.

A little more interchange of conversation and poor Franklin in despair asks, "What then would you have me do with my carriage?" and the Gout replies, "Burn it if you choose; you would at least get heat out of it once in this way." In the end, Franklin promises that, if his persecutor will only leave him, he will never more play at chess, but will take exercise daily, and live temperately--a promise the Gout tells him that, with a few months of good health, "will be forgotten like the forms of last year's clouds."

"The Handsome and Deformed Leg" divides the world into two classes, the happy, who fix their eyes on the bright side of things and enjoy everything, and the unhappy, who fix their eyes on the dark side of things, and criticise everything; and thereby render themselves completely odious. An old philosophical friend of his, Franklin said, carefully avoided any intimacy with the latter class of people. He had, like other philosophers, a thermometer to show him the heat of the weather, and a barometer to mark when it was likely to prove good or bad; but, there being no instrument invented to discern at first sight whether a person had their unpleasant disposition, he, for that purpose, made use of his legs, one of which was remarkably handsome, and the other, by some accident, crooked and deformed. If a stranger, at the first interview, regarded his ugly leg more than his handsome one, he doubted him. If he spoke of it and took no notice of the handsome leg, that was sufficient to determine this philosopher to have no further acquaintance with him.

Everybody [concludes Franklin] has not this two-legged
Instrument, but every one with a little Attention, may
observe Signs of that carping, fault-finding
Disposition, & take the same Resolution of avoiding the
Acquaintance of those infected with it. I therefore
advise those critical, querulous, discontented, unhappy
People, that if they wish to be respected and belov'd
by others, & happy in themselves they should _leave off
looking at the ugly leg_.

"The Economical Project" is a happy combination of humor and prudential instruction, and was written about the time when the Quinquet lamp was an object of general public curiosity. An inquiry having been started on one occasion in his presence, Franklin says, as to whether its brightness was not offset by its lavish consumption of oil, he went home, and to bed, three or four hours after midnight, with his head full of the subject. At about six in the morning, he was awakened by a noise, and was surprised to find his room full of light. At first, he imagined that he was surrounded by a number of Quinquet lamps, but, on rubbing his eyes, he perceived that the light came in at the windows, and, when he got up and looked out to see what caused it, he saw the sun just rising above the horizon. His servant had forgotten the preceding evening to close the shutters. Looking at his watch, and finding that it was but six o'clock, and still thinking it something extraordinary that the sun should rise so early, he consulted an almanac, and ascertained that it was just the hour for sunrise on that day, and, moreover, he learned from the almanac that the sun would rise still earlier every day till towards the end of June. His readers, he was sure, would be as much astonished as he was when they heard that the sun rises so early, and especially when he assured them that it gives light as soon as it rises. He was convinced of this. He was certain of his fact. One could not be more certain of any fact. On repeating his observation the three following mornings, he found always precisely the same result.

Yet when he spoke of the matter it was to incredulous countenances. One auditor, a learned natural philosopher, assured him that he must certainly be mistaken as to the light coming into his room, for, it being well known that there could be no light abroad at that hour, it followed that none could enter from without, and that, of consequence, his open windows, instead of letting in the light, must have only served to let out the darkness. This philosopher, Franklin confessed, puzzled him a little, but subsequent observation confirmed him in his first opinion. On the strength of these facts, Franklin enters upon a series of elaborate calculations to demonstrate that, between the 20th of March and 20th of September, the Parisians, because of their habit of preferring candlelight in the evening to sunlight in the morning, had consumed sixty-four millions and fifty thousand pounds of candles, which, at an average price of thirty sols per pound, made ninety-six millions and seventy-five thousand livres tournois. An immense sum! that the City of Paris might save every year by the economy of using sunshine instead of candles; to say nothing of the period of the year during which the days are shorter. This computation is succeeded by a number of suggestions as to the different means by which such of the Parisians as did not amend their hours upon learning from this paper that it is daylight when the sun rises could be induced to reform their habits.

For his discovery, Franklin further said that he demanded neither place, pension, exclusive privilege nor any other reward whatever. He was looking only to the honor of it. He would not deny, when he was assailed by little, envious minds, that the ancients knew that the sun rises at certain hours. They too possibly had almanacs, but it does not follow that they knew that it gives light as soon as it rises. That was what he claimed as his discovery. It was certainly unknown to the moderns, at least to the Parisians; which to prove he need use but one plain, simple argument. It was impossible that a people as well-instructed, judicious and prudent as any in the world, all professing to be lovers of economy, and subject to onerous taxation, should have lived so long by the smoky, unwholesome and enormously expensive light of candles, if they had really known that they might have as much pure light of the sun for nothing.

_A Letter from China_ in which a sailor, who had passed some time in that country, is made to narrate in a simple, bald way what he saw and experienced while there, is worth reading, if only because of the evidence that it furnishes that almost every trifle from Franklin's pen has a certain literary quality. One sentence in the letter at any rate possesses the true Franklin flavor; that in which the wanderer states that in China stealing, robbing and housebreaking are punished severely, but that cheating is free there in everything, as cheating in horses is among gentlemen in England.

Other humorous or satirical compositions from the hand of Franklin belong to the period between his return from the French mission and his death.

His letter to the _Pennsylvania Gazette_ on the _Abuse of the Press_, deprecates in a familiar and jocular way the scurrilous license which marked the newspaper controversies of the time. After recalling insulting epithets heaped upon other public servants, he mentions that he, too, the unanimous choice as President of the Council and Assembly of Pennsylvania, had been denounced as "_An old Rogue_," who had given his assent to the Federal Constitution merely to avoid the refunding of money that he had purloined from the United States.

There is--indeed [the letter ends], a good deal of
manifest _Inconsistency_ in all this, and yet a
Stranger, seeing it in your own Prints, tho' he does
not believe it all, may probably believe enough of it
to conclude, that Pennsylvania is peopled by a Set of
the most unprincipled, wicked, rascally and quarrelsome
Scoundrels upon the Face of the Globe. I have
sometimes, indeed, suspected that those Papers are the
Manufacture of foreign Enemies among you, who write
with a view of disgracing your Country, and making you
appear contemptible and detestable all the World over;
but then I wonder at the Indiscretion of your Printers
in publishing such Writings! There is, however, one of
your _Inconsistencies_ that consoles me a little, which
is, that tho' _living_, you give one another the
characters of Devils; _dead_, you are all Angels! It is
delightful, when any of you die, to read what good
Husbands, good Fathers, good Friends, good Citizens,
and good Christians you were, concluding with a Scrap
of Poetry that places you, with certainty, every one in
Heaven. So that I think Pennsylvania a good country _to
dye in_, though a very bad one to _live in_.

The _Comparison of the Conduct of the Ancient Jews and of the Anti-Federalists in the United States of America_ belongs to the same category as _Plain Truth_ rather than to the class of writings which Franklin termed "Bagatelles." The parallel, however, between the jealousy, worked upon by insidious men, pretending public good, but with nothing really in view except private interest, which led the Israelites to oppose the establishment of the New Constitution, after the flight from Egypt, and the hostility of the Anti-Federalists to the work of the Convention of 1787, is pursued with such cleverness as to lift it out of the province of the ordinary newspaper essay. There is an unwonted strain of solemnity in its last sentences.

To conclude [Franklin declares], I beg I may not be
understood to infer, that our General Convention was
divinely inspired, when it form'd the new federal
Constitution, merely because that Constitution has been
unreasonably and vehemently opposed; yet I must own I
have so much Faith in the general Government of the
world by _Providence_, that I can hardly conceive a
Transaction of such momentous Importance to the Welfare
of Millions now existing, and to exist in the Posterity
of a great Nation, should be suffered to pass without
being in some degree influenc'd, guided, and governed
by that omnipotent, omnipresent and beneficent Ruler,
in whom all inferior Spirits live, and move, and have
their Being.

Of the _Account of the Supremest Court of Judicature in Pennsylvania, viz., the Court of the Press_, in which Franklin suggested that formal cognizance should be taken of the Cudgel as well as of the Liberty of the Press, we have already said enough.

The pretended speech of Sidi Mehemet Ibrahim, a member of the Divan of Algiers against the Petition of the Erika or Purists, asking that Piracy and Slavery be abolished, was written by him on the eve of his death, and is one of his best satirical thrusts. It was a parody on a speech that had been lately delivered in Congress in defence of negro slavery by Mr. Jackson of Georgia, and its wit consists in the art with which it appositely urges in justification of the Algerian practice of plundering and enslaving Christians all the considerations urged by Jackson in his plea for African slavery. In his letter, conveying Sidi's speech to the _Federal Gazette_, Franklin states that it might be found in Martin's Account of the former's consulship, anno 1687, and we are told that this statement caused many persons to apply to bookstores and libraries for Martin's supposed work. Then, as now, there could be no better means for determining how matter-of-fact a person was than to test his sense of humor with one of Franklin's facetious cheats.

The exact time at which the _Petition of the Left Hand to those who have the Superintendency of Education_ was written is unknown. Its _motif_ is not unlike that of the _Petition of the Letter Z_. It complains that from infancy the petitioner had been led to consider her sister as a being of more elevated rank. She had been suffered to grow up without the least instruction while nothing was spared in the education of the latter, who had had masters to teach her writing, drawing, music and other accomplishments. If by chance the Petitioner touched a pencil, a pen or a needle, she was bitterly rebuked, and more than once had been beaten for being awkward and wanting a graceful manner.

But conceive not Sirs [says the left hand further],
that my complaints are instigated merely by vanity. No;
my uneasiness is occasioned by an object much more
serious. It is the practice in our family, that the
whole business of providing for its subsistence falls
upon my sister and myself. If any indisposition should
attack my sister,--and I mention it in confidence upon
this occasion, that she is subject to the gout, the
rheumatism, and cramp, without making mention of other
accidents,--what would be the fate of our poor family?
Must not the regret of our parents be excessive, at
having placed so great a difference between sisters who
are so perfectly equal? Alas! we must perish from
distress; for it would not be in my power even to
scrawl a suppliant petition for relief, having been
obliged to employ the hand of another in transcribing
the request which I have now the honour to prefer to
you.

One of the essays of Franklin is an essay which he termed a "bagatelle," but which is of a different cast from most of his papers bearing that designation. This is the essay on the _Morals of Chess_. As a mere literary production, it possesses remarkable merit, but it is more valuable still for the singular union of wisdom and benevolence found in all of the writer's precepts relating to the conduct of life. It is only upon the contracted face of an ordinary chess-board that the sagacious reflections and salutary counsels of this paper are based, but many of them are quite extensive enough in their application to be suitable for the morals of the wider chess-board on which men and women themselves are the pawns, and the universal currents of human nature and human existence the players. By playing at chess, Franklin thought, we may learn foresight, circumspection, caution and hopefulness. When playing it, if the agreement is that the rules of the game shall be strictly observed, they should be strictly observed by both parties. If the agreement is that they shall not be strictly observed, one party should claim no indulgence for himself that he is not willing to grant to his adversary. No false move should ever be made by a player to extricate himself from a difficulty or to gain an advantage. There can be no pleasure in playing with a person once detected in such an unfair practice. If your adversary is long in playing, you should not hurry him, or express any uneasiness at his delay, nor sing, nor whistle, nor look at your watch, nor take up a book to read, nor tap with your feet on the floor, or with your fingers on the table, nor do anything that may disturb his attention. For all these things displease, and they do not show your skill in playing but your craftiness or your rudeness.

* * * * *

You should not endeavor to amuse and deceive your adversary by pretending to have made bad moves in order to render him confident and careless and inattentive to your schemes. This is fraud and deceit, not skill. If you gain the victory, you should not give way to exultation or insult, nor show too much pleasure. On the contrary, you should endeavor to console your adversary, and soothe his wounded pride by every sort of civil expression that may be used with truth, such as, "You understand the game better than I, but you are a little inattentive," or "You play too fast," or "You had the best of the game, but something happened to divert your thoughts, and that turned it in my favour." If you are simply a spectator, you should observe the most perfect silence; for, if you give advice, you offend both parties, him, against whom you give it, because it may cause the loss of his game, him, in whose favour you give it, because though it be good, and he follows it, he loses the pleasure he might have had, if you had permitted him to think until it had occurred to himself.

And thus this essay, so full of wholesome, kind advice from a counsellor, who loved men none the less because he knew all their failings and foibles as well as virtues, continues a little longer, until the reader, already won over to its perfect rectitude of sentiment and purpose, entirely forgets how obvious are all the truisms of its stating that he has so often offended. The measure of self-abnegation, suggested by the conclusion of the essay, is, we fear, rather too exacting for the tug of chess-board selfishness upon the weaker side of human nature. If it is agreed that the rules of the game are not to be rigorously enforced, then, says Franklin, moderate your desire of victory over your adversary, and be pleased with one over yourself. Do not snatch eagerly at every advantage offered by his unskilfulness or inattention, but point out to him kindly that by such a move he places or leaves a piece in danger and unsupported; or that by another he will put his king in a perilous situation &c. "By this generous civility (so opposite to the unfairness above forbidden) you may, indeed, happen to lose the game to your opponent," the close of the essay declares, "but you will win what is better, his esteem, his respect, and his affection, together with the silent approbation and goodwill of impartial spectators."

We shall not linger upon the letters of Franklin. The substance of them has already been worked into this book too freely for that. It is sufficient to say that they are among the very best in the English language. It would be idle to compare them with those of Gray, Horace Walpole, Cowper, Byron or Fitzgerald, the acknowledged masters of that form of composition. Franklin was not a conscious man of letters at all, and is not to be judged by such academic standards. If he was, we might say that Cowper aerated with a little of Walpole most nearly, though, after all, but remotely, suggests a true conception of what Franklin was as a letter-writer. Few men were ever saner than Cowper was during his really lucid intervals; but then Cowper was not a man of business, a statesman or a philosopher, and the elixir of Walpole's gaiety differs from that of Franklin's as a stimulant of the wine-shop differs from fresh air and sunshine. The official and semi-official letters of Franklin contain some of the most solid and sagacious of his reflections and observations on political topics. His familiar letters to his kinsfolk and friends often run out into thoughts upon the management of our individual lives and our relations to the visible and invisible universe which are likely to be a part of the currency of human wisdom as long as human society lasts. And almost all of his known letters have value enough to make us feel, when still another of the thousands written by him happens to be reclaimed from loss, as Reuben in his parable might have felt, if he had recovered his precious axe.

Among the cleverest of his letters was his familiar one to his daughter on the Order of the Cincinnati. If his advice had been asked, he said, he perhaps would not have objected to their wearing their ribbon and badge themselves, if they derived pleasure from such trivial things, but he certainly should have objected to the idea of making the honor hereditary. And this was the amusing and original way in which he presented his views on the subject:

For Honour, worthily obtain'd (as for Example that of
our Officers), is in its Nature a _personal_ Thing, and
incommunicable to any but those who had some Share in
obtaining it. Thus among the Chinese, the most ancient,
and from long Experience the wisest of Nations, honour
does not _descend_, but _ascends_. If a man from his
Learning, his Wisdom, or his Valour, is promoted by the
Emperor to the Rank of Mandarin, his Parents are
immediately entitled to all the same Ceremonies of
Respect from the People, that are establish'd as due to
the Mandarin himself; on the supposition that it must
have been owing to the Education, Instruction, and good
Example afforded him by his Parents, that he was
rendered capable of serving the Publick.

This _ascending_ Honour is therefore useful to the
State, as it encourages Parents to give their Children
a good and virtuous Education. But the _descending
Honour_, to Posterity who could have no Share in
obtaining it, is not only groundless and absurd, but
often hurtful to that Posterity, since it is apt to
make them proud, disdaining to be employ'd in useful
Arts, and thence falling into Poverty, and all the
Meannesses, Servility, and Wretchedness attending it;
which is the present case with much of what is called
the _Noblesse_ in Europe. Or if to keep up the Dignity
of the Family, Estates are entailed entire on the
Eldest male heir, another Pest to Industry and
Improvement of the Country is introduc'd, which will be
followed by all the odious mixture of pride and
Beggary, and idleness, that have half depopulated [and
_decultivated_] Spain; occasioning continual Extinction
of Families by the Discouragements of Marriage [and
neglect in the improvement of estates].

I wish, therefore, that the Cincinnati, if they must go
on with their Project, would direct the Badges of their
Order to be worn by their Parents, instead of handing
them down to their Children. It would be a good
Precedent, and might have good Effects. It would also
be a kind of Obedience to the Fourth Commandment, in
which God enjoins us to honour our Father and Mother,
but has nowhere directed us to honour our Children. And
certainly no mode of honouring those immediate Authors
of our Being can be more effectual, than that of doing
praiseworthy Actions, which reflect Honour on those who
gave us our Education; or more becoming, than that of
manifesting, by some public Expression or Token, that
it is to their Instruction and Example we ascribe the
Merit of those Actions.

But the Absurdity of _descending Honours_ is not a mere
Matter of philosophical Opinion; it is capable of
mathematical Demonstration. A Man's Son, for instance,
is but half of his Family, the other half belonging to
the Family of his Wife. His Son, too, marrying into
another Family, his Share in the Grandson is but a
fourth; in the Great Grandson, by the same Process, it
is but an Eighth; in the next Generation a Sixteenth;
the next a Thirty-second; the next a Sixty-fourth; the
next an Hundred and Twenty-eighth; the next a Two
hundred and Fifty-sixth; and the next a Five hundred
and twelfth; thus in nine Generations, which will not
require more than 300 years (no very great Antiquity
for a Family), our present Chevalier of the Order of
Cincinnatus's Share in the then existing Knight, will
be but a 512th part; which, allowing the present
certain Fidelity of American Wives to be insur'd down
through all those Nine Generations, is so small a
Consideration, that methinks no reasonable Man would
hazard for the sake of it the disagreeable
Consequences of the Jealousy, Envy, and Ill will of his
Countrymen.

Let us go back with our Calculation from this young
Noble, the 512th part of the present Knight, thro' his
nine Generations, till we return to the year of the
Institution. He must have had a Father and Mother, they
are two. Each of them had a Father and Mother, they are
four. Those of the next preceding Generation will be
eight, the next Sixteen, the next thirty-two, the next
sixty-four, the next one hundred and Twenty-eight, the
next Two hundred and fifty-six, and the ninth in this
Retrocession Five hundred and twelve, who must be now
existing, and all contribute their Proportion of this
future _Chevalier de Cincinnatus_. These, with the
rest, make together as follows:

2
4
8
16
32
64
128
256
512
----
1022

One Thousand and Twenty-two Men and Women, contributors
to the formation of one Knight. And if we are to have a
Thousand of these future Knights, there must be now and
hereafter existing One Million and Twenty-two Thousand
Fathers and Mothers, who are to contribute to their
Production, unless a Part of the Number are employ'd in
making more Knights than One. Let us strike off then
the 22,000, on the Supposition of this double Employ,
and then consider whether, after a reasonable
Estimation of the Number of Rogues, and Fools, and
Royalists and Scoundrels and Prostitutes, that are
mix'd with, and help to make up necessarily their
Million of Predecessors, Posterity will have much
reason to boast of the noble Blood of the then existing
Set of Chevaliers de Cincinnatus. [The future
genealogists, too, of these Chevaliers, in proving the
lineal descent of their honour through so many
generations (even supposing honour capable in its
nature of descending), will only prove the small share
of this honour, which can be justly claimed by any one
of them; since the above simple process in arithmetic
makes it quite plain and clear that, in proportion as
the antiquity of the family shall augment, the right to
the honour of the ancestor will diminish; and a few
generations more would reduce it to something so small
as to be very near an absolute nullity.] I hope,
therefore, that the Order will drop this part of their
project, and content themselves, as the Knights of the
Garter, Bath, Thistle, St. Louis, and other Orders of
Europe do, with a Life Enjoyment of their little Badge
and Ribband, and let the Distinction die with those who
have merited it. This I imagine will give no offence.
For my own part, I shall think it a Convenience, when I
go into a Company where there may be Faces unknown to
me, if I discover, by this Badge, the Persons who merit
some particular Expression of my Respect; and it will
save modest Virtue the Trouble of calling for our
Regard, by awkward roundabout Intimations of having
been heretofore employ'd in the Continental Service.

The Gentleman, who made the Voyage to France to provide
the Ribands and Medals, has executed his Commission. To
me they seem tolerably done; but all such Things are
criticis'd. Some find Fault with the Latin, as wanting
classic Elegance and Correctness; and, since our Nine
Universities were not able to furnish better Latin, it
was pity, they say, that the Mottos had not been in
English. Others object to the Title, as not properly
assumable by any but Gen. Washington, [and a few
others] who serv'd without Pay. Others object to the
_Bald Eagle_ as looking too much like a _Dindon_, or
Turkey. For my own Part, I wish the Bald Eagle had not
been chosen as the Representative of our Country; he is
a Bird of bad moral Character; he does not get his
living honestly; you may have seen him perch'd on some
dead Tree, near the River where, too lazy to fish for
himself, he watches the Labour of the Fishing-Hawk;
and, when that diligent Bird has at length taken a
Fish, and is bearing it to his Nest for the support of
his Mate and young ones, the Bald Eagle pursues him,
and takes it from him. With all this Injustice he is
never in good Case; but, like those among Men who live
by Sharping and Robbing, he is generally poor, and
often very lousy. Besides, he is a rank Coward; the
little _King Bird_, not bigger than a Sparrow, attacks
him boldly and drives him out of the District. He is
therefore by no means a proper emblem for the brave and
honest Cincinnati of America, who have driven all the
_King-birds_ from our Country; though exactly fit for
that Order of Knights, which the French call
_Chevaliers d'Industrie_.

I am, on this account, not displeas'd that the Figure
is not known as a Bald Eagle, but looks more like a
Turk'y. For in Truth, the Turk'y is in comparison a
much more respectable Bird, and withal a true original
Native of America. Eagles have been found in all
Countries, but the Turk'y was peculiar to ours; the
first of the Species seen in Europe being brought to
France by the Jesuits from Canada, and serv'd up at the
Wedding Table of Charles the Ninth. He is, [though a
little vain and silly, it is true, but not the worse
emblem for that,] a Bird of Courage, and would not
hesitate to attack a Grenadier of the British Guards,
who should presume to invade his Farm Yard with a _red_
Coat on.

Nor need we dwell longer either upon Franklin as a poet. Considered seriously as such, he was undoubtedly one of the kind, that, as Horace says, neither Gods nor men can endure. But he should not be seriously regarded as a poet at all. We should bring no severer judgment, to his couplets than was brought to them by the plowmen and frontiersmen, who kept _Poor Richard's Almanac_ suspended over their mantelpieces; and his anacreontics should be read, as they were sung, after the edge of criticism has been dulled by a bottle or so. It is only fair to Poor Richard, however, to say that no one had a poorer opinion of his gifts as a poet than himself. "I know as thee," he says in one of his prefaces, "that I am no _Poet born_: and it is a Trade I never learnt, nor indeed could learn. _If I make Verses, 'tis in Spight of Nature and my Stars, I write._" In another preface, after honoring his friend Taylor, of Ephemerides fame, with a considerable number of lines, he exclaims: "Souse down into Prose again, my Muse; for Poetry's no more thy Element, than Air is that of the Flying-Fish." And we need go no further than one of Franklin's lively letters to Polly, at which we have already glanced, to satisfy ourselves that he placed quite as low an estimate on his verses as Poor Richard did on his. Speaking of the Muse, which he mentioned in his letter as having visited him that morning, he observes in his light-hearted way:

This Muse appear'd to be no Housewife. I suppose few of
them are. She was _drest_ (if the Expression is
allowable) in an _Undress_, a kind of slatternly
_Negligee_, neither neat nor clean, nor well made; and
she has given the same sort of Dress to my Piece. On
reviewing it, I would have reform'd the lines and made
them all of a Length, as I am told Lines ought to be;
but I find I can't lengthen the short ones without
stretching them on the Rack, and I think it would be
equally cruel to cut off any Part of the long ones.
Besides the Superfluity of _these_ makes up for the
Deficiency of _those_; and so, from a Principle of
Justice, I leave them at full Length, that I may give
you, at least in one Sense of the Word, _good Measure_.