Chapter V: H. B (5)

The success of Franklin's first foreign mission was, therefore, substantial and satisfactory. During this sojourn of five years in England he had made many valuable friends outside of court and political circles, among whom Hume, Robertson and Adam Smith were conspicuous. In 1759, for his literary and more particularly his scientific attainments, he received the freedom of the city of Edinburgh and the degree of doctor of laws from the university of St Andrews. He had been made a Master of Arts at Harvard and at Yale in 1753, and at the college of William and Mary in 1756; and in 1762 he received the degree of D.C.L. at Oxford. While in England he had made active use of his remarkable talent for pamphleteering. In the clamour for peace following the death of George II. (25th of October 1760), he was for a vigorous prosecution of the war with France; he had written what purported to be a chapter from an old book written by a Spanish Jesuit, _On the Meanes of Disposing the Enemie to Peace_, which had a great effect; and in the spring of 1760 there had been published a more elaborate paper written by Franklin with the assistance of Richard Jackson, agent of Massachusetts and Connecticut in London, entitled _The Interest of Great Britain Considered with Regard to Her Colonies, and the Acquisitions of Canada and Guadeloupe_ (1760). This pamphlet answered the argument that it would be unsafe to keep Canada because of the added strength that would thus be given to any possible movement for independence in the English colonies, by urging that so long as Canada remained French there could be no safety for the English colonies in North America, nor any permanent peace in Europe. Tradition reports that this pamphlet had considerable weight in determining the ministry to retain Canada.

Franklin sailed again for America in August 1762, hoping to be able to settle down in quiet and devote the remainder of his life to experiments in physics. This quiet was interrupted, however, by the "Paxton Massacre" (Dec. 14, 1763)--the slaughter of a score of Indians (children, women and old men) at Lancaster, Pennsylvania, by some young rowdies from the town of Paxton, who then marched upon Philadelphia to kill a few Christian Indians there. Franklin, appealed to by the governor, raised a troop sufficient to frighten away the "Paxton boys," and for the moment there seemed a possibility of an understanding between Franklin and the proprietors. But the question of taxing the estates of the proprietors came up in a new form, and a petition from the assembly was drawn by Franklin, requesting the king "to resume the government" of Pennsylvania. In the autumn election of 1764 the influence of the proprietors was exerted against Franklin, and by an adverse majority of 25 votes in 4000 he failed to be re-elected to the assembly. The new assembly sent Franklin again to England as its special agent to take charge of another petition for a change of government, which, however, came to nothing. Matters of much greater consequence soon demanded Franklin's attention.

Early in 1764 Lord Grenville had informed the London agents of the American colonies that he proposed to lay a portion of the burden left by the war with France upon the shoulders of the colonists by means of a stamp duty, unless some other tax equally productive and less inconvenient were proposed. The natural objection of the colonies, as voiced, for example, by the assembly of Pennsylvania, was that it was a cruel thing to tax colonies already taxed beyond their strength, and surrounded by enemies and exposed to constant expenditures for defence, and that it was an indignity that they should be taxed by a parliament in which they were not represented; at the same time the Pennsylvania assembly recognized it as "their duty to grant aid to the crown, according to their abilities, whenever required of them in the usual manner." To prevent the introduction of the Stamp Act, which he characterized as "the mother of mischief," Franklin used every effort, but the bill was easily passed, and it was thought that the colonists would soon be reconciled to it. Because he, too, thought so, and because he recommended John Hughes, a merchant of Philadelphia, for the office of distributor of stamps, Franklin himself was denounced--he was even accused of having planned the Stamp Act--and his family in Philadelphia was in danger of being mobbed. Of Franklin's examination, in February 1766, by the House in Committee of the Whole, as to the effects of the Stamp Act, Burke said that the scene reminded him of a master examined by a parcel of schoolboys, and George Whitefield said: "Dr Franklin has gained immortal honour by his behaviour at the bar of the House. His answer was always found equal to the questioner. He stood unappalled, gave pleasure to his friends and did honour to his country."[3] Franklin compared the position of the colonies to that of Scotland in the days before the union, and in the same year (1766) audaciously urged a similar union with the colonies before it was too late. The knowledge of colonial affairs gained from Franklin's testimony, probably more than all other causes combined, determined the immediate repeal of the Stamp Act. For Franklin this was a great triumph, and the news of it filled the colonists with delight and restored him to their confidence and affection. Another bill (the Declaratory Act), however, was almost immediately passed by the king's party, asserting absolute supremacy of parliament over the colonies, and in the succeeding parliament, by the Townshend Acts of 1767, duties were imposed on paper, paints and glass imported by the colonists; a tax was imposed on tea also. The imposition of these taxes was bitterly resented in the colonies, where it quickly crystallized public opinion round the principle of "No taxation without representation." In spite of the opposition in the colonies to the Declaratory Act, the Townshend Acts and the tea tax, Franklin continued to assure the British ministry and the British public of the loyalty of the colonists. He tried to find some middle ground of reconciliation, and kept up his quiet work of informing England as to the opinions and conditions of the colonies, and of moderating the attitude of the colonies toward the home government; so that, as he said, he was accused in America of being too much an Englishman, and in England of being too much an American. He was agent now, not only of Pennsylvania, but also of New Jersey, of Georgia and of Massachusetts. Hillsborough, who became secretary of state for the colonies in 1768, refused to recognize Franklin as agent of Massachusetts, because the governor of Massachusetts had not approved the appointment, which was by resolution of the assembly. Franklin contended that the governor, as a mere agent of the king, could have nothing to do with the assembly's appointment of its agent to the king; that "the King, and not the King, Lords, and Commons collectively, is their sovereign; and that the King, with _their_ respective Parliaments, is their only legislator." Franklin's influence helped to oust Hillsborough, and Dartmouth, whose name Franklin suggested, was made secretary In 1772 and promptly recognized Franklin as the agent of Massachusetts.

In 1773 there appeared in the _Public Advertiser_ one of Franklin's cleverest hoaxes, "An Edict of the King of Prussia," proclaiming that the island of Britain was a colony of Prussia, having been settled by Angles and Saxons, having been protected by Prussia, having been defended by Prussia against France in the war just past, and never having been definitely freed from Prussia's rule; and that, therefore, Great Britain should now submit to certain taxes laid by Prussia--the taxes being identical with those laid upon the American colonies by Great Britain. In the same year occurred the famous episode of the Hutchinson Letters. These were written by Thomas Hutchinson, Governor of Massachusetts, Andrew Oliver (1706-1774), his lieutenant-governor, and others to William Whately, a member of Parliament, and private secretary to George Grenville, suggesting an increase of the power of the governor at the expense of the assembly, "an abridgement of what are called English liberties," and other measures more extreme than those undertaken by the government. The correspondence was shown to Franklin by a mysterious "member of parliament" to back up the contention that the quartering of troops in Boston was suggested, not by the British ministry, but by Americans and Bostonians. Upon his promise not to publish the letters Franklin received permission to send them to Massachusetts, where they were much passed about and were printed, and they were soon republished in English newspapers. The Massachusetts assembly on receiving the letters resolved to petition the crown for the removal of both Hutchinson and Oliver. The petition was refused and was condemned as scandalous, and Franklin, who took upon himself the responsibility for the publication of the letters, in the hearing before the privy council at the Cockpit on the 29th of January 1774 was insulted and was called a thief by Alexander Wedderburn (the solicitor-general, who appeared for Hutchinson and Oliver), and was removed from his position as head of the post office in the American colonies.

Satisfied that his usefulness in England was at an end, Franklin entrusted his agencies to the care of Arthur Lee, and on the 21st of March 1775 again set sail for Philadelphia. During the last years of his stay in England there had been repeated attempts to win him (probably with an under-secretaryship) to the British service, and in these same years he had done a great work for the colonies by gaining friends for them among the opposition, and by impressing France with his ability and the excellence of his case. Upon reaching America, he heard of the fighting at Lexington and Concord, and with the news of an actual outbreak of hostilities his feeling toward England seems to have changed completely. He was no longer a peacemaker, but an ardent war-maker. On the 6th of May, the day after his arrival in Philadelphia, he was elected by the assembly of Pennsylvania a delegate to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia. In October he was elected a member of the Pennsylvania assembly, but, as members of this body were still required to take an oath of allegiance to the crown, he refused to serve. In the Congress he served on as many as ten committees, and upon the organization of a continental postal system, he was made postmaster-general, a position he held for one year, when (in 1776) he was succeeded by his son-in-law, Richard Bache, who had been his deputy. With Benjamin Harrison, John Dickinson, Thomas Johnson and John Jay he was appointed in November 1775 to a committee to carry on a secret correspondence with the friends of America "in Great Britain, Ireland and other parts of the world." He planned an appeal to the king of France for aid, and wrote the instructions of Silas Deane who was to convey it. In April 1776 he went to Montreal with Charles Carroll, Samuel Chase and John Carroll, as a member of the commission which conferred with General Arnold, and attempted without success to gain the co-operation of Canada. Immediately after his return from Montreal he was a member of the committee of five appointed to draw up the Declaration of Independence, but he took no actual part himself in drafting that instrument, aside from suggesting the change or insertion of a few words in Jefferson's draft. From July 16 to September 28 he acted as president of the Constitutional Convention of Pennsylvania.

With John Adams and Edward Rutledge he was selected by Congress to discuss with Admiral Howe (September 1776, at Staten Island) the terms of peace proposed by Howe, who had arrived in New York harbour in July 1776, and who had been an intimate friend of Franklin; but the discussion was fruitless, as the American commissioners refused to treat "_back_ of this step of independency." On the 26th of September in the same year Franklin was chosen as commissioner to France to join Arthur Lee, who was in London, and Silas Deane, who had arrived in France in June 1776. He collected all the money he could command, between L3000 and L4000, lent it to Congress before he set sail, and arrived at Paris on the 22nd of December. He found quarters at Passy,[4] then a suburb of Paris, in a house belonging to Le Ray de Chaumont, an active friend of the American cause, who had influential relations with the court, and through whom he was enabled to be in the fullest communication with the French government without compromising it in the eyes of Great Britain.

At the time of Franklin's arrival in Paris he was already one of the most talked about men in the world. He was a member of every important learned society in Europe; he was a member, and one of the managers, of the Royal Society, and was one of eight foreign members of the Royal Academy of Sciences in Paris. Three editions of his scientific works had already appeared in Paris, and a new edition had recently appeared in London. To all these advantages he added a political purpose--the dismemberment of the British empire--which was entirely congenial to every citizen of France. "Franklin's reputation," wrote John Adams with characteristic extravagance, "was more universal than that of Leibnitz or Newton, Frederick or Voltaire; and his character more esteemed and beloved than all of them.... If a collection could be made of all the gazettes of Europe, for the latter half of the 18th century, a greater number of panegyrical paragraphs upon _le grand Franklin_ would appear, it is believed, than upon any other man that ever lived." "Franklin's appearance in the French salons, even before he began to negotiate," says Friedrich Christoph Schlosser, "was an event of great importance to the whole of Europe.... His dress, the simplicity of his external appearance, the friendly meekness of the old man, and the apparent humility of the Quaker, procured for Freedom a mass of votaries among the court circles who used to be alarmed at its coarseness and unsophisticated truths. Such was the number of portraits,[5] busts and medallions of him in circulation before he left Paris that he would have been recognized from them by any adult citizen in any part of the civilized world."

Franklin's position in France was a difficult one from the start, because of the delicacy of the task of getting French aid at a time when France was unready openly to take sides against Great Britain. But on the 6th of February 1778, after the news of the defeat and surrender of Burgoyne had reached Europe, a treaty of alliance and a treaty of amity and commerce between France and the United States were signed at Paris by Franklin, Deane and Lee. On the 28th of October this commission was discharged and Franklin was appointed sole plenipotentiary to the French court. Lee, from the beginning of the mission to Paris, seems to have been possessed of a mania of jealousy toward Franklin, or of misunderstanding of his acts, and he tried to undermine his influence with the Continental Congress. John Adams, when he succeeded Deane (recalled from Paris through Lee's machinations) joined in the chorus of fault-finding against Franklin, dilated upon his social habits, his personal slothfulness and his complete lack of business-like system; but Adams soon came to see that, although careless of details, Franklin was doing what no other man could have done, and he ceased his harsher criticism. Even greater than his diplomatic difficulties were Franklin's financial straits. Drafts were being drawn on him by all the American agents in Europe, and by the Continental Congress at home. Acting as American naval agent for the many successful privateers who harried the English Channel, and for whom he skilfully got every bit of assistance possible, open and covert, from the French government, he was continually called upon for funds in these ventures. Of the vessels to be sent to Paris with American cargoes which were to be sold for the liquidation of French loans to the colonies made through Beaumarchais, few arrived; those that did come did not cover Beaumarchais's advances, and hardly a vessel came from America without word of fresh drafts on Franklin. After bold and repeated overtures for an exchange of prisoners--an important matter, both because the American frigates had no place in which to stow away their prisoners, and because of the maltreatment of American captives in such prisons as Dartmoor--exchanges began at the end of March 1779, although there were annoying delays, and immediately after November 1781 there was a long break in the agreement; and the Americans discharged from English prisons were constantly in need of money. Franklin, besides, was constantly called upon to meet the indebtedness of Lee and of Ralph Izard (1742-1804), and of John Jay, who in Madrid was being drawn on by the American Congress. In spite of the poor condition in Europe of the credit of the struggling colonies, and of the fact that France was almost bankrupt (and in the later years was at war), and although Necker strenuously resisted the making of any loans to the colonies, France, largely because of Franklin's appeals, expended, by loan or gift to the colonies, or in sustenance of the French arms in America, a sum estimated at $60,000,000.

In 1781 Franklin, with John Adams, John Jay, Jefferson, who remained in America, and Henry Laurens, then a prisoner in England, was appointed on a commission to make peace with Great Britain. In the spring of 1782 Franklin had been informally negotiating with Shelburne, secretary of state for the home department, through the medium of Richard Oswald, a Scotch merchant, and had suggested that England should cede Canada to the United States in return for the recognition of loyalist claims by the states. When the formal negotiations began Franklin held closely to the instructions of Congress to its commissioners, that they should maintain confidential relations with the French ministers and that they were "to undertake nothing in the negotiations for peace or truce without their knowledge and concurrence," and were ultimately to be governed by "their advice and opinion." Jay and Adams disagreed with him on this point, believing that France intended to curtail the territorial aspirations of the Americans for her own benefit and for that of her ally, Spain. At last, after the British government had authorized its agents to treat with the commissioners as representatives of an independent power, thus recognizing American independence before the treaty was made, Franklin acquiesced in the policy of Jay. The preliminary treaty was signed by the commissioners on the 30th of November 1782, the final treaty on the 3rd of September 1783. Franklin had repeatedly petitioned Congress for his recall, but his letters were unanswered or his appeals refused until the 7th of March 1785, when Congress resolved that he be allowed to return to America; on the 10th of March Thomas Jefferson, who had joined him in August of the year before, was appointed to his place. Jefferson, when asked if he replaced Franklin, replied, "No one can replace him, sir; I am only his successor." Before Franklin left Paris on the 12th of July 1785 he had made commercial treaties with Sweden (1783) and Prussia (1785; signed after Franklin's departure by Jefferson and John Adams). Franklin arrived in Philadelphia on the 13th of September, disembarking at the same wharf as when he had first entered the city. He was immediately elected a member of the municipal council of Philadelphia, becoming its chairman; and was chosen president of the Supreme Executive Council (the chief executive officer) of Pennsylvania, and was re-elected in 1786 and 1787, serving from October 1785 to October 1788. In May 1787 he was elected a delegate to the Convention which drew up the Federal Constitution, this body thus having a member upon whom all could agree as chairman, should Washington be absent. He opposed over-centralization of government and favoured the Connecticut Compromise, and after the work of the Convention was done used his influence to secure the adoption of the Constitution.[6] As president of the Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery, Franklin signed a petition to Congress (12th February 1790) for immediate abolition of slavery, and six weeks later in his most brilliant manner parodied the attack on the petition made by James Jackson (1757-1806) of Georgia, taking off Jackson's quotations of Scripture with pretended texts from the Koran cited by a member of the Divan of Algiers in opposition to a petition asking for the prohibition of holding Christians in slavery. These were his last public acts. His last days were marked by a fine serenity and calm; he died in his own house in Philadelphia on the 17th of April 1790, the immediate cause being an abscess in the lungs. He was buried with his wife in the graveyard (Fifth and Arch Streets) of Christ Church, Philadelphia.

Physically Franklin was large, about 5 ft. 10 in. tall, with a well-rounded, powerful figure; he inherited an excellent constitution from his parents--"I never knew," says he, "either my father or mother to have any sickness but that of which they dy'd, he at 89, and she at 85 years of age"--but injured it somewhat by excesses; in early life he had severe attacks of pleurisy, from one of which, in 1727, it was not expected that he would recover, and in his later years he was the victim of stone and gout. When he was sixteen he became a vegetarian for a time, rather to save money for books than for any other reason, and he always preached moderation in eating, though he was less consistent in his practice in this particular than as regards moderate drinking. He was always enthusiastically fond of swimming, and was a great believer in fresh air, taking a cold air bath regularly in the morning, when he sat naked in his bedroom beguiling himself with a book or with writing for a half-hour or more. He insisted that fresh, cold air was not the cause of colds, and preached zealously the "gospel of ventilation." He was a charming talker, with a gay humour and a quiet sarcasm and a telling use of anecdote for argument. Henri Martin, the French historian, speaks of him as "of a mind altogether French in its grace and elasticity." In 1730 he married Deborah Read, in whose father's house he had lived when he had first come to Philadelphia, to whom he had been engaged before his first departure from Philadelphia for London, and who in his absence had married a ne'er-do-well, one Rogers, who had deserted her. The marriage to Franklin is presumed to have been a common law marriage, for there was no proof that Miss Read's former husband was dead, nor that, as was suspected, a former wife, alive when Rogers married Miss Read, was still alive, and that therefore his marriage to Deborah was void. His "Debby," or his "dear child," as Franklin usually addressed her in his letters, received into the family, soon after her marriage, Franklin's illegitimate son, William Franklin (1729-1813),[7] with whom she afterwards quarrelled, and whose mother, tradition says, was Barbara, a servant in the Franklin household. Another illegitimate child became the wife of John Foxcroft of Philadelphia. Deborah, who was "as much dispos'd to industry and frugality as" her husband, was illiterate and shared none of her husband's tastes for literature and science; her dread of an ocean voyage kept her in Philadelphia during Franklin's missions to England, and she died in 1774, while Franklin was in London. She bore him two children, one a son, Francis Folger, "whom I have seldom since seen equal'd in everything, and whom to this day [thirty-six years after the child's death] I cannot think of without a sigh," who died (1736) when four years old of small-pox, not having been inoculated; the other was Sarah (1744-1808), who married Richard Bache (1737-1811), Franklin's successor in 1776-1782 as postmaster-general. Franklin's gallant relations with women after his wife's death were probably innocent enough. Best known of his French _amies_ were Mme Helvetius, widow of the philosopher, and the young Mme Brillon, who corrected her "Papa's" French and tried to bring him safely into the Roman Catholic Church. With him in France were his grandsons, William Temple Franklin, William Franklin's natural son, who acted as private secretary to his grandfather, and Benjamin Franklin Bache (1769-1798), Sarah's son, whom he sent to Geneva to be educated, for whom he later asked public office of Washington, and who became editor of the _Aurora_, one of the leading journals in the Republican attacks on Washington.

Franklin early rebelled against New England Puritanism and spent his Sundays in reading and in study instead of attending church. His free-thinking ran its extreme course at the time of his publication in London of _A Dissertation on Liberty and Necessity, Pleasure and Pain_ (1725), which he recognized as one of the great _errata_ of his life. He later called himself a deist, or theist, not discriminating between the terms. To his favourite sister he wrote: "There are some things in your New England doctrine and worship which I do not agree with; but I do not therefore condemn them, or desire to shake your belief or practice of them." Such was his general attitude. He did not believe in the divinity of Christ, but thought "his system of morals and his religion, as he left them to us, the best the world ever saw, or is like to see." His intense practical-mindedness drew him away from religion, but drove him to a morality of his own (the "art of virtue," he called it), based on thirteen virtues each accompanied by a short precept; the virtues were Temperance, Silence, Order, Resolution, Frugality, Industry, Sincerity, Justice, Moderation, Cleanliness, Tranquility, Chastity and Humility, the precept accompanying the last-named virtue being "Imitate Jesus and Socrates." He made a business-like little notebook, ruled off spaces for the thirteen virtues and the seven days of the week, "determined to give a week's strict attention to each of the virtues successively ... [going] thro' a course compleate in thirteen weeks and four courses in a year," marking for each day a record of his adherence to each of the precepts. "And conceiving God to be the fountain of wisdom," he "thought it right and necessary to solicit His assistance for obtaining it," and drew up the following prayer for daily use: "O powerful Goodness! bountiful Father! merciful Guide! Increase in me that wisdom which discovers my truest interest. Strengthen my resolution to perform what that wisdom dictates. Accept my kind offices to Thy other children, as the only return in my power for Thy continual favours to me." He was by no means prone to overmuch introspection, his great interest in the conduct of others being shown in the wise maxims of Poor Richard, which were possibly too utilitarian but were wonderfully successful in instructing American morals. His _Art of Virtue_ on which he worked for years was never completed or published in any form.

"Benjamin Franklin, Printer," was Franklin's own favourite description of himself. He was an excellent compositor and pressman; his workmanship, clear impressions, black ink and comparative freedom from errata did much to get him the public printing in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, and the printing of the paper money[8] and other public matters in Delaware. The first book with his imprint is _The Psalms of David Imitated in the Language of the New Testament and apply'd to the Christian State and Worship. By I. Watts ..., Philadelphia: Printed by B. F. and H. M. for Thomas Godfrey, and Sold at his Shop, 1729._ The first novel printed in America was Franklin's reprint in 1744 of _Pamela_; and the first American translation from the classics which was printed in America was a version by James Logan (1674-1751) of Cato's _Moral Distichs_ (1735). In 1744 he published another translation of Logan's, Cicero _On Old Age_, which Franklin thought typographically the finest book he had ever printed. In 1733 he had established a press in Charleston, South Carolina, and soon after did the same in Lancaster, Pa., in New Haven, Conn., in New York, in Antigua, in Kingston, Jamaica, and in other places. Personally he had little connexion with the Philadelphia printing office after 1748, when David Hall became his partner and took charge of it. But in 1753 he was eagerly engaged in having several of his improvements incorporated in a new press, and more than twenty years after was actively interested in John Walter's scheme of "logography." In France he had a private press in his house in Passy, on which he printed "bagatelles." Franklin's work as a publisher is for the most part closely connected with his work in issuing the _Gazette_ and _Poor Richard's Almanack_ (a summary of the proverbs from which appeared in the number for 1758, and has often been reprinted--under such titles as _Father Abraham's Speech_, and _The Way to Wealth_).[9]

Of much of Franklin's work as an author something has already been said. Judged as literature, the first place belongs to his _Autobiography_, which unquestionably ranks among the few great autobiographies ever written. His style in its simplicity, facility and clearness owed something to De Foe, something to Cotton Mather, something to Plutarch, more to Bunyan and to his early attempts to reproduce the manner of the third volume of the _Spectator_; and not the least to his own careful study of word usage. From Xenophon's _Memorabilia_ he learned when a boy the Socratic method of argument. Swift he resembled in the occasional broadness of his humour, in his brilliantly successful use of sarcasm and irony,[10] and in his mastery of the hoax. Balzac said of him that he "invented the lightning-rod, the hoax ('le canard') and the republic." Among his more famous hoaxes were the "Edict of the King of Prussia" (1773), already described; the fictitious supplement to the Boston _Chronicle_, printed on his private press at Passy in 1782, and containing a letter with an invoice of eight packs of 954 cured, dried, hooped and painted scalps of rebels, men, women and children, taken by Indians in the British employ; and another fictitious _Letter from the Count de Schaumberg to the Baron Hohendorf commanding the Hessian Troops in America_ (1777)--the count's only anxiety is that not enough men will be killed to bring him in moneys he needs, and he urges his officer in command in America "to prolong the war ... for I have made arrangements for a grand Italian opera, and I do not wish to be obliged to give it up."[11]

Closely related to Franklin's political pamphlets are his writings on economics, which, though undertaken with a political or practical purpose and not in a purely scientific spirit, rank him as the first American economist. He wrote in 1729 _A Modest Enquiry into the Nature and Necessity of a Paper Currency_, which argued that a plentiful currency will make rates of interest low and will promote immigration and home manufactures, and which did much to secure the further issue of paper money in Pennsylvania. After the British Act of 1750 forbidding the erection or the operating of iron or steel mills in the colonies, Franklin wrote _Observations concerning the Increase of Mankind and the Peopling of Countries_ (1751); its thesis was that manufactures come to be common only with a high degree of social development and with great density of population, and that Great Britain need not, therefore, fear the industrial competition of the colonies, but it is better known for the estimate (adopted by Adam Smith) that the population of the colonies would double every quarter-century; and for the likeness to Malthus's[12] "preventive check" of its statement: "The greater the common fashionable expense of any rank of people the more cautious they are of marriage." His _Positions to be examined concerning National Wealth_ (1769) shows that he was greatly influenced by the French physiocrats after his visit to France in 1767. His _Wail of a Protected Manufacturer_ voices a protest against protection as raising the cost of living; and he held that free trade was based on a natural right. He knew Kames, Hume and Adam Smith, and corresponded with Mirabeau, "the friend of Man." Some of the more important of his economic theses, as summarized by W. A. Wetzel, are: that money as coin may have more than its bullion value; that natural interest is determined by the rent of land valued at the sum of money loaned--an anticipation of Turgot; that high wages are not inconsistent with a large foreign trade; that the value of an article is determined by the amount of labour necessary to produce the food consumed in making the article; that manufactures are advantageous but agriculture only is truly productive; and that when practicable (as he did not think it practicable at the end of the War of Independence) state revenue should be raised by direct tax.

Franklin as a scientist[13] and as an inventor has been decried by experts as an amateur and a dabbler; but it should be remembered that it was always his hope to retire from public life and devote himself to science. In the American Philosophical Society (founded 1743) scientific subjects were much discussed. Franklin wrote a paper on the causes of earthquakes for his _Gazette_ of the 15th of December 1737; and he eagerly collected material to uphold his theory that waterspouts and whirlwinds resulted from the same causes. In 1743, from the circumstance that an eclipse not visible in Philadelphia because of a storm had been observed in Boston, where the storm although north-easterly did not occur until an hour after the eclipse, he surmised that storms move _against_ the wind along the Atlantic coast. In the year before (1742) he had planned the "Pennsylvania fire-place," better known as the "Franklin stove," which saved fuel, heated all the room, and had the same principle as the hot-air furnace; the stove was never patented by Franklin, but was described in his pamphlet dated 1744. He was much engaged at the same time in remedying smoking chimneys, and as late as 1785 wrote to Jan Ingenhousz, physician to the emperor of Austria, on chimneys and draughts; smoking street lamps he remedied by a simple contrivance. The study of electricity he took up in 1746 when he first saw a Leyden jar, in the manipulation of which he became expert and which he improved by the use of granulated lead in the place of water for the interior armatures; he recognized that condensation is due to the dielectric and not to the metal coatings. A note in his diary, dated the 7th of November 1749, shows that he had then conjectured that thunder and lightning were electrical manifestations; in the same year he planned the lightning-rod (long known as "Franklin's rod"), which he described and recommended to the public in 1753, when the Copley medal of the Royal Society was awarded him for his discoveries. The famous experiment with the kite, proving lightning an electrical phenomenon, was performed by Franklin in June 1752. He overthrew entirely the "friction" theory of electricity and conceived the idea of plus and minus charges (1753); he thought the sea the source of electricity. On light Franklin wrote to David Rittenhouse in June 1784; the sum of his own conjectures was that the corpuscular theory of Newton was wrong, and that light was due to the vibration of an elastic aether. He studied with some care the temperature of the Gulf Stream. In navigation he suggested many new contrivances, such as water-tight compartments, floating anchors to lay a ship to in a storm, and dishes that would not upset during a gale; and beginning in 1757 made repeated experiments with oil on stormy waters. As a mathematician he devised various elaborate magic squares and novel magic circles, of which he speaks apologetically, because they are of no practical use. Always much interested in agriculture, he made an especial effort (like Robert R. Livingston) to promote the use of plaster of Paris as a fertiliser. He took a prominent part in aeronautic experiments during his stay in France. He made an excellent clock, which because of a slight improvement introduced by James Ferguson in 1757 was long known as Ferguson's clock. In medicine Franklin was considered important enough to be elected to the Royal Medical Society of Paris in 1777, and an honorary member of the Medical Society of London in 1787. In 1784 he was on the committee which investigated Mesmer, and the report is a document of lasting scientific value. Franklin's advocacy of vegetarianism, of sparing and simple diet, and of temperance in the use of liquors, and of proper ventilation has already been referred to. His most direct contribution to medicine was the invention for his own use of bifocal eyeglasses.

A summary of so versatile a genius is impossible. His services to America in England and France rank him as one of the heroes of the American War of Independence and as the greatest of American diplomats. Almost the only American scientist of his day, he displayed remarkably deep as well as remarkably varied abilities in science and deserved the honours enthusiastically given him by the _savants_ of Europe.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Franklin's works were not collected in his own
lifetime, and he made no effort to publish his writings. _Experiments
and Observations on Electricity_ (London, 1769) was translated into
French by Barbeu Dubourg (Paris, 1773); Vaughan attempted a more
complete edition, _Political, Miscellaneous and Philosophical Pieces_
(London, 1779); an edition in three volumes appeared after Franklin's
death (London, 1806); what seemed the authentic _Works_, as it was
under the care of Temple Franklin, was published at London (6 vols.,
1817-1819; 3 vols., 1818) and with some additional matter at
Philadelphia (6 vols., 1818). Sparks's edition (10 vols., Boston,
1836-1842; revised, Philadelphia, 1858) also contained fresh matter;
and there are further additions in the edition of John Bigelow
(Philadelphia, 1887-1888; 5th ed., 1905) and in that by Albert Henry
Smyth (10 vols., New York, 1905-1907). There are important
Frankliniana, about 13,000 papers, in the possession of the American
Philosophical Society, to which they were conveyed by the son of
Temple Franklin's executor, George Fox. Other papers which had been
left to Fox lay for years in barrels in a stable garret; they were
finally cleared out, their owner, Mary Fox, intending to send them to
a paper mill. One barrel went to the mill. The others, it was found,
contained papers belonging to Franklin, and this important collection
was bought and presented to the university of Pennsylvania. The
valuable Frankliniana collected by Henry Stevens were purchased by
Congress in 1885. These MS. collections were first carefully gone over
for the edition of the _Works_ by A. H. Smyth. Franklin's
_Autobiography_ was begun in 1771 as a private chronicle for his son,
Governor William Franklin; the papers, bringing the story of his
father's life down to 1730, were lost by the governor during the War
of Independence, and in 1783 came into the possession of Abel James,
who restored them to Franklin and urged him to complete the sketch. He
wrote a little in 1784, more in 1788, when he furnished a copy to his
friend le Veillard, and a little more in 1790. The original manuscript
was long in the possession of Temple Franklin, who spent years
rearranging the matter in it and making over into politer English his
grandfather's plain-spokenness. So long was the publication delayed
that it was generally believed that Temple Franklin had sold all the
papers to the British government; a French version, _Memoires de la
vie privee_ (Paris, 1791), was retranslated into English twice in 1793
(London), and from one of these versions (by Robinson) still another
French version was made (Paris, 1798). Temple Franklin, deciding to
print, got from le Veillard the copy sent to him in 1788 (sending in
return the original with autograph alterations and the final
addition), and from the copy published (London, 1817) an edition
supposed to be authentic and complete. The complete autograph of the
biography, acquired by John Bigelow in 1867 from its French owners,
upon collation with Temple Franklin's edition showed that the latter
contained 1200 emasculations and that it omitted entirely what had
been written in 1790. Bigelow published the complete _Autobiography_
with additions from Franklin's correspondence and other writings in
1868; a second edition (3 vols., Philadelphia, 1888) was published
under the title, _The Life of Benjamin Franklin, Written by Himself_.

In addition to the _Autobiography_ see James Parton, _Life and Times
of Benjamin Franklin_ (2 vols., New York, 1864); John T. Morse, Jr.,
_Benjamin Franklin_ (Boston, 1889, in the American Statesmen series);
J. B. McMaster, _Benjamin Franklin as a Man of Letters_ (Boston, 1887,
in American Men of Letters series); Paul L. Ford, _The Many-Sided
Franklin_ (New York, 1899) and _Franklin Bibliography_ (Brooklyn,
1889); E. E. Hale and E. E. Hale, Jr., _Franklin in France_ (2 vols.,
Boston, 1888); J. H. A. Doniol, _Histoire de la participation de la
France a l'etablissement des Etats-Unis d'Amerique_ (Paris, 6 vols.,
1886-1900); S. G. Fisher, _The True Benjamin Franklin_ (Philadelphia,
1899); E. Robins, _Benjamin Franklin_ (New York, 1898, in the American
Men of Energy series); W. A. Wetzel, "Benjamin Franklin as an
Economist," No. 9, in series 13 of _Johns Hopkins Studies in
Historical and Political Science_; and the prefaces and biographical
matter in A. H. Smyth's edition of the _Works_ (New York, 10 vols.,
1905-1907). (R. We.)

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Keimer and his sister had come the year before from London, where
he had learned his trade; both were ardent members of the fanatic
band of "French prophets." He proposed founding a new sect with the
help of Franklin, who after leaving his shop ridiculed him for his
long square beard and for keeping the seventh day. Keimer settled in
the Barbadoes about 1730; and in 1731 began to publish at Bridgetown
the semi-weekly _Barbadoes Gazette_. Selections from it called
_Caribbeana_ (1741) and _A Brand Plucked from the Burning,
Exemplified in the Unparalleled Case of Samuel Keimer_ (1718) are
from his pen. He died about 1738.

[2] The meeting between Franklin, the type of the shrewd, cool
provincial, and Braddock, a blustering, blundering, drinking British
soldier, is dramatically portrayed by Thackeray in the 9th chapter of
_The Virginians_.

[3] Many questions (about 20 of the first 25) were put by his friends
to draw out what he wished to be known.

[4] The house is familiar from the drawing of it by Victor Hugo.

[5] Many of these portraits bore inscriptions, the most famous of
which was Turgot's line, "Eripuit fulmen coelo sceptrumque tyrannis."

[6] Notably in a pamphlet comparing the Jews and the
Anti-Federalists.

[7] William Franklin served on the Canadian frontier with
Pennsylvania troops, becoming captain in 1750; was in the post-office
in 1754-1756; went to England with his father in 1758; was admitted
to legal practice in 1758; in 1763, recommended by Lord Fairfax,
became governor of New Jersey; he left the Whig for the Tory party;
and in the War of Independence was a faithful loyalist, much to the
pain and regret of his father, who, however, was reconciled to him in
part in 1784. He was held as a prisoner from 1776 until exchanged in
1778; and lived four years in New York, and during the remainder of
his life in England with an annual pension of L800 from the crown.

[8] For the prevention of counterfeiting continental paper money
Franklin long afterwards suggested the use on the different
denominations of different leaves, having noted the infinite variety
of leaf venation.

[9] "Seventy-five editions of it have been printed in English,
fifty-six in French, eleven in German and nine in Italian. It has
been translated into Spanish, Danish, Swedish, Welsh, Polish, Gaelic,
Russian, Bohemian, Dutch, Catalan, Chinese, modern Greek and phonetic
writing. It has been printed at least four hundred times, and is
to-day as popular as ever."--P. L. Ford, in _The Many-Sided Franklin_
(1899).

[10] Both Swift and Franklin made sport of the typical astrologer
almanack-maker.

[11] Another hoax was Franklin's parable against religious
persecution thrown into Scriptural form and quoted by him as the
fifty-first chapter of Genesis. In a paper on a "Proposed New Version
of the Bible" he paraphrased a few verses of the first chapter of
Job, making them a satiric attack on royal government; but the
version may well rank with these hoaxes, and even modern writers have
been taken in by it, regarding it as a serious proposal for a
"modernized" version and decrying it as poor taste. Matthew Arnold,
for example, declared this an instance in which Franklin was lacking
in his "imperturbable common sense"; and J. B. McMaster, though
devoting several pages to its discussion, very ingenuously declares
it "beneath criticism."

[12] Malthus quoted Franklin in his first edition, but it was not
until the second that he introduced the theory of the "preventive
check." Franklin noted the phenomenon with disapproval in his
advocacy of increased population; Malthus with approval in his search
for means to decrease population.

[13] The title of philosopher as used in Franklin's lifetime referred
neither in England nor in France to him as author of moral maxims,
but to him as a scientist--a "natural philosopher."

FRANKLIN, SIR JOHN (1786-1847), English rear-admiral and explorer, was born at Spilsby, Lincolnshire, on the 16th of April 1786. His family was descended from a line of free-holders or "franklins" from whom some centuries earlier they had derived their surname; but the small family estate was sold by his father, who went into business. John, who was the fifth and youngest son and ninth child, was destined for the church. At the age of ten he was sent to school at St Ives, and soon afterwards was transferred to Louth grammar school, which he attended for two years. About this time his imagination was deeply impressed by a holiday walk of 12 m. which he made with a companion to look at the sea, and he determined to be a sailor. In the hope of dispelling this fancy his father sent him on a trial voyage to Lisbon in a merchantman; but it being found on his return that his wishes were unchanged he was entered as a midshipman on board the "Polyphemus," and shortly afterwards took part in her in the hard-fought battle of Copenhagen (2nd of April 1801). Two months later he joined the "Investigator," a discovery-ship commanded by his cousin Captain Matthew Flinders, and under the training of that able scientific officer was employed in the exploration and mapping of the coasts of Australia, where he acquired a correctness of astronomical observation and a skill in surveying which proved of eminent utility in his future career. He was on board the "Porpoise" when that ship and the "Cato" were wrecked (18th of August 1803) on a coral reef off the coast of Australia, and after this misfortune proceeded to China. Thence he obtained a passage to England in the "Earl Camden," East Indiaman, commanded by Captain (afterwards Sir) Nathaniel Dance, and performed the duty of signal midshipman in the famous action of the 15th of February 1804 when Captain Dance repulsed a strong French squadron led by the redoubtable Admiral Linois. On reaching England he joined the "Bellerophon," 74, and was in charge of the signals on board that ship during the battle of Trafalgar. Two years later he joined the "Bedford," attaining the rank of lieutenant the year after, and served in her on the Brazil station (whither the "Bedford" went as part of the convoy which escorted the royal family of Portugal to Rio de Janeiro in 1808), in the blockade of Flushing, and finally in the disastrous expedition against New Orleans (1814), in which campaign he displayed such zeal and intelligence as to merit special mention in despatches.

On peace being established, Franklin turned his attention once more to the scientific branch of his profession, and sedulously extended his knowledge of surveying. In 1818 the discovery of a North-West Passage to the Pacific became again, after a long interval, an object of national interest, and Lieutenant Franklin was given the command of the "Trent" in the Arctic expedition, under the orders of Captain Buchan in the "Dorothea". During a heavy storm the "Dorothea" was so much damaged by the pack-ice that her reaching England became doubtful, and, much to the chagrin of young Franklin, the "Trent" was compelled to convoy her home instead of being allowed to prosecute the voyage alone. This voyage, however, had brought Franklin into personal intercourse with the leading scientific men of London, and they were not slow in ascertaining his peculiar fitness for the command of such an enterprise. To calmness in danger, promptness and fertility of resource, and excellent seamanship, he added an ardent desire to promote science for its own sake, together with a love of truth that led him to do full justice to the merits of his subordinate officers, without wishing to claim their discoveries as a captain's right. Furthermore, he possessed a cheerful buoyancy of mind, sustained by deep religious principle, which was not depressed in the most gloomy times. It was therefore with full confidence in his ability and exertions that, in 1819, he was placed in command of an expedition appointed to proceed overland from the Hudson Bay to the shores of the Arctic Sea, and to determine the trendings of that coast eastward of the Coppermine river. At this period the northern coast of the American continent was known at two isolated points only,--this, the mouth of the Coppermine river (which, as Franklin discovered, was erroneously placed four degrees of latitude too much to the north), and the mouth of the Mackenzie far to the west of it. Lieutenant Franklin and his party, consisting of Dr Richardson, Midshipmen George Back and Richard Hood, and a few ordinary boatmen, arrived at the depot of the Hudson's Bay Company at the end of August 1819, and making an autumnal journey of 700 m. spent the first winter on the Saskatchewan. Owing to the supplies which had been promised by the North-West and Hudson's Bay Companies not being forthcoming the following year, it was not until the summer of 1821 that the Coppermine was ascended to its mouth, and a considerable extent of sea-coast to the eastward surveyed. The return journey led over the region known as the Barren Ground, and was marked by the most terrible sufferings and privations and the tragic death of Lieutenant Hood. The survivors of the expedition reached York Factory in the month of June 1822, having accomplished altogether 5550 m. of travel. While engaged on this service Franklin was promoted to the rank of commander (1st of January 1821), and upon his return to England at the end of 1822 he obtained the post rank of captain and was elected a fellow of the Royal Society. The narrative of this expedition was published in the following year and became at once a classic of travel, and soon after he married Eleanor, the youngest daughter of William Porden, an eminent architect.

Early in 1825 he was entrusted with the command of a second overland expedition, and upon the earnest entreaty of his dying wife, who encouraged him to place his duty to his country before his love for her, he set sail without waiting to witness her end. Accompanied as before by Dr (afterwards Sir) John Richardson and Lieutenant (afterwards Sir) George Back, he descended the Mackenzie river in the season of 1826 and traced the North American coast as far as 149 deg. 37' W. long., whilst Richardson at the head of a separate party connected the mouths of the Coppermine and Mackenzie rivers. Thus between the years 1819 and 1827 he had added 1200 m. of coast-line to the American continent, or one-third of the whole distance from the Atlantic to the Pacific. These exertions were fully appreciated at home and abroad. He was knighted in 1829, received the honorary degree of D.C.L. from the university of Oxford, was awarded the gold medal of the Geographical Society of Paris, and was elected corresponding member of the Paris Academy of Sciences. The results of these expeditions are described by Franklin and Dr Richardson in two magnificent works published in 1824-1829. In 1828 he married his second wife, Jane, second daughter of John Griffin. His next official employment was on the Mediterranean station, in command of the "Rainbow," and his ship soon became proverbial in the squadron for the happiness and comfort of her officers and crew. As an acknowledgment of the essential service which he rendered off Patras in the Greek War of Independence, he received the cross of the Redeemer of Greece from King Otto, and after his return to England he was created knight commander of the Guelphic order of Hanover.