Chapter III: Religion and Morals (2)

The passage which follows in Franklin's Autobiography implies that his utter inability at this period to restrain his passions directed his thoughts more seriously than ever to marriage, and he was determined to have a wife. It may be well here to comment again on his remarkable frankness. There have been distinguished men, like Rousseau, who were at times morbidly frank. Their frankness, however, usually took the form of a confession which did not add to their dignity. But Franklin never confessed anything; he told it. His dignity was as natural and as instinctive as Washington's, though of a different kind. His supreme intellect easily avoided all positions in which he would have to confess or make admissions; and, as there was nothing morbid in his character, so there was nothing morbid in his frankness.

The frankness seems to have been closely connected with his serenity and courage. There never was a man so little disturbed by consequences or possibilities. He was quick to take advantage of popular whims, and he would not expose himself unnecessarily to public censure. His letter to President Stiles, of Yale, is an example. Being asked for his religious opinion, he states it fully and without reserve, although knowing that it would be extremely distasteful to the man to whom it was addressed, and, if made public, would bring upon him the enmity of the most respectable people in the country, whose good opinion every one wishes to secure. The only precaution he takes is to ask the president not to publish what he says, and he gives his reasons as frankly as he gives the religious opinion. But if the letter had been published before his death, he would have lost neither sleep nor appetite, and doubtless, by some jest or appeal to human sympathy, would have turned it to good account.

Since his time there have been self-made men in this country who have advanced themselves by professing fulsome devotion to the most popular forms of religion, and they have found this method very useful in their designs on financial institutions or public office. We would prefer them to take Franklin for their model; and they may have all his failings if they will only be half as honest.

But to return to his designs for a wife, which were by no means romantic. Miss Read, for whom he had a partiality, had married one Rogers during Franklin's absence in London. Rogers ill treated and deserted her, and, dejected and melancholy, she was now living at home with her mother. She and Franklin had been inclined to marry before he went to London, but her mother prevented it. According to his account, she had been in love with him; but, although he liked her, we do not understand that he was in love. He never seems to have been in love with any woman in the sense of a romantic or exalted affection, although he flirted with many, both young and old, almost to the close of his life.

But now, on renewing his attentions, he found that her mother had no objections. There was, however, one serious difficulty, for Mr. Rogers, although he had deserted her, was not known to be dead, and divorces were but little thought of at that time. Franklin naturally did not want to add bigamy to his other youthful offences, and it would also have required a revision of his liturgy and code. Rogers had, moreover, left debts which Franklin feared he might be expected to pay, and he had had enough of that sort of thing. "We ventured, however," he says, "over all these difficulties, and I took her to wife September 1, 1730." None of the inconveniences happened, for neither Rogers nor his debts ever turned up.

Franklin's detractors have always insisted that no marriage ceremony was performed and that he was never legally married. There is no record of such a marriage in Christ Church, of which Mrs. Rogers was a member, and the phrase used, "took her to wife," is supposed to show that they simply lived together, fearing a regular ceremony, which, if Rogers was alive, would convict them of bigamy. The absence of any record of a ceremony is, however, not necessarily conclusive that there was no ceremony of any kind; and the question is not now of serious importance, for they intended marriage, always regarded themselves as man and wife, and, in any event, it was a common-law marriage. Their children were baptized in Christ Church as legitimate children, and in a deed executed three or four years after 1730 they are spoken of as husband and wife.

A few months after the marriage his illegitimate son William was born, and Mr. Bigelow has made the extraordinary statement, "William may therefore be said to have been born in wedlock, though he was not reputed to be the son of Mrs. Franklin."[12] This is certainly an enlarged idea of the possibilities of wedlock, and on such a principle marriage to one woman would legitimatize the man's illegitimate offspring by all others. It is difficult to understand the meaning of such a statement, unless it is an indirect way of suggesting that William was the son of Mrs. Franklin; but of this there is no evidence.

Franklin always considered his neglect of Miss Read after he had observed her affection for him one of the errors of his life. He had almost forgotten her while in London, and after he returned appears to have shown her no attention, until, by the failure of the match Mrs. Godfrey had arranged for him, he was driven to the determination to marry some one. He believed that he had largely corrected this error by marrying her. "She proved a good and faithful helpmate," he says; "assisted me much by attending the shop; we throve together, and have ever mutually endeavored to make each other happy." She died in 1774, while Franklin was in England.

There is nothing in anything he ever said to show that they did not get on well together. On the contrary, their letters seem to show a most friendly companionship. He addressed her in his letters as "my dear child," and sometimes closed by calling her "dear Debby," and she also addressed him as "dear child." During his absence in England they corresponded a great deal. Her letters to him were so frequent that he complained that he could not keep up with them; and his letters to her were written in his best vein, beautiful specimens of his delicate mastery of language, as the large collection of them in the possession of the American Philosophical Society abundantly shows.

In writing to Miss Catharine Ray, afterwards the wife of Governor Greene, of Rhode Island, who had sent him a cheese, he said,--

"Mrs. Franklin was very proud that a young lady should have so
much regard for her old husband as to send him such a present.
We talk of you every time it comes to the table. She is sure you
are a sensible girl, and a notable housewife, and talks of
bequeathing me to you as a legacy; but I ought to wish you a
better, and I hope she will live these hundred years; for we are
grown old together, and if she has any faults, I am so used to
them that I don't perceive them. As the song says,--

"'Some faults we have all, & so has my Joan,
But then they're exceedingly small;
And, now I'm grown used to them, so like my own,
I scarcely can see them at all,
My dear friends,
I scarcely can see them at all.'

"Indeed I begin to think she has none, as I think of you. And
since she is willing I should love you as much as you are
willing to be loved by me, let us join in wishing the old lady a
long life and a happy one."

While absent at an Indian conference on the frontier, he wrote reprovingly to his wife for not sending him a letter:

"I had a good mind not to write to you by this opportunity; but
I never can be ill natured enough even when there is the most
occasion. I think I won't tell you that we are well, nor that we
expect to return about the middle of the week, nor will I send
you a word of news; that's poz. My duty to mother, love to the
children, and to Miss Betsey and Gracy. I am your loving
husband.

"P. S. I have _scratched out the loving words_; being writ in
haste by mistake when I forgot I was angry."

Mrs. Franklin was a stout, handsome woman. We have a description of her by her husband in a letter he wrote from London telling her of the various presents and supplies he had sent home:

"I also forgot, among the china, to mention a large fine jug for
beer, to stand in the cooler. I fell in love with it at first
sight; for I thought it looked like a fat jolly dame, clean and
tidy, with a neat blue and white calico gown on, good natured
and lovely, and put me in mind of somebody."

This letter is full of interesting details. He tells her of the regard and friendship he meets with from persons of worth, and of his longing desire to be home again. A full description of the articles sent would be too long to quote entire, but some of it may be given as a glimpse of their domestic life:

"I send you some English china; viz, melons and hams for a
dessert of fruit or the like; a bowl remarkable for the neatness
of the figures, made at Bow, near this city; some coffee cups of
the same; a Worcester bowl, ordinary. To show the difference of
workmanship, there is something from all the china works in
England; and one old true china bason mended, of an odd color.
The same box contains four silver salt ladles, newest but
ugliest fashion; a little instrument to core apples; another to
make little turnips out of great ones; six coarse diaper
breakfast cloths; they are to spread on the tea table, for
nobody breakfasts here on the naked table, but on the cloth they
set a large tea board with the cups. There is also a little
basket, a present from Mrs. Stevenson to Sally, and a pair of
garters for you, which were knit by the young lady, her
daughter, who favored me with a pair of the same kind; the only
ones I have been able to wear, as they need not be bound tight,
the ridges in them preventing their slipping. We send them
therefore as a curiosity for the form, more than for the value.
Goody Smith may, if she pleases, make such for me hereafter. My
love to her."

At the time of the Stamp Act, in 1765, when the Philadelphians were much incensed against Franklin for not having, as they thought, sufficiently resisted, as their agent in England, the passage of the act, the mob threatened Mrs. Franklin's house, and she wrote to her husband:

"I was for nine days kept in a continual hurry by people to
remove, and Sally was persuaded to go to Burlington for safety.
Cousin Davenport came and told me that more than twenty people
had told him it was his duty to be with me. I said I was pleased
to receive civility from anybody, so he staid with me some time;
towards night I said he should fetch a gun or two, as we had
none. I sent to ask my brother to come and bring his gun also,
so we turned one room into a magazine; I ordered some sort of
defense up stairs such as I could manage myself. I said when I
was advised to remove, that I was very sure you had done nothing
to hurt anybody, nor had I given any offense to any person at
all, nor would I be made uneasy by anybody, nor would I stir or
show the least uneasiness, but if any one came to disturb me I
would show a proper resentment. I was told that there were eight
hundred men ready to assist anyone that should be molested."

This letter is certainly written in a homely and pleasant way, not unlike the style of her husband, and other letters of hers have been published at different times possessing the same merit; but they have all been more or less corrected, and in some instances rewritten, before they appeared in print, for she was a very illiterate woman. I have not access to the original manuscript of the letter I have quoted, but I will give another, which is to be found in the collection of the American Philosophical Society, exactly as she wrote it:

October ye 29, 1773.

"MY DEAR CHILD

"I have bin very much distrest a boute as I did not oney letter
nor one word from you nor did I hear one word from oney bodey
that you wrote to So I must submit and indever to submit to what
I ame to bair I did write by Capt Folkner to you but he is gone
doun and when I read it over I did not like it and so if this
dont send it I shante like it as I donte send you oney news nor
I donte go abrode.

"I shall tell you what consernes myself our yonegest Grandson is
the finest child as alive he has had the small Pox and had it
very fine and got abrod agen Capt All will tell you a boute him
Benj Franklin Beache but as it is so deficall to writ I have
desered him to tell you I have sente a squerel for your friend
and wish her better luck it is a very fine one I have had very
bad luck with two they one killed and another run a way allthou
they was bred up tame I have not a caige as I donte know where
the man lives that makes them my love to Sally Franklin--my
love to all our cousins as thou menthond remember me to Mr and
Mrs Weste due you ever hear aney thing of Ninely Evers as was.

* * * * *

"I cante write any mor I am your afeckthone wife

"D. FRANKLIN"

She was not a congenial companion for Franklin in most of his tastes and pursuits, in his studies in science and history, or in his political and diplomatic career. He never appears to have written to her on any of these subjects. But she helped him, as he has himself said, in the early days in the printing-office, buying rags for the paper and stitching pamphlets. It was her homely, housewifely virtues, handsome figure, good health, and wholesome common sense which appealed to him; and it was a strong appeal, for he enjoyed these earthly comforts fully as much as he did the high walks of learning in which his fame was won. He once wrote to her, "it was a comfort to me to recollect that I had once been clothed from head to foot in woolen and linen of my wife's manufacture, and that I never was prouder of any dress in my life."

She bore him two children. The first was a son, Francis Folger Franklin, an unusually bright, handsome boy, the delight of all that knew him. Franklin had many friends, and seems to have been very much attached to his wife, but this child was the one human being whom he loved with extravagance and devotion. Although believing in inoculation as a remedy for the small-pox, he seems to have been unable to bear the thought of protecting in this way his favorite son; at any rate, he neglected to take the precaution, and the boy died of the disease when only four years old. The father mourned for him long and bitterly, and nearly forty years afterwards, when an old man, could not think of him without a sigh.

The other child was a daughter, Sarah, also very handsome, who married Richard Bache and has left numerous descendants. His illegitimate son, William, was brought home when he was a year old and cared for along with his other children; and William's illegitimate son, Temple Franklin, was the companion and secretary of his grandfather in England and France. The illegitimate daughter was apparently never brought home, and is not referred to in his writings, except in those occasional letters in which he sends her his love. According to the letter already mentioned as in the collection of the Pennsylvania Historical Society, she was married to John Foxcroft, who was deputy colonial postmaster in Philadelphia. It was well that she was kept away from Franklin's house, for the presence of William appears to have given trouble enough. A household composed of legitimate and illegitimate children is apt to be inharmonious at times, especially when the mother of the legitimate children is the mistress of the house.

Franklin's biographies tell us that Mrs. Franklin tenderly nurtured William. This may be true, and, judging from expressions in her printed letters, she seems to have been friendly enough with him. But from other sources we find that as William grew up she learned to hate him, and this, with some other secrets of the Franklin household, has been described in the diary of Daniel Fisher:

"As I was coming down from my chamber this afternoon a
gentlewoman was sitting on one of the lowest stairs which were
but narrow, and there not being room enough to pass, she rose up
& threw herself upon the floor and sat there. Mr. Soumien & his
Wife greatly entreated her to arise and take a chair, but in
vain, she would keep her seat, and kept it, I think, the longer
for their entreaty. This gentlewoman, whom though I had seen
before I did not know, appeared to be Mrs. Franklin. She assumed
the airs of extraordinary freedom and great Humility, Lamented
heavily the misfortunes of those who are unhappily infected with
a too tender or benevolent disposition, said she believed all
the world claimed a privilege of troubling her Pappy (so she
usually calls Mr. Franklin) with their calamities and
distresses, giving us a general history of many such wretches
and their impertinent applications to him." (Pennsylvania
Magazine of History, vol. xvii. p. 271.)

In the pamphlet called "What is Sauce for a Goose is also Sauce for a Gander," already alluded to, Franklin is spoken of as "Pappy" in a way which seems to show that the Philadelphians knew his wife's nickname for him and were fond of using it to ridicule him.

Afterwards, Daniel Fisher lived in Franklin's house as his clerk, and thus obtained a still more intimate knowledge of his domestic affairs.

"Mr. Soumien had often informed me of great uneasiness and
dissatisfaction in Mr. Franklin's family in a manner no way
pleasing to me, and which in truth I was unwilling to credit,
but as Mrs. Franklin and I of late began to be Friendly and
sociable I discerned too great grounds for Mr. Soumien's
Reflections, arising solely from the turbulence and jealousy and
pride of her disposition. She suspecting Mr. Franklin for having
too great an esteem for his son in prejudice of herself and
daughter, a young woman of about 12 or 13 years of age, for whom
it was visible Mr. Franklin had no less esteem than for his son
young Mr. Franklin. I have often seen him pass to and from his
father's apartment upon Business (for he does not eat, drink, or
sleep in the House) without the least compliment between Mrs.
Franklin and him or any sort of notice taken of each other, till
one Day as I was sitting with her in the passage when the young
Gentleman came by she exclaimed to me (he not hearing):--

"'Mr. Fisher there goes the greatest Villain upon Earth.'

"This greatly confounded & perplexed me, but did not hinder her
from pursuing her Invectives in the foulest terms I ever heard
from a Gentlewoman." (Pennsylvania Magazine of History, vol.
xvii. p. 276.)

Fisher's descriptions confirm the gossip which has descended by tradition in many Philadelphia families. He found Mrs. Franklin to be a woman of such "turbulent temper" that this and other unpleasant circumstances forced him to leave. Possibly these were some of the faults which her husband speaks of as so exceedingly small and so like his own that he scarcely could see them at all. The presence of her husband's illegitimate son must have been very trying, and goes a long way to excuse her.

All that Franklin has written about himself is so full of a serene philosophic spirit, and his biographers have echoed it so faithfully, that, in spite of his frankness, things are made to appear a little easier than they really were. His life was full of contests, but they have not all been noted, and the sharpness of many of them has been worn off by time. In Philadelphia, where he was engaged in the most bitter partisan struggles, where the details of his life were fully known,--his humble origin, his slow rise, his indelicate jokes, and his illegitimate children,--there were not a few people who cherished a most relentless antipathy towards him which neither his philanthropy nor his philosophic and scientific mind could soften. This bitter feeling against the "old rogue," as they called him, still survives among some of the descendants of the people of his time, and fifty or sixty years ago there were virtuous old ladies living in Philadelphia who would flame into indignation at the mention of his name.

Chief-Justice Allen, who was his contemporary and opponent in politics, described him as a man of "wicked heart," and declared that he had often been a witness of his "envenomed malice." In H. W. Smith's "Life of Rev. William Smith" a great deal of this abuse can be found. Provost Smith and Franklin quarrelled over the management of the College of Philadelphia, and on a benevolent pamphlet by the provost Franklin wrote a verse from the poet Whitehead:[13]

"Full many a peevish, envious, slanderous elf
Is in his works, Benevolence itself
For all mankind, unknown his bosom heaves,
He only injures those with whom he lives.
Read then the man. Does truth his actions guide?
Exempt from petulance, exempt from pride?
To social duties does his heart attend--As
son, as father, husband, brother, friend?
Do those who know him love him? If they do
You have my permission--you may love him too."

(Smith's Life of Rev. William Smith, vol. i. p. 341.)

Provost Smith's biographer resents this attack by giving contemporary opinions of Franklin; and a paragraph omitted in the regular edition (page 347 of volume i.), but printed on an extra leaf and circulated among the author's friends, may be quoted as an example. It was, however, not original with Smith's biographer, but was copied with a few changes from Cobbett's attack on Franklin:

"Dr. Benjamin Franklin has told the world in poetry what, in his
judgment, my ancestor was. His venerable shade will excuse me,
if I tell in prose what, in the judgment of men who lived near a
century ago, Dr. Smith was not: He was no almanack maker, nor
quack, nor chimney-doctor, nor soap boiler, nor printer's devil,
neither was he a deist; and all his children were born in
wedlock. He bequeathed no old and irrecoverable debts to a
hospital. He never cheated the poor during his life nor mocked
them in his death. If his descendants cannot point to his statue
over a library, they have not the mortification of hearing him
daily accused of having been a fornicator, a hypocrite, and an
infidel."

Some of the charges in this venomous statement are in a sense true, but are exaggerated by the manner in which they are presented, an art in which Cobbett excelled. I have in the preceding chapters given sufficient details to throw light on many of them. Franklin was an almanac-maker, a chimney-doctor, and a soap-boiler, but in none of these is there anything to his discredit. As to his irrecoverable debts, it is true that he left them to the Pennsylvania Hospital, saying in his will that, as the persons who owed them were unwilling to pay them to him, they might be willing to pay them to the hospital as charity. They were a source of great annoyance to the managers, and were finally returned to his executors. The statement that he cheated the poor during his life and mocked them in his death is entirely unjustified. He was often generous with his money to people in misfortune, and several such instances can be found in his letters. It is also going too far to say that he was a quack and a hypocrite.

While in England he associated on the most intimate terms with eminent literary and scientific men. Distinguished travellers from the Continent called on him to pay their respects. He stayed at noblemen's country-seats and with the Bishop of St. Asaph. He corresponded with all these people in the most friendly and easy manner; they were delighted with his conversation and could never see enough of him. In France everybody worshipped him, and the court circles received him with enthusiasm. But in Philadelphia the colonial aristocracy were not on friendly terms with him. He had, of course, numerous friends, including some members of aristocratic families; but we find few, if any, evidences of that close intimacy and affection which he enjoyed among the best people of Europe.

This hostility was not altogether due to his humble origin or to the little printing-office and stationery store where he sold goose-feathers as well as writing material and bought old rags. These disadvantages would not have been sufficient, for his accomplishments and wit raised him far above his early surroundings, and the colonial society of Philadelphia was not illiberal in such matters. The principal cause of the hostility towards him was his violent opposition to the proprietary party, to which most of the upper classes belonged, and, having this ground of dislike, it was easy for them to strengthen and excuse it by the gossip about his illegitimate son and the son's mother kept as a servant in his house. They ridiculed the small economies he practised, and branded his religious and moral theorizing as hypocrisy.

He was very fond of broad jokes, which have always been tolerated in America under certain circumstances; but the man who writes them, especially if he also writes and talks a great deal about religion and undertakes to improve prayer-books, gives a handle to his enemies and an opportunity for unfavorable comment. The _Portfolio_, a Philadelphia journal, of May 23, 1801, representing more particularly the upper classes of the city, prints one of his broad letters, and takes the opportunity to assail him for "hypocrisy, hackneyed deism, muck-worn economy," and other characteristics of what it considers humbug and deceit. It has been suggested that far back in the past one of Franklin's ancestors might have been French, for his name in the form Franquelin was at one time not uncommon in France. This might account for his easy brightness and vivacity, and also, it may be added, for such letters as he sometimes wrote:

"TO Mr. JAMES READ

"Saturday morning Aug 17 '45.

"DEAR J.

"I have been reading your letter over again, and since you
desire an answer I sit me down to write you; yet as I write in
the market, will I believe be but a short one, tho' I may be
long about it. I approve of your method of writing one's mind
when one is too warm to speak it with temper: but being myself
quite cool in this affair I might as well speak as write, if I
had opportunity. Your copy of Kempis must be a corrupt one if
it has that passage as you quote it, _in omnibus requiem
quaesivi, sed non inveni, nisi in angulo cum libello_. The good
father understood pleasure (_requiem_) better, and wrote _in
angulo cum puella_. Correct it thus without hesitation."

* * * * *

(Portfolio, vol. i. p. 165.)

The letter continues the jest in a way that I do not care to quote; but the last half of it is full of sage and saintly advice. It is perhaps the only letter which gives at the same time both sides of Franklin's character. But Sparks and Bigelow in their editions of his works give the last half only, with no indication that the first half has been omitted.

In the same year that he wrote this letter he also wrote his letter of advice to a young man on the choice of a mistress, a copy of which is now in the State Department at Washington, while numerous copies taken from it have been circulated secretly all over the country. This year (1745) seems to have been his reckless period, for it was about that time that he published "Polly Baker's Speech," which will be given in another chapter. In the State Department at Washington is also preserved his letter on Perfumes to the Royal Academy of Brussels, which cannot be published under the rules of modern taste, and, in fact, Franklin himself speaks of it as having "too much _grossièreté_" to be borne by polite readers.[14] I shall, however, give as much of the letter on the choice of a mistress as is proper to publish.

"June 25th, 1745.

"MY DEAR FRIEND:

"I know of no medicine fit to diminish the violent natural
inclinations you mention, and if I did, I think I should not
communicate it to you. Marriage is the _proper_ remedy. It is
the most natural state of man, and, therefore, the state in
which you are most likely to find solid happiness. Your reasons
against entering it at present appear to me not well founded.
The circumstantial advantages you have in view of postponing it
are not only uncertain, but they are small in comparison with
that of the thing itself.

"It is the man and woman united that make the complete human
being. Separate she wants his force of body and strength of
reason. He her softness, sensibility, and acute discernment.
Together they are more likely to succeed in the world. A single
man has not nearly the value he would have in a state of union.
He is an incomplete animal. He resembles the odd half of a pair
of scissors. If you get a prudent, healthy wife, your industry
in your profession, with her good economy will be a fortune
sufficient.

"But if you will not take this counsel, and persist in thinking
a commerce with the sex inevitable, then I repeat my former
advice, that in all your amours you should _prefer old women to
young ones_. You call this a paradox and demand my reasons. They
are these:

"1st. Because they have more knowledge of the world, and their
minds are better stored with observations; their conversation is
more improving and more lastingly agreeable.

"2d. Because when women cease to be handsome, they study to be
good. To maintain their influence over men, they supply the
diminution of beauty by an augmentation of utility. They learn
to do a thousand services, small and great, and are the most
tender and useful of all friends when you are sick. Thus they
continue amiable, and hence there is scarcely such a thing to be
found as an old woman who is not a good woman.

"3d. Because there is no hazard of children, which, irregularly
produced, may be attended with much inconvenience.

"4th. Because, through more experience, they are more prudent
and discreet in conducting an intrigue to prevent suspicion. The
commerce with them is therefore safe with regard to your
reputation and with regard to theirs. If the affair should
happen to be known, considerate people might be rather inclined
to excuse an old woman who would kindly take care of a young
man, form his manners by her good counsels, and prevent his
ruining his health and fortunes among mercenary prostitutes.

"5th....

"6th....

"7th. Because the compunction is less. The having made a young
girl miserable may give you frequent bitter reflections, none of
which can attend the making an _old_ woman _happy_.

"8th and lastly....

"Thus much for my paradox, but I still advise you to marry
directly, being sincerely,

"Your Affectionate Friend,
"B. F."

Franklin, however, was capable of the most courteous gallantry to ladies. In France he delighted the most distinguished women of the court by his compliments and witticisms. When about fifty years old he wrote some letters to Miss Catharine Ray, of Rhode Island, which, as coming from an elderly man to a bright young girl who was friendly with him and told him her love-affairs, are extremely interesting. One of them about his wife we have already quoted. In a letter to him Miss Ray had asked, "How do you do and what are you doing? Does everybody still love you, and how do you make them do so?" After telling her about his health, he said,--

"As to the second question, I must confess (but don't you be
jealous), that many more people love me now than ever did
before; for since I saw you, I have been able to do some general
services to the country and to the army, for which both have
thanked and praised me, and say they love me. They say so, as
you used to do; and if I were to ask any favors of them, they
would, perhaps, as readily refuse me; so that I find little real
advantage in being beloved, but it pleases my humor."

On another occasion he wrote to her,--

"Persons subject to the _hyp_ complain of the northeast wind as
increasing their malady. But since you promised to send me
kisses in that wind, and I find you as good as your word, it is
to me the gayest wind that blows, and gives me the best spirits.
I write this during a northeast storm of snow, the greatest we
have had this winter. Your favors come mixed with the snowy
fleeces, which are pure as your virgin innocence, white as your
lovely bosom, and--as cold. But let it warm towards some worthy
young man, and may Heaven bless you both with every kind of
happiness."

He had another young friend to whom he wrote pretty letters, Miss Mary Stevenson, daughter of the Mrs. Stevenson in whose house he lived in London when on his diplomatic missions to England. He encouraged her in scientific study, and some of his most famous explanations of the operations of nature are to be found in letters written to her. He had hoped that she would marry his son William, but William's fancy strayed elsewhere.

"PORTSMOUTH, 11 August, 1762.

"MY DEAR POLLY

"This is the best paper I can get at this wretched inn, but it
will convey what is intrusted to it as faithfully as the finest.
It will tell my Polly how much her friend is afflicted that he
must perhaps never again see one for whom he has so sincere an
affection, joined to so perfect an esteem; who he once flattered
himself might become his own, in the tender relation of a child,
but can now entertain such pleasing hopes no more. Will it tell
_how much_ he is afflicted? No, it cannot.

"Adieu, my dearest child. I will call you so. Why should I not
call you so, since I love you with all the tenderness of a
father? Adieu. May the God of all goodness shower down his
choicest blessings upon you, and make you infinitely happier
than that event would have made you...."

(Bigelow's Works of Franklin, vol. iii. p. 209.)

This correspondence with Miss Stevenson continued for a great many years, and there are beautiful letters to her scattered all through his published works. The letters both to her and to Miss Ray became more serious as the two young women grew older and married. Miss Stevenson sought his advice on the question of her marriage, and his reply was as wise and affectionate as anything he ever wrote. She married Dr. Hewson, of London, and they migrated to Philadelphia, where she became the mother of a numerous family.

Franklin had a younger sister, Jane, a pretty girl, afterwards Mrs. Mecom, of whom he was very fond, and he kept up a correspondence with her all his life, sending presents to her at Boston, helping her son to earn a livelihood, and giving her assistance in her old age. Their letters to each other were most homely and loving, and she took the greatest pride in his increasing fame.

His correspondence with his parents was also pleasant and familiar. In one of his letters to his mother he amuses her by accounts of her grandchildren, and at the same time pays a compliment to his sister Jane.

"As to your grandchildren, Will is now nineteen years of age, a
tall, proper youth, and much of a beau. He acquired a habit of
idleness on the Expedition, but begins of late to apply himself
to business, and I hope will become an industrious man. He
imagined his father had got enough for him, but I have assured
him that I intend to spend what little I have myself, if it
pleases God that I live long enough; and, as he by no means
wants acuteness, he can see by my going on that I mean to be as
good as my word.

"Sally grows a fine girl, and is extremely industrious with her
needle, and delights in her work. She is of a most affectionate
temper, and perfectly dutiful and obliging to her parents, and
to all. Perhaps I flatter myself too much, but I have hopes that
she will prove an ingenious, sensible, notable and worthy woman
like her aunt Jenny." (Bigelow's Works of Franklin, vol. ii. p.
154.)

Over the grave of his parents in the Granary Burial-Ground in Boston he placed a stone, and prepared for it one of those epitaphs in which he was so skilful and which were almost poems:

Josiah Franklin and Abiah his wife
lie here interred.
They lived together in wedlock fifty-five years;
and without an estate or any gainful employment,
by constant labour, and honest industry,
(with God's blessing,)
maintained a large family comfortably;
and brought up thirteen children and seven grandchildren reputably.
From this instance, reader,
be encouraged to diligence in thy calling,
and distrust not Providence.
He was a pious and prudent man,
she a discreet and virtuous woman.
Their youngest son,
in filial regard to their memory,
places this stone.

J. F. born 1655--died 1744,--Æ. 89.
A. F. born 1667--died 1752,--Æ. 85.

FOOTNOTES:

[5] Men, Women, and Manners in Colonial Times, vol. i. p. 210.

[6] Men, Women, and Manners in Colonial Times, vol. i. p. 222.

[7] Bigelow's Works of Franklin, vol. i. p. 180.

[8] Bigelow's Works of Franklin, vol. v. p. 209.

[9] H. W. Smith's Life of Rev. William Smith, vol. ii. p. 174.

[10] Some years afterwards, when he had become prosperous, he restored the money to Mr. Vernon, with interest to date.

[11] Vol. v. p. 201.

[12] Bigelow's Works of Franklin, vol. iii. p. 216, note.

[13] This verse Franklin also quotes against Smith in a letter to Miss Stevenson. (Bigelow's Works of Franklin, vol. iii. p. 235.)

[14] Bigelow's Works of Franklin, vol. vii. p. 374.