BENJAMIN FRANKLINThe Man
TWO
Benjamin Franklin was the first distinguished American “self-made man.†He took himself in hand at an early age, and with only two years schooling, educated himself so that he became a man of science, a man of letters, a philosopher, a statesman and a diplomat, and acquired a fortune besides. And not only was he all of these things, more than creditably, but he took rank among the greatest minds of the highly educated and scientific Eighteenth Century. This was a period of original investigation: much “new thought†of all kinds was coming into the world, and Franklin’s mind was exactly the type of mind that was characteristic of this age—particularly in France. Apart from his genial personality and his talent for always doing the right thing and the popular thing socially, his scientific and philosophical tastes were precisely those in fashion in France.
How did this man attain to such power and eminence? At twenty-three he was half-educated and crude. At forty he was known as one of the most famous scientists of the day and a brilliant writer; and before he was fifty he had received the Copley medal from the Royal Society; the freedom of the City of Edinburgh; LL.D. from the University of St. Andrews; degrees from Harvard, Yale, and William and Mary; and, in 1762, D.C.L. from Oxford.
What were the characteristics and the tastes, and what was the disposition and the appearance of the extraordinary personage who accomplished all these things? These are questions that are naturally asked.
We never think of Franklin in his youth. We picture him according to the Duplessis (dew-ples′-see) portrait painted in Paris when he was seventy-two; or, according to the old prints that show him wearing the familiar old fur cap and the heavy-rimmed spectacles. Franklin was rather tall (about five feet ten inches), corpulent and heavy, with rounded shoulders. He was a good swimmer; he was muscular and strong, and he was a believer in vegetarianism and air-baths. In late years he suffered from gout in his foot, and wrote in Paris a humorous dialogue from which we get a very good idea of the old gentleman’s habits and tastes. On his appeal to Gout to spare him, his persecutor exclaims: “Not a jot; your rhetoric and your politeness are thrown away; your apology avails nothing. If your situation in life is a sedentary one, your amusements, your recreations, at least, should be active. You ought to walk or ride; or, if the weather prevents that, play at billiards. But let us examine your course of life. While the mornings are long and you have leisure to go abroad, what do you do? Why, instead of gaining an appetite for breakfast by salutary exercise, you amuse yourself with books, pamphlets, or newspapers, which commonly are not worth the reading. Yet you eat an inordinate breakfast, four dishes of tea with cream, and one or two buttered toasts, with slices of hung beef, which I fancy are not things the most easily digested. Immediately afterwards you sit down to write at your desk, or converse with persons who apply to you on business. Thus the time passes till one, without any kind of bodily exercise. But all this I could pardon, in regard, as you say, to your sedentary condition. But what is your practice after dinner? Walking in the beautiful garden of those friends with whom you have dined, would be the choice of men of sense; yours is to be fixed down to chess, where you are found engaged for two or three hours!â€
But notwithstanding his sedentary life and his gout and his other maladies, Franklin lived to be eighty-four, preserving his extraordinary brightness and gayety to the last. His mental faculties were unimpaired, his face was fresh and serene, and his spirits were buoyant.
This charming vivacity and this play and sparkle of mind greatly contributed towards making Franklin so beloved of the French. His life in Paris was the happiest of his whole career. He was very social, and he therefore enjoyed the Parisian garden parties and dinners, the attractive women, and the literary, scientific and philosophical men. He left France with reluctance, saying he could never forget the years of happiness that he had spent “in the sweet society of a people whose conversation is instructive, whose manners are highly pleasing, and who, above all the nations in the world, have, in the greatest perfection, the art of making themselves beloved by strangers.â€
Franklin had a great talent for making friends; and one of the greatest pleasures of his life was the enjoyment of his children and grandchildren. He was always ready with a witty retort, and he loved a joke and a hearty laugh. In fact, nothing seemed too large or too small for Benjamin Franklin.
Regarding religion, he early revolted against New England Puritanism and went through various stages of belief; but in his old age he had faith in the immortality of the soul. His tolerance led John Adams to say: “The Catholics thought him a Catholic. The Church of England claimed him. The Presbyterians thought him half a Presbyterian, and Friends believed him a wet Quaker.†Of his morals he has himself written, and he prepared a moral code with comments.
Intellectual, practical, industrious, capable and genial, combining so many qualities in one mind and with a vast amount of public work achieved, Franklin remains a puzzle, for he seems to have had abundant time to enjoy those social talents which amounted to genius.
PREPARED BY THE EDITORIAL STAFF OF THE MENTOR ASSOCIATIONILLUSTRATION FOR THE MENTOR. VOL. 6. No. 7. SERIAL No. 155COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY THE MENTOR ASSOCIATION, INC.
FROM AN ENGRAVING BY ROBERT WHITECHURCH. FROM THE PAINTING BY C. SCHUESSELEFRANKLIN BEFORE THE LORDS IN COUNCIL.Whitehall Chapel, London, 1774
FROM AN ENGRAVING BY ROBERT WHITECHURCH. FROM THE PAINTING BY C. SCHUESSELE
FRANKLIN BEFORE THE LORDS IN COUNCIL.Whitehall Chapel, London, 1774