FOOTNOTES:

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.

[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.

Franklin’sancestors in both America and England had not been remarkable for their success in worldly affairs. Most of them did little more than earn a living, and, being of contented dispositions, had no ambition to advance beyond it. Some of them were entirely contented with poverty. All of them, however, were inclined to be economical and industrious. They had no extended views of business enterprise, and we find none of them among the great merchants or commercial classes who were reaching out for the foreign trade of that age. Either from lack of foresight or lack of desire, they seldom selected very profitable callings. They took what was nearest at hand—making candles or shoeing horses—and clung to it persistently.

Franklin advanced beyond them only because all their qualities of economy, thrift, industry, and serene contentedness were intensified in him. His choice of a calling was no better than theirs, for printing was not a very profitable business in colonial times, and was made so in his case only by his unusual sagacity.

I have already described his adventures as a young printer, and how he was sent on a wild-goose chase to London by Governor Keith, of Pennsylvania. I have also told how on his return to Philadelphia hegave up printing and became the clerk of Mr. Denham. He liked Mr. Denham and the clerkship, and never expected to return to his old calling. If Mr. Denham had lived, Franklin might have become a renowned Philadelphia merchant and financier, like Robert Morris, an owner of ships and cargoes, a trader to India and China, and an outfitter of privateers. But this sudden change from the long line of his ancestry was not to be. Nature, as if indignant at the attempt, struck down both Denham and himself with pleurisy within six months of their association in business. Denham perished, and Franklin, after a narrow escape from death, went back reluctantly to set type for Keimer.

He was now twenty-one, a good workman, with experience on two continents, and Keimer made him foreman of his printing-office. Within six months, however, his connection with Keimer was ended by a quarrel, and one of the workmen, Hugh Meredith, suggested that he and Franklin should set up in the printing business for themselves, Meredith to furnish the money through his father, and Franklin to furnish the skill. This offer was eagerly accepted; but as some months would be required to obtain type and materials from London, Franklin’s quarrel with Keimer was patched up and he went back to work for him.

In the spring of 1728 the type arrived. Franklin parted from Keimer in peace, and then with Meredith sprung upon him the surprise of a rival printing establishment. They rented a house for twenty-four pounds a year, and to help pay it tookin Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Godfrey as lodgers. But their money was all spent in getting started, and they had a hard struggle. Their first work was a translation of a Dutch history of the Quakers. Franklin worked late and early. People saw him still employed as they went home from their clubs late at night, and he was at it again in the morning before his neighbors were out of bed.

There were already two other printing-offices, Keimer’s and Bradford’s, and hardly enough work for them. The town prophesied failure for the firm of Franklin & Meredith; and, indeed, their only hope of success seemed to be in destroying one or both of their rivals, a serious undertaking for two young men working on borrowed capital. There was so little to be made in printing at that time that most of the printers were obliged to branch out into journalism and to keep stationery stores. Franklin resolved to start a newspaper, but, unfortunately, told his secret to one of Keimer’s workmen, and Keimer, to be beforehand, immediately started a newspaper of his own, calledThe Universal Instructor in all Arts and Sciences and the Pennsylvania Gazette.

FRONT PAGE OF THE FIRST NUMBER OF THE “PENNSYLVANIA GAZETTE,” PUBLISHED BY FRANKLIN AND MEREDITHFRONT PAGE OF THE FIRST NUMBER OF THE “PENNSYLVANIA GAZETTE,” PUBLISHED BY FRANKLIN AND MEREDITH

Franklin was much disgusted, and in resentment, as he tells us, and to counteract Keimer, began writing amusing letters for the other newspaper of the town, Bradford’sMercury. His idea was to crush Keimer’s paper by building up Bradford’s until he could have one of his own. His articles, which were signed “Busy Body,” show the same talent for humor that he had displayed in Boston afew years before, when he wrote for his brother’s newspaper over the name “Silence Dogood;” but there is a great difference in their tone. No ridicule of the prevailing religion or hatred of those in authority appears in them. The young man evidently found Philadelphia more to his taste than Boston, and was not at war with his surroundings. The “Busy Body” papers are merely pleasant raillery at the failings of human nature in general, interspersed with good advice, something like that which he soon afterwards gave in “Poor Richard.”

Keimer tried to keep his journal going by publishing long extracts from an encyclopædia which had recently appeared, beginning with the letter A, and he tried to imitate the wit of the “Busy Body.” But he merely laid himself open to the “Busy Body’s” attacks, who burlesqued and ridiculed his attempts, and Franklin in his Autobiography gives himself the credit of having drawn public attention so strongly to Bradford’sMercurythat Keimer, after keeping hisUniversal Instructorgoing on only ninety subscribers for about nine months, gave it up. Franklin & Meredith bought it in and thus disposed of one of their rivals. That rival, being incompetent and ignorant, soon disposed of himself by bankruptcy and removal to the Barbadoes. Franklin continued the publication of the newspaper under the title of thePennsylvania Gazette;but it was vastly improved in every way,—better type, better paper, more news, and intelligent, well-reasoned articles on public affairs instead of Keimer’s stupid prolixity.

An article written by Franklin on that great question of colonial times, whether the Legislature of each colony should give the governor a fixed salary or pay him only at the end of each year, according as he had pleased them, attracted much attention. It was written with considerable astuteness, and, while upholding the necessity of the governor’s dependence on the Legislature, was careful not to give offence to those who were of a different opinion. The young printers also won favor by reprinting neatly and correctly an address of the Assembly to the governor, which Bradford had previously printed in a blundering way. The members of the Assembly were so pleased with it that they voted their printing to Franklin & Meredith for the ensuing year. These politicians, finding that Franklin knew how to handle a pen, thought it well, as a matter of self-interest, to encourage him.

The two young men were kept busily employed, yet found it very difficult to make both ends meet, although they did everything themselves, not having even a boy to assist them. Meredith’s father, having suffered some losses, could lend them but half of the sum they had expected from him. The merchant who had furnished them their materials grew impatient and sued them. They succeeded in staying judgment and execution for a time, but fully expected to be eventually sold out by the sheriff and ruined.

At this juncture two friends of Franklin came to him and offered sufficient money to tide over his difficulties if he would get rid of Meredith, who wasintemperate, and take all the business on himself. This he succeeded in doing, and with the money supplied by his friends paid off his debts and added a stationery shop, where he sold paper, parchment, legal blanks, ink, books, and, in time, soap, goose-feathers, liquors, and groceries; he also secured the printing of the laws of Delaware, and, as he says, went on swimmingly. Soon after this he married Miss Read, and he has left us an account of how they lived together:

“We kept no idle servants, our table was plain and simple, our furniture of the cheapest. For instance, my breakfast was for a long time bread and milk (no tea), and I ate it out of a twopenny earthen porringer, with a pewter spoon. But mark how luxury will enter families, and make a progress in spite of principle: being called one morning to breakfast, I found it in a china bowl, with a spoon of silver! They had been bought for me without my knowledge by my wife, and had cost her the enormous sum of three and twenty shillings, for which she had no other excuse or apology to make but that she thoughtherhusband deserved a silver spoon and china bowl as well as any of his neighbors.”

A story is told on the Eastern Shore of Maryland of a young man who called one evening on an old farmer to ask him how it was that he had become rich.

“It is a long story,” said the old man, “and while I am telling it we might as well save the candle,” and he put it out.

“You need not tell it,” said the youth. “I see.”

Franklin’s method was the one that had always been practised by his ancestors, and with his wider intelligence and great literary ability it was sure to succeed. The silver spoons slowly increased untilin the course of years, as he tells us, the plate in his house was “augmented gradually to several hundred pounds in value.”

His newspaper, thePennsylvania Gazette, was the best in the colonies. Besides the ordinary news and advertisements, together with little anecdotes and squibs which he was always so clever in telling, he printed in it extracts fromThe Spectatorand various moral writers, articles from English newspapers, as well as articles of his own which had been previously read to the Junto. He also published long poems by Stephen Duck, now utterly forgotten; but he was then the poet laureate and wrote passable verse. He carefully excluded all libelling and personal abuse; but what would now be considered indelicate jests were not infrequent. These broad jokes, together with witticisms at the expense of ecclesiastics, constituted the stock amusements of the time, as the English literature of that period abundantly shows.

Opening one of the old volumes of hisGazetteat random, we find for September 5, 1734, a humorous account of a lottery in England, by which, to encourage the propagation of the species, all the old maids of the country are to be raffled for. Turning over the leaves, we find the humorous will of a fellow who, among other queer bequests, leaves his body “as a very wholesome feast to the worms of his family vault.” In another number an account is given of some excesses of the Pope, with a Latin verse and its translation which had been pasted on Pasquin’s statue:

“Omnia Venduntur imoDogmata ChristiEt ne me vendunt, evolo.Roma Vale.”“Rome all things sells, even doctrines old and new.I’ll fly for fear of sale; so Rome adieu.”

“Omnia Venduntur imoDogmata ChristiEt ne me vendunt, evolo.Roma Vale.”

“Rome all things sells, even doctrines old and new.I’ll fly for fear of sale; so Rome adieu.”

In the number for November 7, 1734, we are given “The Genealogy of a Jacobite.”

“The DevilbegatSin, SinbegatError, ErrorbegatPride, PridebegatHatred, HatredbegatIgnorance, IgnorancebegatBlind Zeal, Blind ZealbegatSuperstition, SuperstitionbegatPriestcraft, PriestcraftbegatLineal Succession, Lineal SuccessionbegatIndelible Character, Indelible CharacterbegatBlind Obedience, Blind ObediencebegatInfallibility, Infallibilitybegatthe Pope and his Brethren in the time of Egyptian Darkness, the PopebegatPurgatory, PurgatorybegatAuricular Confession, Auricular ConfessionbegatRenouncing of Reason, Renouncing of ReasonbegatContempt of Scriptures, Contempt of the ScripturesbegatImplicit Faith, Implicit FaithbegatCarnal Policy, Carnal PolicybegatUnlimited Passive Obedience, Unlimited Passive ObediencebegatNon-Resistance, Non-ResistancebegatOppression, OppressionbegatFaction, FactionbegatPatriotism, PatriotismbegatOpposition to all the Measures of the Ministry, OppositionbegatDisaffection, DisaffectionbegatDiscontent, Discontentbegata Tory, and a Torybegata Jacobite, with Craftsman and Fog and their Brethren on the Body of the Whore of Babylon when she was deemed past child bearing.”

Franklin’s famous “Speech of Polly Baker” is supposed to have first appeared in theGazette. This is a mistake, but it was reprinted again and again in American newspapers for half a century.

“The Speech of Miss Polly Baker before a Court of Judicatory, in New England, where she was prosecuted for a fifth time, for having a Bastard Child; which influenced the Court to dispense with her punishment, and which induced one of her judges to marry her the next day—by whom she had fifteen children.“May it please the honourable bench to indulge me in a few words: I am a poor, unhappy woman, who have no money to fee lawyers to plead for me, being hard put to it to get a living.... Abstracted from the law, I cannot conceive (may it please your honours) what the nature of my offence is. I have brought five children into the world, at the risque of my life; I have maintained them well by my own industry, without burthening the township, and would have done it better, if it had not been for the heavy charges and fines I have paid. Can it be a crime (in the nature of things, I mean) to add to the King’s subjects, in a new country that really needs people? I own it, I should think it rather a praiseworthy than a punishable action. I have debauched no other woman’s husband, nor enticed any youth; these things I never was charged with; nor has any one the least cause of complaint against me, unless, perhaps, the ministers of justice, because I have had children without being married, by which they have missed a wedding fee. But can this be a fault of mine? I appeal to your honours. You are pleased to allow I don’t want sense; but I must be stupefied to the last degree, not to prefer the honourable state of wedlock to the condition I have lived in. I always was, and still am willing to enter into it; and doubt not my behaving well in it; having all the industry, frugality, fertility, and skill in economy appertaining to a good wife’s character. I defy any one to say I ever refused an offer of that sort; on the contrary, I readily consented to the only proposal of marriage that ever was made me, which was when I was a virgin, but too easily confiding in the person’s sincerity that made it, I unhappily lost my honour by trusting to his; for he got me with child, and then forsook me.“That very person, you all know; he is now become a magistrate of this country; and I had hopes he would have appeared this day on the bench, and have endeavoured to moderate the Court in my favour; then I should have scorned to have mentioned it, but I must now complain of it as unjust and unequal, that my betrayer, and undoer, the first cause of all my faults and miscarriages (if they must be deemed such), should be advanced to honour and power in the government that punishes my misfortunes with stripes and infamy.... But how can it be believed that Heaven is angry at my having children, when to the little done by me towards it, God has been pleased to add his divine skill and admirable workmanship in the formation of their bodies, and crowned the whole by furnishing them with rational and immortal souls? Forgive me, gentlemen, if I talk a little extravagantly on these matters: I am no divine, but if you,gentlemen, must be making laws, do not turn natural and useful actions into crimes by your prohibitions. But take into your wise consideration the great and growing number of bachelors in the country, many of whom, from the mean fear of the expense of a family, have never sincerely and honestly courted a woman in their lives; and by their manner of living leave unproduced (which is little better than murder) hundreds of their posterity to the thousandth generation. Is not this a greater offence against the public good than mine? Compel them, then, by law, either to marriage, or to pay double the fine of fornication every year. What must poor young women do, whom customs and nature forbid to solicit the men, and who cannot force themselves upon husbands, when the laws take no care to provide them any, and yet severely punish them if they do their duty without them; the duty of the first and great command of nature and nature’s God, increase and multiply; a duty, from the steady performance of which nothing has been able to deter me, but for its sake I have hazarded the loss of the public esteem, and have frequently endured public disgrace and punishment; and therefore ought, in my humble opinion, instead of a whipping, to have a statue erected to my memory.”

“May it please the honourable bench to indulge me in a few words: I am a poor, unhappy woman, who have no money to fee lawyers to plead for me, being hard put to it to get a living.... Abstracted from the law, I cannot conceive (may it please your honours) what the nature of my offence is. I have brought five children into the world, at the risque of my life; I have maintained them well by my own industry, without burthening the township, and would have done it better, if it had not been for the heavy charges and fines I have paid. Can it be a crime (in the nature of things, I mean) to add to the King’s subjects, in a new country that really needs people? I own it, I should think it rather a praiseworthy than a punishable action. I have debauched no other woman’s husband, nor enticed any youth; these things I never was charged with; nor has any one the least cause of complaint against me, unless, perhaps, the ministers of justice, because I have had children without being married, by which they have missed a wedding fee. But can this be a fault of mine? I appeal to your honours. You are pleased to allow I don’t want sense; but I must be stupefied to the last degree, not to prefer the honourable state of wedlock to the condition I have lived in. I always was, and still am willing to enter into it; and doubt not my behaving well in it; having all the industry, frugality, fertility, and skill in economy appertaining to a good wife’s character. I defy any one to say I ever refused an offer of that sort; on the contrary, I readily consented to the only proposal of marriage that ever was made me, which was when I was a virgin, but too easily confiding in the person’s sincerity that made it, I unhappily lost my honour by trusting to his; for he got me with child, and then forsook me.

“That very person, you all know; he is now become a magistrate of this country; and I had hopes he would have appeared this day on the bench, and have endeavoured to moderate the Court in my favour; then I should have scorned to have mentioned it, but I must now complain of it as unjust and unequal, that my betrayer, and undoer, the first cause of all my faults and miscarriages (if they must be deemed such), should be advanced to honour and power in the government that punishes my misfortunes with stripes and infamy.... But how can it be believed that Heaven is angry at my having children, when to the little done by me towards it, God has been pleased to add his divine skill and admirable workmanship in the formation of their bodies, and crowned the whole by furnishing them with rational and immortal souls? Forgive me, gentlemen, if I talk a little extravagantly on these matters: I am no divine, but if you,gentlemen, must be making laws, do not turn natural and useful actions into crimes by your prohibitions. But take into your wise consideration the great and growing number of bachelors in the country, many of whom, from the mean fear of the expense of a family, have never sincerely and honestly courted a woman in their lives; and by their manner of living leave unproduced (which is little better than murder) hundreds of their posterity to the thousandth generation. Is not this a greater offence against the public good than mine? Compel them, then, by law, either to marriage, or to pay double the fine of fornication every year. What must poor young women do, whom customs and nature forbid to solicit the men, and who cannot force themselves upon husbands, when the laws take no care to provide them any, and yet severely punish them if they do their duty without them; the duty of the first and great command of nature and nature’s God, increase and multiply; a duty, from the steady performance of which nothing has been able to deter me, but for its sake I have hazarded the loss of the public esteem, and have frequently endured public disgrace and punishment; and therefore ought, in my humble opinion, instead of a whipping, to have a statue erected to my memory.”

A newspaper furnishing the people with so much information and sound advice, mingled with broad stories, bright and witty, and appealing to all the human passions,—in other words, so thoroughly like Franklin,—was necessarily a success. It was, however, a small affair,—a single sheet which, when folded, was about twelve by eighteen inches,—and it appeared only twice a week.

It differed from other colonial newspapers chiefly in its greater brightness and in the literary skill shown in its preparation. But attempts have been made to exaggerate its merits, and Parton declares that in it Franklin “originated the modern system of business advertising” and that “he was the first man who used this mighty engine of publicity as we now use it.” A careful examination of theGazetteand the other journals of the time fails to disclose any evidence in support of this extravagant statement. The advertisements in theGazetteare like those in the other papers,—runaway servants and slaves, ships and merchandise for sale, articles lost or stolen. On the whole, perhaps more advertisements appear in theGazettethan in any of the others, though a comparison of theGazettewith Bradford’sMercuryshows days when the latter has the greater number.

Franklin advertised rather extensively his own publications, and the lamp-black, soap, and “ready money for old rags” which were to be had at his shop, for the reason, doubtless, that, being owner of both the newspaper and the shop, the advertisements cost him nothing. This is the only foundation for the tale of his having originated modern advertising. His advertisements are of the same sort that appeared in other papers, and there is not the slightest suggestion of modern methods in them.

Parton also says that Franklin “invented the plan of distinguishing advertisements by means of little pictures which he cut with his own hands.” If he really was the inventor of this plan, it is strange that he allowed his rival Bradford to use it in theMercurybefore it was adopted by theGazette. No cuts appear in the advertisements in theGazetteuntil May 30, 1734; but theMercury’sadvertisements have them in the year 1733.

Franklin made no sudden or startling changes in the methods of journalism; he merely used themeffectively. His reputation and fortune were increased by his newspaper, but his greatest success came from his almanac, the immortal “Poor Richard.”

In those days almanacs were the literature of the masses, very much as newspapers are now. Everybody read them, and they supplied the place of books to those who would not or could not buy these means of knowledge. Every farm-house and hunter’s cabin had one hanging by the fireplace, and the rich were also eager to read afresh every year the weather forecasts, receipts, scraps of history, and advice mingled with jokes and verses.

Every printer issued an almanac as a matter of course, for it was the one publication which was sure to sell, and there was always more or less money to be made by it. While Franklin and Meredith were in business they published their almanac annually, and it was prepared by Thomas Godfrey, the mathematician, who with his wife lived in part of Franklin’s house. But, as has been related, Mrs. Godfrey tried to make a match between Franklin and one of her relatives, and when that failed the Godfreys and Franklin separated, and Thomas Godfrey devoted his mathematical talents to the preparation of Bradford’s almanac.

This was in the year 1732, and the following year Franklin had no philomath, as such people were called, to prepare his almanac. A great deal depended on having a popular philomath. Some of them could achieve large sales for their employer, while others could scarcely catch the public attentionat all. Franklin’s literary instinct at once suggested the plan of creating a philomath out of his own imagination, an ideal one who would achieve the highest possibilities of the art. So he wrote his own almanac, and announced that it was prepared by one Richard Saunders, who for short was called “Poor Richard,” and he proved to be the most wonderful philomath that ever lived.

As Shakespeare took the suggestions and plots of his plays from old tales and romances, endowing his spoils by the touch of genius with a life that the originals never possessed, so Franklin plundered right and left to obtain material for the wise sayings of “Poor Richard.” There was, we are told, a Richard Saunders who was the philomath of a popular English almanac called “The Apollo Anglicanus,” and another popular almanac had been called “Poor Robin;” but “Poor Richard” was a real creation, a new human character introduced to the world like Sir Roger de Coverley.

Novel-writing was in its infancy in those days, and Bunyan’s “Pilgrim’s Progress,” Addison’s character of Sir Roger, and the works of Richardson, Fielding, and Smollett were the only examples of this new literature. That beautiful sentiment that prompts children to say, “Tell us a story,” and which is now fed to repletion by trash, was then primitive, fresh, and simple. Franklin could have written a novel in the manner of Fielding, but he had no inclination for such a task. He took more naturally and easily to creating a single character somewhat in the way Sir Roger de Coverley was created byAddison, whose essays he had rewritten so often for practice.

TITLE-PAGE OF POOR RICHARD’S ALMANAC FOR 1733TITLE-PAGE OF POOR RICHARD’S ALMANAC FOR 1733

Sir Roger was so much of a gentleman, there were so many delicate touches in him, that he never became the favorite of the common people. But “Poor Richard” was the Sir Roger of the masses; he won the hearts of high and low. In that first number for the year 1733 he introduces himself very much after the manner of Addison.

“Courteous Reader,“I might in this place attempt to gain thy favor by declaring that I write almanacks with no other view than that of the public good, but in this I should not be sincere; and men are now-a-days too wise to be deceived by pretences, how specious soever. The plain truth of the matter is, I am excessive poor, and my wife, good woman, is, I tell her, excessive proud; she cannot bear, she says, to sit spinning in her shift of tow, while I do nothing but gaze at the stars; and has threatened more than once to burn all my books and rattling traps (as she calls my instruments) if I do not make some profitable use of them for the good of my family. The printer has offered me some considerable share of the profits, and I have thus begun to comply with my dame’s desire.”

“Courteous Reader,

“I might in this place attempt to gain thy favor by declaring that I write almanacks with no other view than that of the public good, but in this I should not be sincere; and men are now-a-days too wise to be deceived by pretences, how specious soever. The plain truth of the matter is, I am excessive poor, and my wife, good woman, is, I tell her, excessive proud; she cannot bear, she says, to sit spinning in her shift of tow, while I do nothing but gaze at the stars; and has threatened more than once to burn all my books and rattling traps (as she calls my instruments) if I do not make some profitable use of them for the good of my family. The printer has offered me some considerable share of the profits, and I have thus begun to comply with my dame’s desire.”

There was a rival almanac, of which the philomath was Titan Leeds. “Poor Richard” affects great friendship for him, and says that he would have written almanacs long ago had he not been unwilling to interfere with the business of Titan. But this obstacle was soon to be removed.

“He dies by my calculation,” says “Poor Richard,” “made at his request, on Oct. 17, 1733, 3 ho., 29 m., P. M., at the very instant of the☌of☉and☿. By his own calculation he will survive till the 26th of the same month. This small difference between us we have disputed whenever we have met these nine years past; but at length he is inclinable to agree with my judgment. Which of us is most exact, a little time will now determine.”

In the next issue “Poor Richard” announces that his circumstances are now much easier. His wife has a pot of her own and is no longer obliged to borrow one of a neighbor; and, best of all, they have something to put in it, which has made her temper more pacific. Then he begins to tease Titan Leeds. He recalls his prediction of his death, but is not quite sure whether it occurred; for he has been prevented by domestic affairs from being at the bedside and closing the eyes of his old friend. The stars have foretold the death with their usual exactitude; but sometimes Providence interferes in these matters, which makes the astrologer’s art a little uncertain. But on the whole he thinks Titan must be dead, “for there appears in his name, as I am assured, an Almanack for the year 1734 in which I am treated in a very gross and unhandsome manner; in which I am called a false predicter, an ignorant, a conceited scribbler, a fool, and a lyar;” and he goes on to show that his good friend Titan would never have treated him in this way.

The next year he is still making sport of Titan, the deceased Titan, and the ghost of Titan, “who pretends to be still living, and to write Almanacks in spight of me;” and he proves again by means of the funniest arguments that he must be dead. Another year he devotes several pages of nonsense to disproving the charge that “Poor Richard” is not a real person. He ridicules astrology and weather forecasting by pretending to be very serious over it. At any rate, he says, “we always hit the day of the month, and that I suppose is esteemed one of themost useful things in an Almanack.” He and his good old wife are getting on now better than ever; and the almanac for 1738 is prepared by Mistress Saunders herself, who rails at her husband and makes queer work with eclipses and forecasting. Then in the number for 1740 Titan writes a letter to “Poor Richard” from the other world.

Besides the formal essays or prefaces which appeared in each number, there were numerous verses, paragraphs of admirable satire on the events of the day or the weaknesses of human nature, and those prudential maxims which in the end became the most famous of all. As we look through a collection of these almanacs for an hour or so we seem to have lived among the colonists, who were not then Americans, but merry Englishmen, heavy eaters and drinkers, full of broad jokes, whimsical, humorous ways, and forever gossiping with hearty good nature over the ludicrous accidents of life, the love-affairs, the married infelicities, and the cuckolds. It is the freshness, the sap, and the rollicking happiness of old English life.

“Old Batchelor would have a wife that’s wise,Fair, rich and young a maiden for his bed;Not proud, nor churlish, but of faultless size,A country housewife in the city bred.He’s a nice fool and long in vain hath staid;He should bespeak her, there’s none ready made.”“Never spare the parson’s wine, nor the baker’s pudding.”“Ne’er take a wife till thou hast a house (and a fire) to put her in.”“My love and I for kisses play’d,She would keep stakes, I was content,But when I won, she would be paid,This made me ask her what she meant:Quoth she, since you are in the wrangling veinHere take your kisses, give me mine again.”“Who has deceived thee so oft as thyself?”“There is no little enemy.”“Of the Eclipses this year.“During the first visible eclipse Saturn is retrograde: For which reason the crabs will go sidelong and the ropemakers backward. The belly will wag before, and the —— will sit down first.... When a New Yorker thinks to sayTHIShe shall sayDISS, and the People in New England and Cape May will not be able to say Cow for their Lives, but will be forc’d to sayKEOWby a certain involuntary Twist in the Root of their Tongues....”“Many dishes many diseases.”“Let thy maid servant be faithful, strong and homely.”“Here I sit naked, like some fairy elf;My seat a pumpkin; I grudge no man’s pelf,Though I’ve no bread nor cheese upon my shelf,I’ll tell thee gratis, when it safe isTo purge, to bleed, or cut thy cattle or—thyself.”“Necessity never made a good bargain.”“A little house well filled, a little field well till’d and a little wife well will’d are great riches.”“Of the Diseases this year.“This Year the Stone-blind shall see but very little; the Deaf shall hear but poorly; and the Dumb shan’t speak very plain. And it’s much, if my Dame Bridget talks at all this Year. Whole Flocks, Herds and Droves of Sheep, Swine and Oxen, Cocks and Hens, Ducks and Drakes, Geese and Ganders shall go to Pot; but the Mortality will not be altogether so great among Cats, Dogs and Horses....”“Of the Fruits of the Earth.“I find that this will be a plentiful Year of all manner of good Things, to those who have enough; but the Orange Trees in Greenland will go near to fare the worse for the Cold. As for Oats, they’ll be a great Help to Horses....”“Lend money to an enemy, and thou’lt gain him; to a friend, and thou’lt lose him.”“Keep your eyes wide open before marriage, half shut afterwards.”“It is hard for an empty sack to stand upright.”

“Never spare the parson’s wine, nor the baker’s pudding.”

“Ne’er take a wife till thou hast a house (and a fire) to put her in.”

“My love and I for kisses play’d,She would keep stakes, I was content,But when I won, she would be paid,This made me ask her what she meant:Quoth she, since you are in the wrangling veinHere take your kisses, give me mine again.”

“Who has deceived thee so oft as thyself?”

“There is no little enemy.”

“Of the Eclipses this year.

“During the first visible eclipse Saturn is retrograde: For which reason the crabs will go sidelong and the ropemakers backward. The belly will wag before, and the —— will sit down first.... When a New Yorker thinks to sayTHIShe shall sayDISS, and the People in New England and Cape May will not be able to say Cow for their Lives, but will be forc’d to sayKEOWby a certain involuntary Twist in the Root of their Tongues....”

“Many dishes many diseases.”

“Let thy maid servant be faithful, strong and homely.”

“Here I sit naked, like some fairy elf;My seat a pumpkin; I grudge no man’s pelf,Though I’ve no bread nor cheese upon my shelf,I’ll tell thee gratis, when it safe isTo purge, to bleed, or cut thy cattle or—thyself.”

“Necessity never made a good bargain.”

“A little house well filled, a little field well till’d and a little wife well will’d are great riches.”

“Of the Diseases this year.

“This Year the Stone-blind shall see but very little; the Deaf shall hear but poorly; and the Dumb shan’t speak very plain. And it’s much, if my Dame Bridget talks at all this Year. Whole Flocks, Herds and Droves of Sheep, Swine and Oxen, Cocks and Hens, Ducks and Drakes, Geese and Ganders shall go to Pot; but the Mortality will not be altogether so great among Cats, Dogs and Horses....”

“Of the Fruits of the Earth.

“I find that this will be a plentiful Year of all manner of good Things, to those who have enough; but the Orange Trees in Greenland will go near to fare the worse for the Cold. As for Oats, they’ll be a great Help to Horses....”

“Lend money to an enemy, and thou’lt gain him; to a friend, and thou’lt lose him.”

“Keep your eyes wide open before marriage, half shut afterwards.”

“It is hard for an empty sack to stand upright.”

For twenty years and more “Poor Richard” kept up this continuous stream of fun, breaking forth afresh every autumn,—sound, wholesome, dealing with the real things and the elemental joys of life, and expressed in that inimitable language of which Franklin was master. In this way was built up the greater part of his wonderful reputation, which in some of its manifestations surprises us so much. Such a reputation is usually of long growth; one or two conspicuous acts will not achieve it. But the man who every year for nearly a generation delighted every human being in the country, from the ploughman and hunter to the royal governors, was laying in store for himself a sure foundation of influence.

The success of “Poor Richard” was immediate. The first number of it went through several editions, and after that the annual sales amounted to about ten thousand copies. For the last number which Franklin prepared for the year 1758, before he turned over the enterprise to his partner, he wrote a most happy preface. It was always his habit, when a controversy or service he was engaged in wasfinished, to summarize the whole affair in a way that strengthened his own position and left an indelible impression which all the efforts of his enemies could not efface. Accordingly, for this last preface he invented a homely, catching tale that enabled him to summarize all the best sayings of “Poor Richard” for the last twenty-five years.

“I stopt my Horse lately where a great Number of people were collected at a Vendue of Merchant Goods. The Hour of Sale not being come, they were conversing on the Badness of the Times, and one of the Company call’d to a plain clean old Man, with white Locks, ‘Pray, Father Abraham, what think you of the Times? Won’t these heavy Taxes quite ruin the Country? How shall we be ever able to pay them? What would you advise us to?’—Father Abraham stood up, and reply’d, ‘If you’d have my Advice, I’ll give it you in short, for a Word to the Wise is enough, and many Words won’t fill a Bushel, as Poor Richard says.’ They join’d in desiring him to speak his Mind, and gathering round him, he proceeded as follows:“‘Friends,’ says he, ‘and neighbours, the Taxes are indeed very heavy, and if those laid on by the Government were the only Ones we had to pay, we might more easily discharge them; but we have many others, and much more grievous to some of us. We are taxed twice as much by our Idleness, three times as much by our Pride, and four times as much by our Folly, and from these Taxes the Commissioners cannot ease or deliver us by allowing an Abatement. However let us hearken to good Advice, and something may be done for us; God helps them that help themselves, as Poor Richard says in his Almanack of 1733.“‘It would be thought a hard Government that should tax its People one tenth Part of their Time, to be employed in its Service. But Idleness taxes many of us much more, if we reckon all that is spent in absolute Sloth, or doing of nothing, with that which is spent in idle Employments or Amusements, that amount to nothing. Sloth, by bringing on Diseases absolutely shortens Life. Sloth, like Rust, consumes faster than Labour wears, while the used Key is always bright, as Poor Richard says. But dost thou love Life, then do not squander Time, for that’s the Stuff Life is made of, as poor Richard says.—Howmuch more than is necessary do we spend in Sleep! forgetting that The Sleeping Fox catches no Poultry, and that there will be sleeping enough in the Grave, as Poor Richard says. If Time be of all Things the most precious, wasting of Time must be, as Poor Richard says, the greatest Prodigality, since, as he elsewhere tells us, Lost Time is never found again; and what we call Time-enough, always proves little enough. Let us then be up and doing, and doing to the Purpose; so by Diligence shall we do more with less Perplexity. Sloth makes all Things difficult, but Industry all Things easy, as Poor Richard says; and He that riseth late, must trot all Day, and shall scarce overtake his Business at night. While Laziness travels so slowly, that Poverty soon overtakes him, as we read in Poor Richard, who adds, Drive thy Business, let that not drive thee; and Early to Bed, and early to rise, makes a Man healthy, wealthy, and wise.“‘So much for Industry, my Friends, and Attention to one’s own Business; but to these we must add Frugality, if we would make our Industry more certainly successful. A man may, if he knows not how to save as he gets, Keep his nose all his life to the Grindstone, and die not worth a Groat at last.“‘And now to conclude, Experience keeps a dear School, but Fools will learn in no other, and scarce in that; for it is true, we may give Advice, but we cannot give Conduct, as Poor Richard says: However, remember this, They that won’t be counselled, can’t be helped, as Poor Richard says: and farther, That if you will not hear Reason, she’ll surely wrap your Knuckles.’“Thus the old Gentleman ended his Harangue. The People heard it, and approved the Doctrine, and immediately practised the contrary, just as if it had been a common Sermon; for the Vendue opened and they began to buy extravagantly, notwithstanding all his Cautions and their own Fear of Taxes.”

“‘Friends,’ says he, ‘and neighbours, the Taxes are indeed very heavy, and if those laid on by the Government were the only Ones we had to pay, we might more easily discharge them; but we have many others, and much more grievous to some of us. We are taxed twice as much by our Idleness, three times as much by our Pride, and four times as much by our Folly, and from these Taxes the Commissioners cannot ease or deliver us by allowing an Abatement. However let us hearken to good Advice, and something may be done for us; God helps them that help themselves, as Poor Richard says in his Almanack of 1733.

“‘It would be thought a hard Government that should tax its People one tenth Part of their Time, to be employed in its Service. But Idleness taxes many of us much more, if we reckon all that is spent in absolute Sloth, or doing of nothing, with that which is spent in idle Employments or Amusements, that amount to nothing. Sloth, by bringing on Diseases absolutely shortens Life. Sloth, like Rust, consumes faster than Labour wears, while the used Key is always bright, as Poor Richard says. But dost thou love Life, then do not squander Time, for that’s the Stuff Life is made of, as poor Richard says.—Howmuch more than is necessary do we spend in Sleep! forgetting that The Sleeping Fox catches no Poultry, and that there will be sleeping enough in the Grave, as Poor Richard says. If Time be of all Things the most precious, wasting of Time must be, as Poor Richard says, the greatest Prodigality, since, as he elsewhere tells us, Lost Time is never found again; and what we call Time-enough, always proves little enough. Let us then be up and doing, and doing to the Purpose; so by Diligence shall we do more with less Perplexity. Sloth makes all Things difficult, but Industry all Things easy, as Poor Richard says; and He that riseth late, must trot all Day, and shall scarce overtake his Business at night. While Laziness travels so slowly, that Poverty soon overtakes him, as we read in Poor Richard, who adds, Drive thy Business, let that not drive thee; and Early to Bed, and early to rise, makes a Man healthy, wealthy, and wise.

“‘So much for Industry, my Friends, and Attention to one’s own Business; but to these we must add Frugality, if we would make our Industry more certainly successful. A man may, if he knows not how to save as he gets, Keep his nose all his life to the Grindstone, and die not worth a Groat at last.

“‘And now to conclude, Experience keeps a dear School, but Fools will learn in no other, and scarce in that; for it is true, we may give Advice, but we cannot give Conduct, as Poor Richard says: However, remember this, They that won’t be counselled, can’t be helped, as Poor Richard says: and farther, That if you will not hear Reason, she’ll surely wrap your Knuckles.’

“Thus the old Gentleman ended his Harangue. The People heard it, and approved the Doctrine, and immediately practised the contrary, just as if it had been a common Sermon; for the Vendue opened and they began to buy extravagantly, notwithstanding all his Cautions and their own Fear of Taxes.”

This speech of the wise old man at the auction, while perhaps not so interesting to us now as are some other parts of “Poor Richard,” was a great hit in its day; in fact, the greatest Franklin ever made. Before it appeared “Poor Richard’s” reputation was confined principally to America, and without thisfinal speech might have continued within those limits. But the “clean old Man, with white locks” spread the fame of “Poor Dick” over the whole civilized world. His speech was reprinted on broadsides in England to be fastened to the sides of houses, translated into French, and bought by the clergy and gentry for distribution to parishioners and tenants. Mr. Paul Leicester Ford, in his excellent little volume, “The Sayings of Poor Richard,” has summarized its success. Seventy editions of it have been printed in English, fifty-six in French, eleven in German, and nine in Italian. It has also been translated into Spanish, Danish, Swedish, Welsh, Polish, Gaelic, Russian, Bohemian, Dutch, Catalan, Chinese, and Modern Greek, reprinted at least four hundred times, and still lives.

It was quite common a hundred years ago to charge Franklin with being an arrant plagiarist. It is true that the sayings of “Poor Richard” and a great deal that went to make up the almanac were taken from Rabelais, Bacon, Rochefoucauld, Ray Palmer, and any other sources where they could be found or suggested. But “Poor Richard” changed and rewrote them to suit his purpose, and gave most of them a far wider circulation than they had before.

More serious charges have, however, been made, and they are summarized in Davis’s “Travels in America,”[15]which was published in 1803. I have already noticed one of these,—the charge that his letter on air-baths was taken from Aubrey’s “Miscellanies,”—which, on examination, I cannot find to besustained. Davis also charges that Franklin’s famous epitaph on himself was taken from a Latin one by an Eton school-boy, published with an English translation in theGentleman’s Magazinefor February, 1736. Franklin’s epitaph is already familiar to most of us:

The BodyofBenjamin FranklinPrinter(Like the cover of an old bookIts contents torn outAnd stript of its lettering and gilding)Lies here, food for worms.But the work shall not be lostFor it will (as he believed) appear once moreIn a new and more elegant editionRevised and correctedbyThe Author.

The Eton boy’s was somewhat like it:

Vitæ Volumine peractoHic Finis Jacobi TonsonPerpoliti Sociorum Principis;Qui Velut Obstetrix MusarumIn Lucem EdivitFœlices Ingenii Partus.Lugete, Scriptorum chorus,Et Frangite Calamos;Ille vester, Margine Erasus, deletur!Sed hæc postrema InscriptioHuic primæ Mortis PaginæImprimatur,Ne Prælo Sepulchri Commissus,Ipse Editor careat Titulo:Hic Jacet BibliopolaFolio vitæ delapsoExpectans novam EditionemAuctiorem et Emendatiorem.

One of these productions might certainly have been suggested by the other. But Franklin’s grandson, William Temple Franklin, who professed to have the original in his possession, in his grandfather’s handwriting, said that it was dated 1728, and it is printed with that date in one of the editions of Franklin’s works. If this date is correct, it would be too early for the epitaph to have been copied from the one in theGentleman’s Magazinefor February, 1736. It might be said that possibly the Eton boy knew of Franklin’s epitaph; but I cannot find that it was printed or in any way made public before 1736. There is no reason why both should not be original, for everybody wrote epitaphs in that century.

Franklin has been credited by one of his biographers with the invention of the comic epitaph, and Smollett’s famous inscription on Commodore Trunnion’s tomb in “Peregrine Pickle” is described as a mere imitation of Franklin’s epitaph on himself. But there is no evidence that Smollett had seen Franklin’s production before “Peregrine Pickle” was published in 1750, and it was not necessary that he should. There were plenty of similar productions long before that time. Franklin’s ownGazette, January 6 to January 15, 1735/6, gives a very witty inscription on a dead greyhound, which is described as cut on the walls of Lord Cobham’s gardens at Stow. In writing comic epitaphs Franklin was merely following the fashion of his time, and he was hardly as good at it as Smollett.

He has himself told us the source of one of his best short essays, “The Ephemera,” a beautiful littleallegory which he wrote to please Madame Brillon in Paris. In a letter to William Carmichael, of June 17, 1780, he describes the circumstances under which it was written, and says that “the thought was partly taken from a little piece of some unknown writer, which I met with fifty years since in a newspaper.”[16]It was in this way that he worked over old material for “Poor Richard.” Everything he had read seemed capable of supplying suggestions, and it must be said that he usually improved on the work of other men.

He was very fond of paraphrasing the Bible as a humorous task and also to show what he conceived to be the meaning of certain passages. He altered the wording of the Book of Job so as to make it a satire on English politics. He did it cleverly, and it was amusing; but it was a very cheap sort of humor.

His most famous joke of this kind was his “Parable against Persecution.” He had learned it by heart, and when he was in England, and the discussion turned on religious liberty, he would open the Bible and read his parable as the last chapter in Genesis. The imitation of the language of Scripture was perfect, and the parable itself was so interesting and striking that every one was delighted with it. His guests would wonder and say that they had never known there was such a chapter in Genesis.

The parable was published and universally admired, but when it appeared in theGentleman’s Magazinesome one very quickly discovered that it had been taken from Jeremy Taylor’s Polemical Discourses, and there was a great discussion over it. Franklin afterwards said, in a letter to Mr. Vaughan, that he had taken it from Taylor; and John Adams said that he never pretended that it was original.[17]It is interesting to see how cleverly he improved on Taylor’s language:

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