The Life of Benjamin Franklin

On the arrival of the vessel at New-York, Ben went up to a tavern, and lo! who should he first cast his eyes on there, but his old friend Collins, of Boston!

Collins had, it seems, been so charmed with Ben's account of Philadelphia, that he came to the determination to try his fortune there also; and learning that Ben was shortly to return by the way of New-York, he had jumped into the first vessel, and was there before him, waiting his arrival. Great was the joy of Ben at the sight of his friend Collins, for it drew after it a train of the most pleasant recollections.—But who can describe his feelings, when flying to embrace that long esteemed youth, he beheld him now risen from his chair equally eager for the embrace, but alas! only able to make a staggering step or two before down he came sprawling on the floor, drunk as a lord!

To see a young man of his wit—his eloquence—his education—his hitherto unstained character and high promise, thus overwhelmed by a worse than brutal vice, would have been a sad sight to Ben, even though that young man had been an entire stranger. But oh! how tenfold sad to see such marks of ruinous dishonour on one so dear, and from whom he had expected so much.

Ben had just returned from assisting to put poor Collins to bed, when the captain of the vessel which had brought him to New-York, stepped up and in a very respectful manner put a note into his hand.—Ben opened it, not without considerable agitation, and read as follows:—

"G. Burnet's compliments await young Mr. Franklin—and should be glad of half an hour's chat with him over a glass of wine."

"G. Burnet!" said Ben, "who can that be?"

"Why, 'tis the governor," replied the captain with a smile. "I have just been to see him, with some letters I brought for him from Boston. And when I told him what a world of books you have, he expressed a curiosity to see you, and begged I would return with you to his palace."

Ben instantly set off with the captain, but not without a sigh as he cast a look back on the door of poor Collins' bed-room, to think what an honour that wretched young man had lost for the sake of two or three vile gulps of filthy grog.

The governor's looks, at the approach of Ben, showed somewhat of disappointment. He had, it seems, expected considerable entertainment from Ben's conversation. But his fresh and ruddy countenance showed him so much younger than he had counted on, that he gave up all his promised entertainment as a lost hope. He received Ben, however, with great politeness, and after pressing on him a glass of wine, took him into an adjoining room, which was his library, consisting of a large and well-chosen collection.

Seeing the pleasure which sparkled in Ben's eyes as he surveyed so many elegant authors, and thought of the rich stores of knowledge which they contained, the governor, with a smile of complacency, as on a young pupil of science, said to him, "Well, Mr. Franklin, I am told by the captain here, that you have a fine collection too."

"Only a trunk full, sir," said Ben.

"A trunk full!" replied the governor. "Why, what use can you have for so many books? Young people at your age have seldom read beyond the 10th chapter of Nehemiah."

"I can't boast," replied Ben, "of having read any great deal beyond that myself; but still, I should be sorry if I could not get a trunk full of books to read every six months." At this, the governor regarding him with a look of surprise, said, "You must then, though so young, be a scholar; perhaps a teacher of the languages."

"No sir," answered Ben, "I know no language but my own."

"What, not Latin nor Greek!"

"No sir, not a word of either."

"Why, don't you think them necessary?"

"I don't set myself up as a judge. But I should not suppose them necessary."

"Aye! well, I should like to hear your reasons."

"Why, sir, I am not competent to give reasons that may satisfy a gentleman of your learning, but the following are the reasons with which I satisfy myself. I look on languages, sir, merely as arbitrary sounds of characters, whereby men communicate their ideas to each other. Now, if I already possess a language which is capable of conveying more ideas than I shall ever acquire, were it not wiser in me to improve my time in getting sense through that one language, than waste it in getting mere sounds through fifty languages, even if I could learn as many?"

Here the governor paused a moment, though not without a little red on his cheeks, for having only a minute before put Ben and the 10th chapter of Nehemiah so close together. However, catching a new idea, he took another start. "Well, but, my dear sir, you certainly differ from the learned world, which is, you know, decidedly in favour of the languages."

"I would not wish wantonly to differ from the learned world," said Ben, "especially when they maintain opinions that seem to be founded on truth. But when this is not the case, to differ from them I have ever thought my duty; and especially since I studied Locke."

"Locke!" cried the governor with surprise, "you studied Locke!"

"Yes, sir, I studied Locke on the Understanding three years ago, when I was thirteen."

"You amaze me, sir. You studied Locke on the Understanding at thirteen!"

"Yes, sir, I did."

"Well, and pray at what college did you study Locke at thirteen; for at Cambridge college in Old England, where I got my education, they never allowed the senior class to look at Locke till eighteen?"

"Why, sir, it was my misfortune never to be at a college, nor even at a grammar school, except nine months when I was a child."

Here the governor sprung from his seat, and staring at Ben, cried out, "the devil! well, and where—where did you get your education, pray?"

"At home, sir, in a tallow chandler's shop."

"In a tallow chandler's shop!" screamed the governor.

"Yes, sir; my father was a poor old tallow chandler, with sixteen children, and I the youngest of all. At eight he put me to school, but finding he could not spare the money from the rest of the children to keep me there, he took me home into the shop, where I assisted him by twisting the candle wicks and filling the moulds all day, and at night I read by myself. At twelve, my father bound me to my brother, a printer, in Boston, and with him I worked hard all day at the press and cases, and again read by myself at night."

Here the governor, spanking his hands together, put up a loud whistle, while his eye-balls, wild with surprise, rolled about in their sockets as if in a mighty mind to hop out. "Impossible, young man!" he exclaimed: "Impossible! you are only sounding my credulity. I can never believe one half of all this." Then turning to the captain, he said, "captain, you are an intelligent man, and from Boston; pray tell me can this young man here, be aiming at any thing but to quiz me?"

"No, indeed, please your excellency," replied the captain, "Mr. Franklin is not quizzing you. He is saying what is really true, for I am acquainted with his father and family."

The governor then turning to Ben said, more moderately, "Well, my dear wonderful boy, I ask your pardon for doubting your word; and now pray tell me, for I feel a stronger desire than ever to hear your objection to learning the dead languages."

"Why, sir, I object to it principally on account of the shortness of human life. Taking them one with another, men do not live above forty years. Plutarch, indeed, puts it only thirty-three. But say forty. Well, of this full ten years are lost in childhood, before any boy thinks of a Latin grammar. This brings the forty down to thirty. Now of such a moment as this, to spend five or six years in learning the dead languages, especially when all the best books in those languages are translated into ours, and besides, we already have more books on every subject than such short-lived creatures can ever acquire, seems very preposterous."

"Well, but what are you to do with their great poets, Virgil and Homer, for example; I suppose you would not think of translating Homer out of his rich native Greek into our poor homespun English, would you?"

"Why not, sir?"

"Why I should as soon think of transplanting a pine-apple from Jamaica to Boston."

"Well, sir, a skilful gardener, with his hot-house, can give us nearly as fine a pine-apple as any in Jamaica. And so Mr. Pope, with his fine imagination, has given us Homer, in English, with more of his beauties than ordinary scholars would find in him after forty years' study of the Greek. And besides, sir, if Homer was not translated, I am far from thinking it would be worth spending five or six years to learn to read him in his own language."

"You differ from the critics, Mr. Franklin; for the critics all tell us that his beauties are inimitable."

"Yes, sir, and the naturalists tell us that the beauties of the basilisk are inimitable too."

"The basilisk, sir! Homer compared with the basilisk! I really don't understand you, sir."

"Why, I mean, sir, that as the basilisk is the more to be dreaded for the beautiful skin that covers his poison, so Homer for the bright colourings he throws over bad characters and passions. Now, as I don't think the beauties of poetry are comparable to those of philanthropy, nor a thousandth part so important to human happiness, I must confess I dread Homer, especially as the companion of youth. The humane and gentle virtues are certainly the greatest charms and sweeteners of life. And I suppose, sir, you would hardly think of sending your son to Achilles to learn these."

"I agree he has too much revenge in his composition."

"Yes, sir, and when painted in the colours which Homer's glowing fancy lends, what youth but must run the most imminent risk of catching a spark of bad fire from such a blaze as he throws on his pictures?"

"Why this, though an uncommon view of the subject, is, I confess, an ingenious one, Mr. Franklin; but surely 'tis overstrained."

"Not at all, sir; we are told from good authority, that it was the reading of Homer that first put it into the head of Alexander the great to become a Hero: and after him of Charles the 12th. What millions of human beings have been slaughtered by these two great butchers is not known; but still probably not a tythe of what have perished in duels between individuals from the pride and revenge nursed by reading Homer."

"Well, sir," replied the governor, "I never heard the prince of bards treated in this way before. You must certainly be singular in your charges against Homer."

"I ask your pardon, sir, I have the honour to think of Homer exactly as did the greatest philosopher of antiquity; I mean Plato, who strictly forbids the reading of Homer in his republic. And yet Plato was a heathen. I don't boast myself as a christian; and yet I am shocked at the inconsistency of our Latin and Greek teachers (generally christians and divines too,) who can one day put Homer into the hands of their pupils, and in the midst of their recitations can stop them short to point out the divine beauties and sublimities which the poet gives to his hero, in the bloody work of slaughtering the poor Trojans; and the next day take them to church to hear a discourse from Christ on the blessedness of meekness and forgiveness. No wonder that hot-livered young men thus educated, should despise meekness and forgiveness, as mere cowards' virtues, and deem nothing so glorious as fighting duels, and blowing out brains."

Here the governor came to a pause, like a gamester at his last trump. But perceiving Ben cast his eyes on a splendid copy of Pope's works, he suddenly seized that as a fine opportunity to turn the conversation. So stepping up, he placed his hand on his shoulder, and in a very familiar manner said, "Well, Mr. Franklin, there's an author that I am sure you'll not quarrel with; an author that I think you'll pronounce faultless."

"Why, sir," replied Ben, "I entertain a most exalted opinion of Pope; but still, sir, I think he is not without his faults."

"It would puzzle you, I suspect, Mr. Franklin, as keen a critic as you are, to point out one."

"Well, sir," answered Ben, hastily turning to the place, "what do you think of this famous couplet of Mr. Pope's—

"Immodest words admit of no defence,For want of decency is want of sense."

"I see no fault there."

"No, indeed!" replied Ben, "why now to my mind a man can ask no better excuse for any thing wrong he does, than his want of sense."

"Well, sir," said the governor, sensibly staggered, "and how would you alter it?"

"Why, sir, if I might presume to alter a line in this great Poet, I would do it in this way:—

"Immodest words admit but this defence—That want of decency is want of sense."

Here the governor caught Ben in his arms as a delighted father would his son, calling out at the same time to the captain, "How greatly am I obliged to you, sir, for bringing me to an acquaintance with this charming boy? O! what a delightful thing it would be for us old fellows to converse with sprightful youth if they were but all like him!—But the d–l of it is, most parents are as blind as bats to the true glory and happiness of their children. Most parents never look higher for their sons than to see them delving like muckworms for money; or hopping about like jay-birds, in fine feathers. Hence their conversation is generally no better than froth and nonsense."

After several other handsome compliments on Ben, and the captain expressing a wish to be going, the governor shook hands with Ben, begging at the same time that he would for ever consider him as one of his fastest friends, and also never came to New-York without coming to see him.

CHAPTER XX

On returning to the tavern, he hastened into his chamber, where he found his drunken comrade, poor Collins, in a fine perspiration, and considerably sobered, owing to the refrigerating effects of a pint of strong sage tea, with a tea-spoonful of saltpetre, which Ben, before he set out to the governor's, had pressed on him as a remedy he had somewhere read, much in vogue among the London topers, to cool off after a rum fever. Collins appeared still to have enough of brandy in him for a frolic; but when Ben came to tell him of the amiable governor Burnet, in whose company, at his own palace, he had spent a most delightful evening; and also to remind him of the golden opportunity he had lost, of forming an acquaintance with that noble gentleman, poor Collins wept bitterly.

Ben was exceedingly affected to see him in tears, and endeavoured to comfort him. But he refused comfort. He said, "if this had been the first time, he should not himself think much of it; but he candidly confessed, that for a long time he had been guilty of it, though till of late he had always kept it to himself, drinking in his chamber. But now he felt at times," he said, "an awful apprehension that he was a lost man. His cravings for liquor were so strong on the one hand, and on the other his powers of resistance so feeble, that it put him fearfully in mind of the dismal state of a poor wretch, within the fatal attraction of a whirlpool, whose resistless suction, in spite of all his feeble efforts, was hurrying him down to sure and speedy destruction."

Collins, who was exceedingly eloquent on every subject, but especially on one so nearly affecting himself, went on deploring his misfortune in strains so tender and pathetic, that Ben, whose eyes were fountains ever ready to flow at the voice of sorrow, could not refrain from weeping, which he did most unfeignedly for a long esteemed friend now going to ruin. He could bear, he said, to see the brightest plumed bird, charmed by the rattle-snake, descending into the horrid sepulchre of the monster's jaws. He could bear to see the richest laden Indiaman, dismasted and rudderless, drifting ashore on the merciless breakers; because made of dust, these things must at any rate return to dust, again. But to see an immortal mind stopped in her first soarings, entangled and limed in the filth of so brutal a vice as drunkenness—that was a sight he could not bear. And as a mother looking on her child that is filleted for the accursed Moloch, cannot otherwise than shed tears, so Ben, when he looked on poor Collins, could not but weep when he saw him the victim of destruction.

However, as a good wit turns every thing to advantage, this sudden and distressing fall of poor Collins, set Ben to thinking: and the result of his thoughts noted down in his journal of that day, deserves the attention of all young men of this day; and even will as long as human nature endures.

"Wit," says he, "in young men, is dangerous, because apt to breed vanity, which, when disappointed, brings them down, and by depriving them of natural cheerfulness, drives them to the bottle for that which is artificial.—And learning also is dangerous, when it is aimed at as an end and not a mean. A young man who aspires to be learned merely for fame, is in danger; for, familiarity breeding contempt, creates an uneasy void that drives him to the bottle. Hence so many learned men with red noses. But when a man from a benevolent heart, seeks learning for the sublime pleasure of imitating the Deity in doing good, he is always made so happy in the spirit and pursuit of this godlike object, that he needs not the stimulus of brandy."

This one hint, if duly reflected on by young men, would render the name of Franklin dear to them for ever.

CHAPTER XXI

The next day, when they came to settle with the tavern-keeper, and Ben with his usual alacrity had paraded his dollars for payment, poor Collins hung back, pale and dumb-founded, as a truant school-boy at the call to recitation. The truth is, the fumes of his brandy having driven all the wit out of his noddle, had puffed it up with such infinite vanity, that he must needs turn in, red faced and silly as he was, to gamble with the cool-headed water-drinking sharpers of New-York. The reader hardly need be informed, that poor Collins' pistareens, which he had scraped together for this expedition, were to these light-fingered gentlemen as a fry of young herrings to the hungry dog-fish.

Ben was now placed in a most awkward predicament. To pay off Collins' scores at New-York, and also his expenses on the road to Philadelphia, would drain him to the last farthing. But how could he leave in distress a young friend with whom he had passed so many happy days and nights in the elegant pleasure of literature, and for whom he had contracted such an attachment! Ben could not bear the idea, especially as his young friend, if left in this sad condition, might be driven to despair; so drawing his purse he paid off Collins' bill, which, from the quantity of liquor he had drank, was swelled to a serious amount; and taking him by the arm, set out with a heart much heavier than his purse, which indeed was now so empty that had it not been replenished at Bristol by the thirty pounds for which, as we have seen, Vernon gave him an order on a gentleman living there, who readily paid it, would never have carried him and his drunken companion to Philadelphia. On their arrival Collins endeavoured to procure employment as a merchant's clerk, and paraded with great confidence his letters of recommendation. But his breath betrayed him. And the merchants would have nothing to say to him notwithstanding all his letters; he continued, therefore, to lodge and board with Ben at his expense. Nor was this all; for knowing that Ben had Vernon's money, he was continually craving loans of it, promising to pay as soon as he should get into business. By thus imposing on Ben's friendship, getting a little of him at one time, and a little at another, he had at last got so much of it, that when Ben, who had gone on lending without taking note, came to count Vernon's money, he could hardly find a dollar to count!

It is not easy to describe the agitation of Ben's mind on making this discovery; nor the alternate chill and fever, that discoloured his cheeks, as he reflected on his own egregious folly in this affair. "What demon," said he to himself, as he bit his lip, "could have put it into my head to tell Collins that I had Vernon's money! Didn't I know that a drunkard has no more reason in him than a hog; and can no better be satisfied, unless like him he is eternally pulling at his filthy swill? And have I indeed been all this time throwing away Vernon's money for brandy to addle the brain of this poor self-made brute? Well then, I am served exactly as I deserve, for thus making myself a pander to his vices. But now that the money is all gone, and I without a shilling to replace it, what's to be done? Vernon will, no doubt, soon learn that I have collected his money; and will of course be daily expecting to hear from me. But what can I write? To tell him that I have collected his money, but lent it to a poor, pennyless sot, will sound like a pretty story, to a man of business! And if I don't write to him, what will he think of me, and what will become of that high opinion he had formed of me, on which it appeared he would have trusted me with thousands? So you see, I have got myself into a pretty hobble. And worse than all yet, how shall I ever again lift up my booby face to my affectionate brother John, after having thus basely stabbed him, through his friend, as also through the honour of our family! O my dear, dear old father; now I see your wisdom and my own folly! A thousand times did you tell me I was too young; too inexperienced yet, to undertake by myself.—But no. It would not all do. For the life of you, you could not lead or drive such divine counsel into this conceited noddle of mine. I despised it as the weakness of old age, and much too slow for me. I wanted to save time, and get three or four years ahead of other young men; and that tempted me to disobedience. Well, I am justly punished for it! My bubble is broke. And now I see I shall be thrown back as long as if I had continued the apprentice of my brother James!!"

O young men! young men! you that with segars in your mouths, and faces flushed with libations of whiskey, can fancy yourselves clever fellows, and boast the long list of your dear friends, O think of the curses that Ben bestowed on his dear friend Collins, for bringing him in such a scrape; and learn that an idle, drinking rascal has no friends. If you think otherwise, it is only a proof that you don't even yet understand the meaning of the word. Friends indeed! you talk of friends! What, you, who instead of nobly pressing on for virtue and knowledge and wealth, to make yourselves an honour and blessing to your connexions, are constantly, by your drunken and gambling courses, making yourselves a disgrace and curse to them. And when, like that fool in the parable, your all is gone, then, instead of modestly going with him into the fields, to feed the swine, you have the impudence to quarter your rags and red noses on your dear friends, spunging and borrowing of them as long as they'll lend. And if at last, they should get wise enough to refuse such unconscionable leechers, as would suck every drop of their blood, instantly you can turn tail and abuse your dear friends as though they were pick-pockets.—Witness now master Collins.

Just as Ben was in the midst of his fever and pet, on discovering as aforesaid, the great injury which Collins had done him, who but that promising youth should come in, red faced and blowzy, and with extreme confidence, demand of him a couple of dollars. Ben, rather tartly, replied that he had no more to spare. "Pshaw," answered Collins, "'tis only a brace of dollars I want, just to treat an old Boston acquaintance I fell in with at the tavern, and you know Vernon tipt you 'the shiners' t'other day to the tune of a round hundred." "Yes," replied Ben, "but what with two dollars at one time, and two at another, you have taken nearly the whole." "Well, man, and what of that," rejoined Collins, swaggeringly; "suppose I had taken the whole; yes, and twice as much, sha'nt I get into fine business presently, some head clerk's place, or governor's secretary? And then you'll see how I'll tumble you in the yellow boys hand over hand, and pay you off these little beggarly items all at a dash."

"Fair words, Mr. Collins," answered Ben, "butter no parsnips. And you have been so long talking at this rate, and yet doing nothing, that I really am afraid–"