The Life of Benjamin Franklin Part 28

B. FRANKLIN.

Now, can any honest man, after this, entertain a doubt that Dr.

Franklin was indeed, "_in practice very much a christian_."

I am aware that some, good men have been offended, and I may add, grieved too, that Dr. Franklin should ever have spoken slightingly of _faith_, &c. But these gentlemen may rest a.s.sured, that Dr. Franklin did this only to keep people from laying such stress on _faith_, &c. as to neglect what is infinitely more important, even LOVE and GOOD WORKS.

And in this grand view, do not the holy apostles, and even Christ himself treat these things in the same way? Every where speaking of "_faith_ and _baptism_ and _long prayers_," when attempted to be put in place of love and good works, as mere "_beggarly elements_," and even "_d.a.m.ning hypocrisies_." However, let honest men read the following letter on the subject, by Dr. Franklin himself. While it serves to remove their doubts and prejudices, it may go to prove that if he had errors in religion, they were not the errors of the heart, nor likely to do any harm in the world; but contrariwise, to make us all much better christians, and happier men, than we are.

The letter is in answer to one from an ill.u.s.trious foreigner; who, on a trip to Philadelphia, made Dr. Franklin a visit. The doctor, for some malady, advised him to try electricity; and actually gave him several shocks. He had not long been gone, before he wrote Dr. Franklin a most flattering account of the effects of his electricity--begged him to be a.s.sured he should never forget such KINDNESS--and concluded with praying that they might both have grace to live a life of FAITH, that if they were never to meet again in this world, they might at last meet in heaven.

DR. FRANKLIN'S ANSWER.

_Philadelphia, June 6, 1753._

SIR,

I received your kind letter of the 2d instant, and am glad that you increase in strength; I hope you will continue mending till you recover your former health.

As to the _kindness_ you mention, the only thanks I desire is, that you would always be equally ready to serve any other person that may need your a.s.sistance, and so let good offices go round, _for_ MANKIND ARE _all of a family_.

For my own part, when I am employed in serving others, I do not look upon myself as conferring favours, but as paying debts. In my travels, and since my settlement, I have received much kindness from men, to whom I shall never have any opportunity of making the least direct return--and numberless mercies from G.o.d, who is infinitely above being benefitted by our services. The kindness from men, I can, therefore, only return on their fellow men, and I can only show my grat.i.tude for those mercies from G.o.d, by a readiness to help his other children, and my brethren. For I do not think that thanks and compliments, though repeated weekly, can discharge our real obligations to each other, and much less those to our Creator. You will see in this, my notion of good works; that I am far from expecting, as you suppose, to _merit heaven_ by them. By heaven, we understand a state of happiness; infinite in degree, and eternal in duration. I can do nothing to deserve such REWARDS. He that, for giving a draught of water to a thirsty person, should expect to be paid with a good plantation, would be modest in his demands, compared with those who think they _deserve_ heaven for the little good they do on earth. Even the mixed imperfect pleasures we enjoy in this world, are rather from G.o.d's goodness, than our merit; how much more such happiness as heaven. For my part, I have not the vanity to think I deserve it, the folly to expect it, nor the ambition to desire it; but content myself in submitting to the will and disposal of that G.o.d who made me--who has. .h.i.therto preserved and blessed me--and in whose FATHERLY GOODNESS I may well confide, that he will never make me miserable--and that even the afflictions I may at any time suffer shall tend to my benefit.

The faith you mention has, doubtless, its use in the world. I do not desire to see it diminished. But I wish it were more productive of _good works_ than I have generally seen it, I mean real good works; works of kindness, charity, mercy, and public spirit; not holiday keeping, sermon reading or hearing, performing church ceremonies, or making long prayers, filled with flatteries and compliments, despised even by wise men, and much less capable of pleasing the Deity. The worship of G.o.d is a _duty_; the hearing and reading of sermons _may_ be useful; but if men rest in _hearing_ and _praying_, as _too many do_, it is as if a tree should value itself on being watered and putting forth leaves, though it never produced any fruit. Your great master thought much less of these outward appearances and professions than many of his modern disciples. He preferred the _doers_ of the word to the mere _hearers_; the son that _seemingly_ refused to obey his father, and yet _performed_ his commands, to him that _professed_ his readiness, but _neglected_ the work; the heretical but charitable Samaritan, to the uncharitable though orthodox priest and sanctified Levite: and those who gave food to the hungry, drink to the thirsty, raiment to the naked, entertainment to the stranger, and relief to the sick, though they never heard of his name, he declares they shall in the last day be accepted, when those who cry Lord, Lord, who value themselves on their faith, though great enough to perform miracles, but have neglected good works, shall be rejected. He professed he came "_not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance_," which implied his modest opinion, that there were some in his time so _good_, that they needed not to hear even _him_ for improvement; but now-a-days, we have scarce a little parson that does not think it the duty of every man within his reach, to think _exactly_ as he does, and that all dissenters offend G.o.d. I wish to such more humility, and to you health and happiness, being

Your friend and servant,

B. FRANKLIN.

What but the spirit of immortal love, which, not content with doing much good in life, fondly looks beyond, and feasts on the happiness that others are to derive from us long after we have ceased to live on earth; what, I ask, but that love, could have dictated

DR. FRANKLIN'S WILL.

_"When thou makest a feast, call not thy rich neighbours: lest they also bid thee again, and a recompense be made thee._

_"But when thou makest a feast, call the poor; and thou shalt be blessed. For they cannot recompense thee, for thou shall be recompensed at the resurrection of the just._

"LUKE, xiv."

Sentiments divinely sublime!--Who, without emotions indescribable, can read them! And yet if they were lost from the Bible, they might be found again in the _Will_ of Benjamin Franklin.

While many others "_rise early, and late take rest, and eat the bread of labour and care_," that they may "_die rich_"--leaving their ma.s.sy treasures, some scanty legacies excepted, to corrupt a few proud relatives, doctor Franklin acted as though the above text, the _true sublime of wisdom and benevolence_, was before him.

After having _bequeathed_ his books, a most voluminous and valuable collection, partly to his family, and partly to the Boston and Philadelphia philosophical societies; and, after having divided a handsome competence among his children, and grand children, he goes on as follows:

"I. Having owed my first instructions in literature to the free grammar schools in Boston, I give one hundred pounds sterling to the free schools in that town, to be laid out in silver medals as honorary rewards for the encouragement of scholarship in those schools.

"II. All the debts to my post-office establishment, which I held many years, I leave to the Philadelphia hospital.

"III. Having always been of opinion, that in democratical governments, there ought to be no offices of _great_ profit, I have long determined to give a part of my public salary to public uses; and being chiefly indebted to Ma.s.sachusetts, my _native_ state, and Pennsylvania, my _adopted_ state, for lucrative employments, I feel it my duty to remember them; and having from long observation, and my own early experience, discovered that the best objects for a.s.sistance are indigent young persons, and the best modes of a.s.sistance, a plain education, a good trade, and a little money to set them up; and having been set up in business, while a poor boy, in Philadelphia, by kind loans of money from two friends there, which was the foundation of my fortune and all the usefulness that the world ascribed to me, I feel a wish to be useful, after my death, to others, in the loans of money; I therefore devote, from the savings of my salaries, the following sums, to the following persons and uses:

"1. To the inhabitants of Boston and Philadelphia, one thousand pounds sterling to each city, to be let out by the oldest divines of different churches, on a _five per cent. interest_ and good _security_, to indigent young tradesmen, not _bachelors_, (as they have not deserved much from their country and the feebler s.e.x,) but married men."

"2. No borrower to have more than sixty pounds sterling, nor less than fifteen."

"3. And in order to serve as many as possible in their turn, as well as to make the payment of the princ.i.p.al borrowed more easy, each borrower shall be obliged to pay, with the yearly interest, one tenth part of the princ.i.p.al; which sums of princ.i.p.al and interest, so paid, shall be again lent out to fresh borrowers.

"B. FRANKLIN."

In a late Boston paper, the friends of humanity have read with much pleasure that doctor Franklin's legacy to the indigent young married tradesmen of that town, of $4444 44 cents, is now increased to $10,902 28 cents, after having been the means of setting up 206 poor young men, besides 75 others, who are now in the use of the capital.

CHAPTER XLV.

_The Death of Doctor Franklin._

One cannot read the biography of this great man without being put in mind of those sweet though simple strains of the bard of Zion.

"Happy the man, whose tender care Relieves the poor distrest; When he's with troubles compa.s.s'd round, The Lord shall give him rest."

"If, he in languishing estate, Oppress'd with sickness, lie, The Lord shall easy make his bed, And inward strength supply."

The latter end of doctor Franklin affords glorious proof that nothing so softens the bed of sickness, and brightens the gloom of the grave, as a life spent in works of love to mankind.

See George Washington, who by an active and disinterested benevolence, was called "THE FATHER OF HIS COUNTRY." See Martha Washington, who by domestic virtues, and extensive charities, obtained to herself the high character of "THE MOTHER TO THE POOR."--Both of these found the last bed spread as it were with roses; and the last enemy converted into a friend. Such is the lot of all who love; "not in _word, but in deed and in truth_."

The friends of doctor Franklin never entered his chamber without being struck with this precious text, _"Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright, for the end of that man is peace."_ Though laid on the bed whence he is to rise no more, he shows no sign of dejection or defeat.

On the contrary, he appears like an aged warrior reposing himself after glorious victory; while his looks beaming with benevolence, express an air pure and serene as the Heaven to which he is going.

Death, which most sick people are so unwilling to mention, was to him a favourite topic, and the sublime conversations of Socrates on that great subject, were heard a second time, from the lips of our American Franklin, pregnant with "_immortality and eternal life_." No wonder then that with such views doctor Franklin should have been so cheerful on his dying bed; so self-possessed and calm, even under the tortures of the gravel, which was wearing him down to the grave. "_Don't go away_," said he to the Rev. Dr. Colline, of the Swedes' church, Philadelphia, who, as a friend, was much with him in his last illness, and at sight of his agonies and cold sweats under the fits of the gravel, would take up his hat to retire--"_O no! don't go away_," he would say, "_don't go away_. These pains will soon be over. They are for my good. And besides, what are the pains of a moment in comparison of the pleasures of eternity."

Blest with an excellent const.i.tution, well nursed by nature's three great physicians, _temperance_, _exercise_, and _cheerfulness_, he was hardly ever sick until after his seventy-sixth year. The gout and gravel then attacked him with great severity. He bore their excruciating tortures as became one who habitually felt that he was as he said, in the hands of an infinitely wise and benevolent being, who did all things right.

His physician, the celebrated Dr. Jones, published the following account of his last illness.

"The stone, had for the last twelve months confined him chiefly to his bed; and during the extreme painful paroxysms, he was obliged to take large doses of laudanum to mitigate his tortures--still in the intervals of pain, he not only amused himself with reading and conversing with his family, and his friends who visited him, but was often employed in doing business of a public as well as private nature, with various persons who waited on him for that purpose, and in every instance displayed, not only that readiness of doing good, which was the distinguishing characteristic of his life, but the fullest possession of his uncommon mental abilities; and not unfrequently indulged himself in those flashes of wit and entertaining anecdotes, which were the delight of all who heard him.

"About sixteen days before his death, he was seized with a pain in his left breast, which increased till it became extremely acute, attended with a cough and laborious breathing. During this state, when the severity of his pains some times drew forth a groan, he would observe, that, _he was afraid he did not bear them as he ought--acknowledged his grateful sense of the many blessings he had received from the Supreme Being, who had raised him from small and low beginnings to such high rank and consideration among men--and made no doubt but his present afflictions were kindly intended to wean him from a world, in which he was no longer fit to act the part a.s.signed him_. In this frame of body and mind he continued till five days before his death, when an imposthumation in his lungs, suddenly burst, and discharged a great quant.i.ty of matter, which he continued to throw up while he had strength, but, as that failed, the organs of respiration became gradually oppressed--a calm lethargic state succeeded--and, on the 7th of April, 1790, about eleven o'clock at night he quietly expired, closing a long and useful life of _eighty-four years and three months_."

Come holy calm of the soul! Expressive silence come! and meditating the mighty talents of the dead, and their constant application to the _glory of the giver_, let us ascend with him on the wings of that blessed promise, "_Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord! even so saith the Spirit, for they rest from their labours and their works do follow them._"

That Franklin is now enjoying that rest which "_remaineth_ _for the people of G.o.d_"--and that while many a blood-stained monster who made great noise in the world, is _followed_ by the cries of thousands of widows and orphans, Franklin dying in the Lord, and followed by the blessings of thousands, fed, clothed, educated, and enriched by his charities, is in GLORY, may be fairly inferred from the following most valuable anecdote of him.

Naturalists tell us, that so great is the paternal care of G.o.d, that every climate affords the food and physic best suited to the necessaries of its population. What grat.i.tude is due to that goodness, which foreseeing the dangers impending over this country from British injustice, sent us two such protectors as Franklin and Washington? The first, (the forerunner of the second,) like the lightning of Heaven, to expose the approaching tempest; and the second, like the rock of the ocean, to meet that tempest in all its fury, and dash it back on its proud a.s.sailants? And how astonishing too, and almost unexampled that goodness, which with talents of wisdom and fort.i.tude to establish our republic, combined the cardinal virtues of _justice_, _industry_, and _economy_ that alone can render our republic immortal?

Hoping that our _youth_ may be persuaded to love and imitate the virtues of the men whose great names they have been accustomed, from the cradle, to lisp with veneration, I have long coveted to set these virtues before them. The grey haired men of other days, have given me their aid. The following I obtained from the Rev. Dr. Helmuth, of the German church, Philadelphia. Hearing that this learned and pious divine possessed a valuable anecdote of doctor Franklin, I immediately waited on him. "Yes, sir," said he, "I have indeed a valuable anecdote of doctor Franklin, which I would tell you with great pleasure; but as I do not speak English very well, I wish you would call on David Ritter, at the sign of the _Golden Lamb_, in Front street; he will tell it to you better. I hastened to Mr Ritter, and told him my errand. He seemed mightily pleased at it, and said, "Yes, I will tell you all I know of it. You must understand then, sir, first of all, that I always had a prodigious opinion of doctor Franklin, as the _usefulest_ man we ever had among us, by a long way; and so hearing that he was sick, I thought I would go and see him. As I rapped at the door, who should come and open it but old Sarah Humphries. I was right glad to see her, for I had known her a long time. She was of the people called FRIENDS; and a mighty good sort of body she was too. The great people set a heap of store by her, for she was famous throughout the town for nursing and tending on the sick. Indeed, many of them, I believe, hardly thought they could sicken, and die right if they had not old Sarah Humphries with them. Soon as she saw me, she said, 'Well David, how dost?'"

"'O, much after the old sort, Sarah,' said I; 'but that's neither here nor there; I am come to see doctor Franklin.'