The Life of Benjamin Franklin (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from The Life of Benjamin Franklin

Franklin's own narrative of his life extends only to the 27th of July, 1757, the day on which he reached London, on his first mission as agent of Pennsylvania to the British court. He was then but little more than fifty-one years of age, so that nearly thirty-three years, em bracing the most conspicuous portion of his career, was left, with the exception of occasional passages in his private correspondence, un touched by his own graphic pen; and though that sequel has been ably related by Dr. Sparks, yet the two performances, valuable as they are universally acknowledged to be, are both strictly narrative, embra cing little but the recital of external occurrences. Well done, there fore, as they are, still much of the most important portion of Franklin's actual life - that inner life which is made up of thoughts and feelings -the unseen workings of the mind, the exercise of the affections, the development of character, and the progress of opinion - is either left out of the narration, or is so briefly noticed, that, without access to his correspondence as well as his more elaborate productions, but scanty means are supplied for making up a full and just estimate of the whole man, the Wide range of his philosophical inquiries, or of his accumula tions of various knowledge, or of the number and value of his political writings, or of the vast amount of public business be transacted, or of the great extent and importance of his services to his country.

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.