CHAPTER XXII.

JOHN ADAMS, in speaking of the course of Franklin, said, "His conduct has been very composed and grave, and, in the opinion of many, very reserved, yet entirely American." His position, prior to the Revolutionary war, and, indeed, during his whole residence abroad, was one of exceeding difficulty. It is to be recollected that he was in England as the agent of colonists who, claiming to be loyal subjects, on that account and in that character preferred petitions to the crown. However much his sympathies might incline him to feel with his countrymen, it was absolutely necessary that he should be "reserved," or he would have made shipwreck of his official trust. Nor are we to regard the advocates of extreme measures against government in America as the only patriots and the only friends of their country. Many hoped to the last that a rupture would be prevented, and the integrity of the British Empire preserved, while her colonies still would receive their rights. And the period has now arrived, in the subsidence of national prejudice, and the abatement of that hatred which was engendered by oppression, when we can look with charitable feelings even upon those Americans who preserved their loyalty and remained true to the British crown. It

is doing a great injustice to the characters and motives of men to judge them by consequences, or, as it may be better expressed, to look at their actions in the light reflected upon them by subsequent events. They could not with any certainty look into futurity, and we must try them, therefore, by the circumstances in which they were placed.

Franklin did not approve of those measures of his countrymen upon which we, in view of what followed, are now accustomed to look with unqualified praise. He was very discreet, and not inclined to hazard the fortunes of the colonies upon acts of violence or expressions of defiance. And, as already noted, he was himself exposed to great annoyance and inconvenience by every symptom of resistance in America. How much he was stung and annoyed may be gathered from the following extract from a letter to his son, written in November, 1767. "I think the New Yorkers have been very discreet in forbearing to write and publish against the late act of Parliament. I wish the Boston people had been as quiet, since Governor Bernard has sent over all their violent papers to the ministry, and wrote them word that he daily expected a rebellion. He did, indeed, afterward correct this extravagance, by writing again, that he now understood those papers were approved but by few, and disliked by all the sober, sensible people of the province. A certain noble lord expressed himself to me with some contempt and disgust of Bernard on this occasion, saying he ought to have known his people better than to im

pute to the whole country sentiments that perhaps are only scribbled by some madman in a garret."

The act above referred to was one passed in pursuance of the assertion of the Declaratory Act, that Parliament had "a right to bind the colonies in all cases whatsoever." It imposed duties on certain articles imported into the colonies, not, as formerly, for the regulation of trade, but to raise a revenue, thus affirming, in a different but quite as objectionable a manner, the right of the Parliament to tax the colonies, which had been the great matter of remonstrance in the Stamp Act. And the act of 1767 was further, and very naturally, hateful to the colonies, because it provided for the establishment of a Board of Commissioners at Boston to collect and distribute the money. Another dangerous measure was, that out of this revenue certain officers should be paid, who had hitherto been dependent for their salaries on the colonial Legislature; and the people justly feared the effect of making their government entirely independent of the governed. These movements on the part of the British ministry called out the storm of indignation to which Franklin referred in the letter above quoted, and further embroiled the governor and the Legislature, which body in Massachusetts truly represented the people. Franklin was absent in France when the commissioners left England for America. Although a connection was one of the Board, he writes to his son, "I assure you I had not the least share in his appointment, having carefully kept out of the way of that whole affair'

As a hint was never lost upon Dr. Franklin, he prob ably learned caution in the history of the Stamp Act, and did not care to have his approval of this act inferred by his enemies.

Governor Bernard, who was for several years in an angry contest with the Legislature of Massachusetts, at last hit upon a new method of annoyance, which procured him peace and rest; that is to say, so far as these desirable objects could be secured by silencing legal and regular opposition. He used his prerogative to shorten the sessions of the Legislature, and delayed and refused to convene it at the request of the people. But the spirit of resistance, the expression of which was prevented under legislative sanction, found utterance in another mode. The inhabitants of Boston met in town meeting, and passed a series of resolutions to encourage industry, economy, and domestic manufactures, and thus to defeat the Revenue Act by putting an end to imports. Similar measures had taken place in Philadelphia, but were relaxed on the repeal of the Stamp Act. The Boston movement had, however, a more formal and public character than any of the same nature which preceded it. A committee was appointed at the town meeting to procure subscriptions to an agreement not to use British articles or superfluities of any description, and the example of Boston was followed by other towns. The most wealthy and influential families made a pride of their simplicity, and the general and united resistance of the Massachusetts people caused their movement to assume, in

the eyes of the ministerial party in England, the hue of rebellion. And the friends of America in Great Britain, or rather, we should say, the opponents of the policy of the Grenville ministry, were sorely pushed by the newspapers. Franklin says, in a letter dated in December, 1767, "The newspapers are in full cry against America. You can not conceive how much the friends of America are run upon and hurt by them, and how much the Grenvillians tri umph." And again: "The proceedings in Boston, as the news came just upon the meeting of Parliament, and occasioned great clamor here, gave me much concern. And, as every offensive thing done in America is charged upon all, and every province, though not concerned in it, suffers in its interests through the general disgust given, and the little distinction here made, it became necessary, I thought, to palliate the matter a little for our own sakes, and therefore I wrote the paper which you have probably seen in the Chronicle of January 7th, signed 'F. S.'"

The paper referred to, entitled "Causes of American Discontents before 1768," is written in Franklin's peculiarly smooth and convincing style, with the skill for which he was remarkable in controversy. The drift of it was to show that the ministry had needlessly exasperated the Americans, who readily and cheerfully gave money to the crown, provided they could be permitted to give it in what they considered a constitutional and loyal mode, while they resisted all attempts to force taxation upon them in