Conduct of Life, which you are preparing for the use of your children. I purpose, likewise, a little work for the benefit of youth, to be called the Art of Virtue.* From the title, I think you will hardly conjecture what the nature of such a book may be. I must, therefore, explain it a little. Many people lead bad lives, that would gladly lead good ones, but know not how to make the change. They have frequently resolved and endearored it, but in vain; because their endeavors have not been properly conducted. To expect people to be good, to be just, to be temperate, &c., without showing them how they should become so, seems like the ineffectual charity mentioned by the apostle, which consisted in saying to the hungry, the cold and the naked, be ye fed, be ye warmed, be ye clothed, without showing them how they should get food, fire or clothing.

Most people have, naturally, some virtues, but none have naturally all the virtues. To acquire those that are wanting, and secure what we acquire, as well as those we have naturally, is the subject of an art. It is as properly an art as painting, navigation or architecture. If a man would become a painter, navigator or architect, it is not enough that he is advised to be one, that he is convinced by the arguments of his adviser that it would be for his advantage to be one, and that he resolves to be one; but he must also be taught the principles of the art, be shown all the methods of working, and how to acquire the habits of using properly all the instruments; and thus, regularly and gradually, he arrives, by practice, at some perfection in the art. If he does not proceed thus, he is apt to meet with difficulties that discourage him, and make him drop the pursuit.

My Art of Virtue has also its instruments, and teaches the manner of using them. Christians are directed to have faith in Christ, as the effectual means of obtaining the change they desire. It may, when sufficiently strong, be effectual with many for a full opinion that a teacher is infinitely wise, good and powerful, and that he will certainly reward and punish the obedient and disobedient, must give great weight to his precepts, and make them much more attended to by his disciples. But many have this faith in so weak a degree, that it does not produce the effect. Our Art of Virtue may, therefore, be of great service to those whose faith is, unhappily, not so strong, and may come in aid of its weakness. Such as are naturally well disposed, and have been carefully educated, so that good habits have been early established, and bad ones prevented, have less

* The plan was never carried out. See some account of it in the Autobiography.

need of this art; but all may be more or less benefited by it. It is, in short, to be adapted for universal use. I imagine what I have now been writing will seem to savor of great presumption; I must, therefore, speedily finish my little piece, and communicate the manuscript to you, that you may judge whether it is possible to make good such pretensions. I shall, at the same time, hope for the benefit of your corrections.

B. FRANKLIN.

[TO MISS MARY STEVENSON.]

Advice in Reading.

CRAVEN-STREET, May 16, 1760.

I SEND my good girl the books I mentioned to her last night. I beg her to accept of them as a small mark of my esteem and friendship. They are written in the familiar, easy manner for which the French are so remarkable, and afford a good deal of philosophic and practical knowledge, unembarrassed with the dry mathematics used by more exact reasoners, but which is apt to discourage young beginners.

I would advise you to read with a pen in your hand, and enter in a little book short hints of what you find that is curious, or that may be useful; for this will be the best method of imprinting such particulars in your memory, where they will be ready, either for practice on some future occasion, if they are matters of utility, or, at least, to adorn and improve your conversation, if they are rather points of curiosity; and, as many of the terms of science are such as you cannot have met with in your common reading, and may therefore be unacquainted with, I think it would be well for you to have a good dictionary at hand, to consult immediately when you meet with a word you do not comprehend the precise meaning of.

This may, at first, seem troublesome and interrupting; but it is a trouble that will daily diminish, as you will daily find less and less occasion for your dictionary, as you become more acquainted with the terms; and, in the mean time, you will read with more satisfaction, because with more understanding. When any point occurs in which you would be glad to have further information than your book affords you, I beg you would not in the least apprehend that I should think it a trouble to receive and answer your questions. It will be a pleasure, and no trouble.

For though I may not be able, out of my own little stock of knowledge, to afford you what you require, I can easily direct you to the books where it may most readily be found. and believe me ever, my dear friend,

Adieu,

B. FRANKLIN.

[TO GEORGE WHITEFIELD.]

Trust in Providence.

PHILADELPHIA, 19 June, 1764.

That

DEAR FRIEND: I received your favors of the 21st past, and of the 3d instant, and immediately sent the enclosed as directed. Your frequently repeated wishes for my eternal, as well as my temporal happiness, are very obliging, and I can only thank you for them and offer you mine in return. I have myself no doubt that I shall enjoy as much of both as is proper for me. Being who gave me existence, and through almost three-score years has been continually showering his favors upon me, whose very chastisements have been blessings to me. - can I doubt that He loves me? And, if He loves me, can I doubt that He will go on to take care of me, not only here, but hereafter? This to some may seem presumption; to me it appears the best-grounded hope, hope of the future built on experience of the past.

By the accounts I have of your late labors, I conclude your health is mended by your journey, which gives me pleasure. Mrs. Franklin presents her cordial respects, with, dear sir, your affectionate humble servant, B. FRANKLIN.

P. S. We hope you will not be deterred from visiting your friends here by the bugbear Boston account of the unhealthiness of Philadelphia.

[TO THE EDITOR OF A LONDON NEWSPAPER.]

Satirical Defence of Newspaper Paragraphs and their False Reports. Monday, 20 May, 1765.

SIR: In your paper of Wednesday last, an ingenious correspondent, who calls himself THE SPECTATOR, and dates from Pimlico, under the guise of good-will to news-writers, whom he

calls a "useful body of men in this great city," has, in my opinion, artfully attempted to turn them and their works into ridicule, wherein, if he could succed, great injury might be done to the public, as well as to these good people.

Supposing, sir, that the "we hears" they give us of this or the other intended tour or voyage of this and the other great personage were mere inventions, yet they at least offer us an innocent amusement while we read, and useful matter for conversation when we are disposed to converse.

Englishmen, sir, are too apt to be silent when they have nothing to say, and too apt to be sullen when they are silent; and when they are sullen, to hang themselves. But, by these we hears, we are supplied with abundant funds for discourse. We discuss the motives for such voyages, the probability of their being undertaken, and the practicability of their execution. Here we display our judgment in politics, our knowledge of the interests of princes, and our skill in geography, and (if we have it) show our dexterity in argumentation. In the mean time, the tedious hour is killed, we go home pleased with the applauses we have received from others, or at least with those we give to ourselves; we sleep soundly, and live on, to the comfort of our families. But, sir, I beg leave to say that all the articles of news that seem improbable are not mere inventions. Some of them, I can assure you on the faith of a traveller, are serious truths. And here, quitting Mr. Spectator of Pimlico, give me leave to instance the various accounts the news-writers have given us, with so much honest zeal for the welfare of Poor Old England, of the establishing manufactures in the colonies to the prejudice of those of the kingdom. It is objected by superficial readers, who yet pretend to some knowledge of those countries, that such establishments are not only improbable, but impossible, for that their sheep have but little wool, not in the whole sufficient for a pair of stockings a year to each inhabitant; that, from the universal dearness of labor among them, the working of iron, and other materials, except in a few coarse instances, is impracticable to any advantage.

Dear sir, do not let us suffer ourselves to be amused with such groundless objections. The very tails of the American sheep are so laden with wool that each has a little car or wagon, on four little wheels, to support and keep it from trailing on the ground. Would they caulk their ships, would they even litter their horses with wool, if it were not both plenty and cheap? And what signifies the dearness of labor, when an English shilling passes for five-and-twenty? Their engaging three hundred silk-throwsters here in one week for New York was treated as a fable, be

cause, forsooth, they have "no silk there to throw." Those who make this objection perhaps do not know that at the same time the agents from the King of Spain were at Quebec to contract for one thousand pieces of cannon to be made there for the fortification of Mexico, and at New York engaging the usual supply of woollen floor-carpets for their West India houses, other agents from the Emperor of China were at Boston treating about an exchange of raw silk for wool, to be carried in Chinese junks through the Straits of Magellan.

And yet all this is as certainly true as the account, said to be from Quebec, in all the papers of last week, that the inhabitants of Canada are making preparations for a cod and whale

fishery this " summer in the upper lakes." Ignorant people may

object, that the upper lakes are fresh, and that cod and whales are salt-water fish; but let them know, sir, that cod, like other fish, when attacked by their enemies, fly into any water where they can be safest; that whales, when they have a mind to eat cod, pursue them wherever they fly; and that the grand leap of the whale in the chase up the Falls of Niagara is esteemed, by all who have seen it, as one of the finest spectacles in nature. Really, sir, the world is grown too incredulous. It is like the pendulum, ever swinging from one extreme to another. Formerly everything printed was believed, because it was in print. Now things seem to be disbelieved for just the very same reason. Wise men wonder at the present growth of infidelity. They should have considered, when they taught people to doubt the authority of newspapers and the truth of predictions in the almanacs, that the next step might be a disbelief of the well-vouched accounts of ghosts and witches, and doubts even of the truths of the Creed.

Thus much I thought it necessary to say in favor of an honest set of writers, whose comfortable living depends on collecting and supplying the printers with news at the small price of sixpence an article, and who always show their regard to truth by contradicting in a subsequent article such as are wrong, for another sixpence, to the great satisfaction and improvement of us coffeehouse students in history and politics, and all future Livys, Rapins, Robertsons, Humes and Macaulays, who may be sincerely inclined to furnish the world with that rara avis, a true history. I am, sir, your humble servant, A TRAVELLER.