arose on the abilities of women, and the propriety of giving them a learned education. Collins maintained their natural unfitness for any of the severer studies, while Franklin took the contrary side of the question,-'perhaps,' he says, 'a little for dispute sake.' His antagonist had always the greater plenty of words; but Franklin thought that, on this occasion in particular, his own arguments were rather the stronger; and on their parting without settling the point, he sat down and put a summary of what he advanced in writing, which he copied out and sent to Collins. This gave a new form to the discussion, which was now carried on for some time by letters, of which three or four had been written on both sides, when the correspondence fell into the hands of Franklin's father. His natural acuteness and good sense enabled him here again to render an essential service to his son, by pointing out to him how far he fell short of his antagonist in elegance of expression, in method, and in perspicuity, though he had the advantage of him in correct spelling and punctuation, which he evidently owed to his experience in the printing-office. From that moment Franklin determined to spare no pains in endeavouring to improve his style; and we shall give, in his own words, the method he pursued for that end.

'About this time,' says he, 'I met with an odd volume of the Spectator: I had never before seen any of them. I bought it, read it over and over, and was much delighted with it. I thought the writing excellent, and wished, if possible, to imitate it. With that view I took some of the papers, and making short hints of the sentiments in each sentence, laid them by a few days, and then, without looking at the book, tried to complete the papers again by expressing each hinted sentiment at length, and as fully as it had been expressed before, in any

suitable words that should occur to me.

Then I compared

my Spectator with the original, discovered some of my faults, and corrected them. But I found I wanted a stock of words, or a readiness in recollecting and using them, which I thought I should have acquired before that time if I had gone on making verses; since the continual search for words of the same import, but of different length to suit the measure, or of different sound for the rhyme, would have laid me under a constant necessity of searching for variety, and also have tended to fix that variety in my mind, and make me master of it. Therefore I took some of the tales in the Spectator and turned them into verse; and after a time, when I had pretty well forgotten the prose, turned them back again. I also sometimes jumbled my collection of hints into confusion, and, after some weeks, endeavoured to reduce them into the best order before I began to form the full sentences and complete the subject. This was to teach me method in the arrangement of the thoughts. By comparing my work with the original I discovered many faults and corrected them; but I sometimes had the pleasure to fancy that in certain particulars of small consequence I had been fortunate enough to improve the method or the language; and this encouraged me to think that I might in time come to be a tolerable English writer, of which I was extremely ambitious.'

Even at this early age nothing could exceed the perseverance and self-denial which he displayed in pursuing his favourite object of cultivating his mental faculties to the utmost of his power. When only sixteen, he chanced to meet with a book in recommendation of a vegetable diet, one of the arguments at least in favour of which made an immediate impression upon him,-namely, its greater cheap

ness; and from this and other considerations, he determined to adopt that way of living for the future. Having taken this resolution, he proposed to his brother, if he would give him weekly only half what his board had hitherto cost, to board himself, an offer which was immediately accepted. He presently found that by adhering to his new system of diet he could still save half what his brother allowed him. 'This,' says he, 'was an additional fund for buying of books; but I had another advantage in it. My brother and the rest going from the printing-house to their meals, I remained there alone, and despatching presently my light repast (which was often no more than a biscuit or a slice of bread, a handful of raisins or a tart from the pastrycook's, and a glass of water), had the rest of the time till their return for study; in which I made the greater progress, from that greater clearness of head and quicker apprehension which generally attend temperance in eating and drinking.' It was about this time that, by means of Cocker's Arithmetic, he made himself master of that science, which he had twice attempted in vain to learn while at school; and that he also obtained some acquaintance with the elements of geometry, by the perusal of a treatise on Navigation. He mentions, likewise, among the works which he now read, Locke on the Human Understanding, and the Port-Royal Art of Thinking; together with two little sketches on the arts of Logic and Rhetoric, which he found at the end of an English grammar, and which initiated him in the Socratic mode of disputation, or that way of arguing by which an antagonist, by being questioned, is imperceptibly drawn into admissions which are afterwards dexterously turned against him. Of this method of reasoning he became, he tells us, excessively fond, finding

it very safe for himself, and very embarassing for those against whom he used it; but he afterwards abandoned it, apparently from a feeling that it gave advantages rather to cunning than to truth, and was better adapted to gain victories in conversation, than either to convince or to inform.

.

A few years before this, his brother had begun to publish a newspaper, the second that had appeared in America. This brought most of the literary people of Boston occasionally to the printing-office; and young Franklin often heard them conversing about the articles that appeared in the newspaper, and the approbation which particular ones received. At last, inflamed with the ambition of sharing in this sort of fame, he resolved to try how a communication of his own would succeed. Having written his paper, therefore, in a disguised hand, he put it at night under the door of the printing-office, where it was found in the morning, and submitted to the consideration of the critics, when they met as usual. 'They read it,' says he; 'commented on it in my hearing; and I had the exquisite pleasure of finding it met with their approbation; and that in their different guesses at the author, none were named but men of some character among us for learning and ingenuity.' 'I suppose,' he adds, that I was rather lucky in my judges, and that they were not really so very good as I then believed them to Encouraged, however, by the success of this attempt, he sent several other pieces to the press in the same way, keeping his secret, till, as he expresses it, all his fund of sense for such performances was exhausted. He then discovered himself, and immediately found that he began to be looked upon as a person of some consequence by his brother's literary acquaintances.

be.'

This newspaper soon after afforded him, very unexpectedly, an opportunity of extricating himself from his indenture to his brother, who had all along treated him with great harshness, and to whom his rising literary reputation only made him more an object of envy and dislike. An article which they had admitted having offended the local government, his brother, as proprietor of the paper, was not only sentenced to a month's imprisonment, but prohibited from any longer continuing to print the offensive journal. In these circumstances, it was determined that it should appear for the future in the name of Benjamin, who had managed it during his brother's confinement; and in order to prevent it being alleged that the former proprietor was only screening himself behind one of his apprentices, the indenture by which the latter was bound was given up to him; he at the same time, in order to secure to his brother the benefit of his services, signing new indentures for the remainder of his time, which were to be kept private. very flimsy scheme it was,' says Franklin; however, it was immediately executed; and the paper was printed accordingly under my name for several months. At length a fresh difference arising between my brother and me, I took upon me to assert my freedom, presuming that he would not venture to produce the new indentures. It was not fair in me to take this advantage, and this I therefore reckon one of the first errata of my life; but the unfairness of it weighed little with me, when under the impressions of resentment for the blows his passion too often urged him to bestow upon me, though he was otherwise not an ill-natured man: perhaps I was too saucy and provoking.'

'A

Finding, however, that his brother, in consequence of this