The First American

by H. W. Brands

  Yet business hardly filled Franklin’s world, even in these difficult early days. Always the improver, in the autumn of 1727 he organized a club of inquirers into matters moral, political, and scientific. Many years later Franklin told Samuel Mather, Cotton’s son, that Cotton Mather’s Essays to Do Good provided the model for the Junto, as Franklin’s clique called itself. If so, Franklin borrowed the model but left the content back in Boston, for rather than the stern religiosity that informed Mather’s intellectual world, a skeptical secularism marked the proceedings of the Junto. New members were required to answer four questions: whether they had any disrespect for current members (a negative answer was anticipated); whether they loved mankind in general, regardless of religion or profession (yes); whether anyone ought to be harmed in his person, property, or reputation, merely on account of his opinions or way of worship (no); and whether they loved and pursued truth for truth’s sake and would impartially impart what they found of it to others (yes). Topics of discussion included why fog formed on the outside of a tankard of cold water in the summer, whether the importation of servants advanced the wealth of America, how far temperance in diet ought to be taken, and in what consisted human happiness.

  The group met on Friday evenings, first at a tavern, later at a house hired for the purpose. To guide discussions, Franklin formulated a set of queries. Had members encountered any citizen failing in his business, and if so, what was the cause? Conversely, were certain citizens thriving, and why? Had any citizen accomplished a particularly praiseworthy feat? How might it be emulated? Were there any egregious errors that ought to be avoided? Had members met any persons suffering from the ill effects of intemperance or passion? Any persons benefiting from the virtuous opposites of those vices? Was anyone departing on a voyage, and might such person transport a message or material item for someone staying home? Had any strangers arrived in town, and had they been welcomed? Were there any young tradesmen who might be encouraged by the Junto’s patronage? Were there any worthy citizens to whom one Junto member might be introduced by another?

  The group also cultivated the literary arts. Common readings were assigned; these provided the grist for debate. By turns the members raised particular issues of morals, philosophy, and civic life. Every three months each member was required to read an essay of his own composition on a subject of his choosing. Other members would critique the content and form of expression. In order to maintain a constructive atmosphere, the rule Franklin had established for himself—to avoid overly assertive or directly contradictory expressions, in favor of suggestions, hypotheses, and polite questions—was eventually applied to the group as a whole. Failure to follow the rule resulted in small but embarrassing fines.

  Franklin’s mates in the Junto were a diverse crew united chiefly by an inquiring spirit and a devotion to self-improvement. Joseph Breintnall, the merchant and scrivener, was substantially older than Franklin; outside his work he loved poetry and natural history. Thomas Godfrey, the glazier, was also a mathematician and inventor; he devised an improvement on the quadrant then commonly in use. Nicholas Scull and William Parsons might have employed Godfrey’s quadrant, for each became surveyor general of the colony. Otherwise Scull was a bibliophile, Parsons a cobbler and astrologer. William Maugridge was a cabinetmaker, William Coleman a merchant’s clerk. Robert Grace was a gentleman, which meant that, unlike the others, he did not have to work for a living. Hugh Meredith, Franklin’s partner, was also a Junto member, as were Stephen Potts and George Webb, his former protégés at Keimer’s.

  However much the Junto drew on the interests and talents of its membership, it clearly was Franklin’s creation. His was the initiative that started it, his the spirit that informed it. Franklin took pains not to dominate the discussions; those fines for unseemly self-assertion were reminders to him as much as to the others. Yet if any group ever reflected the philosophical outlook and social sensibilities of one of its members, the Junto reflected Franklin’s. This was all the more remarkable—and perhaps the plainest testament to his emerging leadership skills—in that he was nearly the youngest member of the group, with no claim to primacy but intellectual and moral force. Lacking wealth or other sources of conventional influence, Franklin led by example.

  The more metaphysical of the Junto’s discussions drew Franklin back to the issues he had examined in his Dissertation on Liberty and Necessity. At that time the harsh reaction of his employer Palmer had caused him to question the practicality of his conclusions, if not their veracity; yet the more he thought about it, the more difficulty he had separating truth from practicality. Franklin was an original and independent thinker, but he never flouted conventional opinion for the thrill of the flouting—as his brother James did, for example. Having made his youthful statement of rebellion by fleeing Boston, Franklin felt no compulsion to redundancy.

  Temperamentally, Franklin was a skeptic rather than a rebel. Indeed, his skepticism made him suspicious of many rebels, who were often as zealous in their quest for change as the most ardent defenders of the status quo were in their defense of what was. His skepticism was probably congenital; such central traits of personality typically are. When it surfaced during his teens, at a time when his reading was rapidly expanding his intellectual horizons, it made him increasingly dubious of biblical revelation. Why should God speak to one insignificant desert tribe, to the exclusion of the vast majority of the human race? Yet unwilling—and in those pre-Darwinian days intellectually unable—to dispense with divinity entirely, Franklin gravitated toward the mechanistic approach of deism. One book written against deism by the chemist Robert Boyle in fact pushed Franklin further in a deistic direction. “The arguments of the deists which were quoted to be refuted,” he wrote, “appeared to me much stronger than the refutations.”

  Franklin’s skeptical soul, however, was not really attuned to theology; it resonated less to first causes than to secondary effects. And the effects of deism struck him as unsettling. Deism, he said in his autobiography, had “perverted” his former friends John Collins and James Ralph and had contributed to his abandonment of his betrothal to Deborah Read, in favor of his “foolish intrigues with low women.” (This infidelity “at times gave me great trouble,” he said, though he did nothing then to rectify it.) In any event, the more he reflected on deism, the less it appealed to him. “I began to suspect that this doctrine, though it might be true, was not very useful.” Reflecting further, he guessed that his dismissal of right and wrong in his Dissertation on Liberty and Necessity had been too clever, which was to say not clever at all. Truth, sincerity, integrity, and other virtues did indeed exist; they were what made human happiness possible—and the fact that human happiness was possible was something anyone not blinded by his own rhetorical virtuosity could see. Franklin remained too much the skeptic to return to revelation as understood by the Cotton Mathers of the world, but now he conceded that if what passed for revelation revealed little about God, it might reveal much about man. “I entertained an opinion, that though certain actions might not be bad because they were forbidden by it, or good because it commanded them, yet probably those actions might be forbidden because they were bad for us, or commanded because they were beneficial to us.”

  This inversion of moral cause and effect came as an epiphany to Franklin. It allowed him to reconcile his skepticism with his practicality. A man had to conform his conduct to prevailing mores if he wished to get ahead; he did not have to conform his convictions to the prevailing theology. With a sigh of relief almost audible from a distance of nearly three centuries, Franklin codified his new thinking in what he called his “Articles of Belief and Acts of Religion,” dated November 20, 1728. Borrowing from Cato, he declared, “I hold: If there is a Power above us (and that there is all nature cries aloud, through all her works), He must delight in virtue, and that which He delights in must be happy.” As the deists did, Franklin measured the immensity of the universe against the minusculity of the earth and the inhabitants
thereof, and concluded from this that it was “great vanity in me to suppose that the Supremely Perfect does in the least regard such an inconsiderable nothing as man.” Moreover, this Supremely Perfect had absolutely no need to be worshipped by humans; He was infinitely above such sentiments or actions. Yet if worship filled no divine purpose, it did serve a human need. “I think it seems required of me, and my duty as a man, to pay divine regards to something.”

  As to virtue in humans, the Supreme Being valued it not for what it did for Him—since humans, again, could do nothing for One so far above them—but for what it did for them. “Since without virtue man can have no happiness in this world, I firmly believe He delights to see me virtuous, because He is pleased when he sees me happy.” This same pragmatic calculus prescribed the appropriate use of all things. “Since He has created many things which seem purely designed for the delight of man, I believe He is not offended when He sees His children solace themselves in any manner of pleasant exercises and innocent delights, and I think no pleasure innocent that is to man hurtful.”

  Thus Franklin, having previously wandered from the pietistic moralism of his Boston upbringing to the agnostic—almost atheistic—amoralism of his London days, now found his way to a pragmatic moralism that made man the measure of virtue rather than virtue the measure of man. The good was what rendered men happy. A more practical philosophy, or one better suited to success in tolerant but sober Philadelphia, was hard to imagine.

  Having settled the philosophical issue—essentially once for all, though he had no way of knowing this—Franklin turned to implementing his conclusions. On the voyage back from London he had filled that part of the time not devoted to playing draughts, conjecturing the ontogeny of crustaceans, or making astronomical observations, with formulating a plan of conduct for his life. Throughout his career Franklin would employ metaphors from the literary world to convey lessons about life; he started early. “Those who write the art of poetry,” he explained, “teach us that if we would write what may be worth the reading, we ought always, before we begin, to form a regular plan and design of our piece; otherwise we shall be in danger of incongruity. I am apt to think it is the same as to life.” He chided himself for the irregularity of his life to date, which consisted of a “confused variety of different scenes.” Now that he was entering on a new phase of his life, he felt obliged to make certain resolutions and form a scheme of action “that henceforth I may live in all respects like a rational creature.”

  His resolutions were straightforward and eminently practical.

  It is necessary for me to be extremely frugal for some time, till I have paid what I owe.

  To endeavor to speak truth in every instance; to give nobody expectations that are not likely to be answered, but aim at sincerity in every word and action—the most amiable excellence in a rational being.

  To apply myself industriously to whatever business I take in hand, and not divert my mind from my business by any foolish project of growing suddenly rich; for industry and patience are the surest means of plenty.

  I resolve to speak ill of no man whatever, not even in a matter of truth; but rather by some means excuse the faults I hear charged upon others, and upon proper occasions speak all the good I know of every body.

  Franklin was proud of this plan, and prouder still, with the passing years, of making it the basis for his life’s conduct. Writing almost half a century later, he said, “It is the more remarkable, as being formed when I was so young, and yet being pretty faithfully adhered to quite through to old age.”

  Having formulated his four commandments on the high seas, Franklin proceeded after landing to identify thirteen cardinal virtues. In typical orderly fashion (number three on the list), he enumerated them, with a thumbnail description of each:

  Temperance

  Eat not to dullness. Drink not to elevation.

  Silence

  Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself. Avoid trifling conversation.

  Order

  Let all your things have their places. Let each part of your business have its time.

  Resolution

  Resolve to perform what you ought. Perform without fail what you resolve.

  Frugality

  Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself: i.e., Waste nothing.

  Industry

  Lose no time. Be always employed in something useful. Cut off all unnecessary actions.

  Sincerity

  Use no hurtful deceit.

  Think innocently and justly; and if you speak, speak accordingly.

  Justice

  Wrong none, by doing injuries or omitting the benefits that are your duty.

  Moderation

  Avoid extremes. Forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.

  Cleanliness

  Tolerate no uncleanness in body, clothes or habitation.

  Tranquillity

  Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.

  Chastity

  Rarely use venery but for health or offspring; never to dullness, weakness or the injury of your own or another’s peace or reputation.

  Franklin’s list originally stopped at a dozen. But a Quaker friend gently pointed out that certain of Franklin’s neighbors thought him proud. Franklin expressed surprise, thinking he had tamed that lion. After the friend cited examples, however, Franklin conceded that he required more work in this area. He added a thirteenth virtue:

  13. Humility

  Imitate Jesus and Socrates.

  Other young men—albeit not many—might have compiled such a list; what truly set Franklin apart was the program he inaugurated to integrate his thirteen virtues into his daily life. The program was straightforward. In successive weeks he would concentrate on mastering particular virtues. There was a method (that is, order: number three again) to his approach. During the first week he would focus on temperance, letting the other virtues fend for themselves. Once he conquered temperance (in his early optimism, a week appeared sufficient), his steady head would allow him to move on to silence. Silence would clear his mind the way temperance cleared his brain; together they would enable him to perfect order. Order would facilitate resolution, which in turn would render resolution easier. And so on.

  To chart his moral progress Franklin compiled a kind of scorecard, consisting of a small notebook of nearly identical pages. Each page was blocked out in seven columns of thirteen rows each. The columns were labeled for the days of the week, Sunday through Saturday. The rows were labeled for the thirteen virtues, temperance down to humility. The pages differed only in the headings; the page for week one was headed “Temperance: Eat not to dullness. Drink not to elevation.” The second page featured silence, the third order, and so on.

  At the end of every day Franklin evaluated his progress—or rather lack of progress—toward making a habit of his virtues. Each failure received a black mark in the appropriate position. During the first week he aimed to keep the row for temperance devoid of spots. During the second week the silence row should be spotless (as, presumably, would be the row above it, for temperance, which by then would have become a habit). At the end of thirteen weeks he would have mastered all the virtues. To allow for stubborn imperfection, and to prevent backsliding, he would then repeat the process—indeed make it a regular and continuing part of his daily regimen. (In this regard the addition of the thirteenth virtue proved convenient, for now the fifty-two weeks of the year neatly comprised four repetitions of the self-improvement process).

  Franklin was an idealist of a very practical sort. In this case his practicality guided his choice of virtues, which were well suited to the worldly success he aimed to achieve; his idealism appeared in his belief that mastering these virtues might be so simply accomplished.

  He shortly discovered, however, as had countless others before him, that virtue was not so simply accomplished. Surprisingly—considering how far the project had already progressed—Frankli
n found order to be the most elusive virtue. To some degree he attributed this to the circumstances of his daily life. His position as a tradesman required him to be, to a not insignificant extent, at the disposal of others. A customer required a job done immediately; this threw an entire day’s schedule into confusion. Franklin’s attempts at order also suffered from what others might have considered a virtue—or at least a gift—in itself. With an excellent memory, his failure to keep things in their places, both spatial and temporal, hindered him only minimally in his work.

  For a time his inability to maintain order vexed him greatly. But soon he began to rationalize his deficiency. He afterward told a story on himself, of a man who wanted to buy an ax from a smith. The man agreed to pay the advertised price only on the condition that the smith grind the ax until the entire surface of the head shone as brightly as the cutting edge. The smith accepted, on a condition of his own: that the purchaser power the grinding wheel. The man consented and the work began. After a time the man inquired how the polishing was progressing. Steadily, said the smith. The man turned the wheel some more and inquired again. Steadily, said the smith. Again more turning, again the inquiry. Again: Steadily. Finally, exhausted from his labors, the man said he would take the ax as it was. No, no, said the smith; keep turning and we shall have the whole head like a mirror by and by. So we might, said the man, but I think I like a speckled ax best.

  Not content simply to accept his speckles, Franklin explained they were better than a polished moral finish. “Something that pretended to be reason was every now and then suggesting to me that such extreme nicety as I exacted of myself might be a kind of foppery in morals, which if it were known would make me ridiculous; that a perfect character might be attended with the inconvenience of being envied and hated; and that a benevolent man should allow a few faults in himself, to keep his friends in countenance.” Yet even as he embraced imperfection—he abandoned his project before the end of the first thirteen-week course—he judged that the mere attempt made him a better and happier man than he would have been otherwise—“as those who aim at perfect writing by imitating the engraved copies, though they never reach the wished for excellence of those copies, their hand is mended by the endeavour.”