for an alert mind to discover all of the implications, philosophic and religious, of the rationale of science. No less could be found here the political speculations which were later to aid the colonists in unyoking themselves from England. The Library was an arsenal capable of supplying weapons to rationalistic minds intent on besieging the fortress of Calvinism. Defenders of natural rights could find ammunition to wound monarchism; here authors could discover the neoclassic ideals of _curiosa felicitas_, perspicuity, order, and lucidity reinforced by the emphasis on clarity and correctness sponsored by the Royal Society and inherent in Newtonianism as well as Cartesianism. In short, the volumes contained the ripest fruition of scientific and rationalistic modernity. One can only conjecture the extent to which this library would perplex, astonish, and finally convert men to rationalism and scientific deism, and release them from bondage to throne and altar. In 1743 Franklin wrote and distributed among his correspondents _A Proposal for Promoting Useful Knowledge among the British Plantations in America_. From a letter (Feb. 17, 1735/6) of William Douglass, one-time friend of Franklin's brother James, to Cadwallader Colden, we learn that some years before 1736, Colden "proposed the forming a sort of Virtuoso Society or rather Correspondence."[i-97] I. W. Riley suggests that Franklin owes Colden thanks for having stimulated him to form the American Philosophical Society.[i-98] There remains no convincing evidence, however, to disprove A. H. Smyth's observation that Franklin's _Proposal_ "appears to contain the first suggestions, in any _public form_ [editors' italics] for an American Philosophical Society." P. S. Du Ponceau has noted with compelling evidence that the philosophical society formed in 1744 was the direct descendant of Franklin's Junto.[i-99] That in part the Philadelphia Library Company was one of the factors in the formation of the scientific society may be inferred from Franklin's request that it be founded in Philadelphia, which, "having the advantages of a good growing library," can "be the centre of the Society."[i-100] The most important factor, however, was obviously the desire to imitate the forms and ideals of the Royal Society of London. Both societies had as their purpose the improvement of "the common stock of knowledge"; neither was to be provincial or national in interests, but was to have in mind the "benefit of mankind in general." A study of Franklin's _Proposal_ will suggest the purpose of the Royal Society as interpreted by Thomas Sprat: