This propensity was the more precious because it was his destiny to take a leading part in many controversies which would have become bitter beyond endurance but for "the strange power" of his "pieces of pleasantry and mirth" to "hush disorders of the soul." He employed both pen and pencil in bringing his excellent sense to bear upon the public mind. What but Franklin's inexhaustible tact and good-humor could have kept the peace in Pennsylvania between the non-combatant Quakers and the militant Christians during the long period when the province was threatened from the sea by hostile fleets and on land by savage Indians? Besides rousing the combatant citizens to action, he made them willing to fight for men who would not fight for themselves, and brought over to his side a large number of the younger and more pliant Quakers. Even in that early time (1747), while bears still swam the Delaware, he contrived to get a picture drawn and engraved to enforce the lessons of his first pamphlet, calling on the Pennsylvanians to prepare for defense. He may have engraved it himself, for he had a dexterous hand, and had long before made little pictures out of type-metal to accompany advertisements. Hercules sits upon a cloud, with one hand resting upon his club. Three horses vainly strive to draw a heavy wagon from the mire. The wagoner kneels, lifts his hands, and implores the aid of Hercules's mighty arm. In the background are trees and houses, and under the picture are Latin words signifying, "Not by offerings nor by womanish prayers is the help of gods obtained." In the text, too, when he essays the difficult task of reconciling the combatants to fighting for the non-combatants, he becomes pictorial, though he does not use the graver. "What!" he cries, "not defend your wives, your helpless children, your aged parents, because the Quakers have conscientious scruples about fighting!" Then he adds the burlesque picture: "Till of late I could scarce believe the story of him who refused to pump in a sinking ship because one on board whom he hated would be saved by it as well as himself." [Illustration: JOIN or DIE A Common Newspaper Heading in 1776; devised by Franklin in May, 1754, at the Beginning of the French War.]