His was a praiseworthy attempt at emancipating himself from the thraldom of passion and raising himself to the high plane of perfection required by the Master when He said "Follow Me." Doubtless, as time wore on, he must have felt as many before and since, that the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. In his autobiography, Franklin attributes his success in business not only to his self-control, uniformity of conduct, philosophical indifference to slight or pique, but also to his habits of frugality, the result in part of his early training. "My original habits of frugality continuing," he says, "and my father having frequently repeated a proverb of Solomon, 'Seest thou a man diligent in his business? he shall stand before kings,' I from thence considered industry as a means of obtaining wealth and distinction, which encouraged me, tho' I did not think that I should ever literally _stand before kings_, which, however, has since happened." Our aged philosopher proceeds to tell us of his good fortune with a little bit of pardonable vanity, to which, by the way, he was never a great stranger, despite his philosophy, acquired virtue, and staid character. Referring to the kings of the earth, he informs us that he "_stood_ before five, and even had the honor of _sitting down_ with one to dinner." An important event in Franklin's life was the founding by him of the first public library in the country in the year 1732. Though but twenty-six years of age, he seems to have been as well aware as any of the millionaire philanthropists of to-day, of the good that may be accomplished among common people by providing them with suitable reading matter. He watched with eagerness the progress of his experiment and was pleased with the success that crowned it. He observes that such libraries "tend to improve the conversation of Americans and to make common tradesmen and farmers as intelligent (well-informed?) as most gentlemen from other countries." Peter Collinson, Fellow of the Royal Society of London, who had dealings with some Philadelphia merchants, was led to take an active interest in the library. This he did by sending over a number of books and papers relating to electricity together with an "electrical tube" with instructions for its use.