The Printer Boy; Or, How Benjamin Franklin Made His Mark: An Example for Youth.Thayer, William Makepeace
History
The Printer Boy; Or, How Benjamin Franklin Made His Mark: An Example for Youth.
Thayer, William Makepeace
Franklin, Benjamin, 1706-1790
It would multiply the pages of this volume beyond its designed limits
to enumerate all the public posts of honour that Franklin adorned, and
all the marks of respect that have been paid to his memory. This brief
reference to the more prominent of these is sufficient to afford the
reader a view of the REMARKABLE MAN, and to illustrate the force of
energy, industry, integrity, and perseverance, in human destiny.
Washington wrote to him: "If to be venerated for benevolence, if to be
admired for talents, if to be esteemed for patriotism, if to be
beloved for philanthropy, can gratify the human mind, you must have
the pleasing consolation to know that you have not lived in vain. And
I flatter myself that it will not be ranked among the least grateful
occurrences of your life to be assured that, so long as I retain my
memory, you will be recollected with respect, veneration, and
affection, by your sincere friend, George Washington."
Congress was in session when Franklin died, and when his death was
announced, on motion of Madison, it was resolved that a badge of
mourning be worn for one month, "as a mark of veneration due to the
memory of a citizen whose native genius was not more an ornament to
human nature than his various exertions of it have been precious to
science, to freedom, and to his country."
In France, Condorcet eulogized him in the Academy of Science, and
Mirabeau in the National Assembly. The latter said: "Antiquity would
have erected altars to this great and powerful genius."
When Rachel was dying, she named her infant son "Ben-oni," which
means, "son of my sorrow," because he was the occasion of her
sufferings and death. But Jacob, his father, called him "Benjamin,"
which signifies "the son of a right hand." There was a time when
Franklin's mother, weeping over her runaway boy, would have called him
"Ben-oni," and it might have appeared to observers that he would turn
out to be such. But the excellent lessons of his early home, and the
good traits of character which he nurtured, caused him to become a
true Benjamin to his parents,--"a son of their right hand." With a
warm, filial heart, he sought to minister to their wants in their
declining years, and, as we have seen, offered the last and highest
tribute of affection in his power, when they were laid in the dust.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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