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| Benjamin Franklin (1772) Year depicted: 1766 Artist: David Martin Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts Philadelphia |
Here’s what he had to say about his life at age 65,
well before he could also weigh his contributions as a Founding Father:
The Opening of
Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography
Composed at Twyford, England, 1771
Directed to his son,
William Franklin,
Royal Governor of New Jersey.
Dear Son:
I have ever had a pleasure in obtaining any little anecdotes
of my ancestors. You may remember the inquiries I made among the remains of my
relations when you were with me in England, and the journey I undertook for that purpose.
Now, imagining it may be equally agreeable to you to know
the circumstances of my life, many of
which you are unacquainted with, and expecting a week's uninterrupted leisure
in my present country retirement, I sit down to write them for you.
Having emerged from the poverty and obscurity in which I was
born and bred, to a state of affluence and some degree of reputation in the
world, and having gone so far through life with a considerable share of
felicity, the conducing means I made use of which with the blessing of God so
well succeeded, my posterity may like to know, may find some of them suitable
to their own situations, and therefore fit to be imitated.
That felicity, when I reflected on it, has induced me
sometimes to say, that were it offered to my choice, I should have no objection
to a repetition of the same life from its beginning, only asking the advantages
authors have in a second edition of the first.
So I might, besides correcting the faults, change some
sinister accidents and events of it for others more favorable, but though this
was denied, I accept the offer.
Catalyst Collection Takeaway: Live your life so that you may say the same.
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