utobiography, in addition to being an American classic, is a
fine record of self-education. His formal training in the classroom was
limited to a few years at a local school in Boston; but his
self-education continued throughout his life. He early manifested a zeal
for reading, and devoured, he tells us, his father's dry library on
theology, Bunyan's works, Defoe's writings, Plutarch's _Lives_, Locke's
_On the Human Understanding_, and innumerable volumes dealing with
secular subjects. His literary style, perhaps the best of his time,
Franklin acquired by the diligent and repeated analysis of the
_Spectator_. In a life crowded with labors, he found time to read widely
in natural science and to win single-handed recognition at the hands of
European savants for his discoveries in electricity. By his own efforts
he "attained an acquaintance" with Latin, Italian, French, and Spanish,
thus unconsciously preparing himself for the day when he was to speak
for all America at the court of the king of France.

Lesser lights than Franklin, educated by the same process, were found
all over colonial America. From this fruitful source of native ability,
self-educated, the American cause drew great strength in the trials of
the Revolution.

THE COLONIAL PRESS

=The Rise of the Newspaper.=--The evolution of American democracy into a
government by public opinion, enlightened by the open discussion of
political questions, was in no small measure aided by a free press. That
too, like education, was a matter of slow growth. A printing press was
brought to Massachusetts in 1639, but it was put in charge of an
official censor and limited to the publication of religious works. Forty
years elapsed before the first newspaper appeared, bearing the curious
title, _Public Occurrences Both Foreign and Domestic_, and it had not
been running very long before the government of Massachusetts suppressed
it for discussing a political question.

Publishing, indeed, seemed to be a precarious business; but in 1704
there came a second venture in journalism, _The Boston News-Letter_,
which proved to be a more lasting enterprise because it refrained from
criticizing the authorities. Still the public interest languished. When
Franklin's brother, James, began to issue his _New England Courant_
about 1720, his friends sought to dissuade him, saying that one
newspaper was enough for America. Nevertheless he continued it; and his
confidence in the future was