s on the
surface, palpable, manifest, forcing itself upon attention; our strength
lay out of sight, in rich veins which none but eyes familiar with their
secret windings could trace. Thus the French alliance, as the European
interpreted it, was the alliance of wealth with poverty, of strength
with weakness,--a magnanimous recognition of efforts which without that
recognition would have been vain. What, then, must have been the
persuasive powers, the commanding genius, of the man who procured that
recognition!

Partly, also, this opinion is owing to the personal character and
personal position of Franklin. Franklin was preeminently a wise man,
wise in the speculative science and wise in the practical art of life.
Something of the maturity of age seems to have tempered the liveliest
sallies of his youth, and much of the vivacity of youth mingles with the
sober wisdom of his age. Thoughtful and self-controlling at twenty, at
seventy his ripe experience was warmed by a genial glow. He entered upon
life with the feeling that he had a part to perform, and the conviction
that his happiness would depend upon his performing it well. What that
part was to be was his earliest study; and a social temperament,
combining with a sound judgment, quickly taught him that the happiness
of the individual is inseparably connected with the happiness of the
species. Thus life became his study as a condition of happiness; man and
Nature, as the means of obtaining it. He sought to control his passions
as he sought to control the lightning, that he might strip them of their
power to harm. Sagacious in the study of causes, he was still more
sagacious in tracing their connection with effects; and his speculations
often lose somewhat of their grandeur by the simple and unpretending
directness with which he adapts them to the common understanding and
makes them minister to the common wants of life. The ambition which
quickened his early exertions met an early reward. He was ambitious to
write well, and he became one of the best writers in our language. He
was ambitious of knowledge, and he laid it up in such stores that men
sought his conversation in order to learn from him. He was ambitious of
pecuniary independence, and he accumulated a fortune that made him
master of his time and actions. He was ambitious of influence, and he
obtained a rare control over the thoughts and the passions of men. He
was ambitious of fame, and he connected his name wit