ppear to Franklin should be
remembered in the discussions which arose later concerning the treaty of
peace.[58]

[Note 57: Bancroft, _Hist. U. S._ ix. 481.]

[Note 58: See Franklin's _Works_, vi. 133. At this time John Adams
strongly entertained the same sentiments, though he afterward felt very
differently about the sincerity of France. _Diplomatic Correspondence of
American Revolution_, iv. 262, 292.]

It may further be mentioned, by the way, that Franklin had the pleasure
of seeing inserted his favorite principle: that free ships should make
free goods, and free persons also, save only soldiers in actual service
of an enemy. In passing, it is pleasant to preserve this, amid the
abundant other testimony to Franklin's humane and advanced ideas as to
the conduct of war between civilized nations.[59] The doctrine of free
ships making free goods, though promulgated early in the century, was
still making slow and difficult progress. Franklin accepted it with
eagerness. He wrote that he was "not only for respecting the ships as
the house of a friend, though containing the goods of an enemy, but I
even wish that ... all those kinds of people who are employed in
procuring subsistence for the species, or in exchanging the necessaries
or conveniences of life, which are for the common benefit of mankind,
such as husbandmen on their lands, fishermen in their barques, and
traders in unarmed vessels, shall be permitted to prosecute their
several innocent and useful employments without interruption or
molestation, and nothing taken from them, even when wanted by an enemy,
but on paying a fair price for the same." Also to the president of
Congress he spoke of Russia's famous proposal for an "armed neutrality
for protecting the liberty of commerce" as "the great public event" of
the year in Europe. He proposed that Congress should order their
cruisers "not to molest foreign ships, but to conform to the spirit of
that treaty of neutrality." Congress promptly voted to request the
admission of the States to the league, and John Adams took charge of
this business during his mission to Holland.

[Note 59: He was able to give a practical proof of his liberality by
furnishing a passport to the packets carrying goods to the Moravian
brethren in Labrador. Hale's _Franklin in France_, i. 245.]

Events having thus established the indefinite continuance of the war,
the good Hartley, profoundly disappointed, wrote a brief note invoking
bless