the
proprietor. In fact, he directed the great province for almost as long
a time as his father had managed it. But he was so totally unlike his
father that it is difficult to find the slightest resemblance in feature
or in mind. He was not in the least disposed to proclaim or argue about
religion. Like the rest of his family, he left the Quakers and joined
the Church of England, a natural evolution in the case of many Quakers.
He was a prosperous, accomplished, sensible, cool-headed gentleman, by
no means without ability, but without any inclination for setting the
world on fire. He was a careful, economical man of business, which is
more than can be said of his distinguished father. He saw no visions and
cared nothing for grand speculations.

Thomas Penn, however, had his troubles and disputes with the Assembly.
They thought him narrow and close. Perhaps he was. That was the opinion
of him held by Franklin, who led the anti-proprietary party. But at the
same time some consideration must be given to the position in which
Penn found himself. He had on his hands an empire, rich, fertile, and
inhabited by liberty-loving Anglo-Saxons and by passive Germans. He
had to collect from their land the purchase money and quitrents rapidly
rolling up in value with the increase of population into millions of
pounds sterling, for which he was responsible to his relatives. At the
same time he had to influence the politics of the province, approve or
reject laws in such a way that his family interest would be protected
from attack or attempted confiscation, keep the British Crown satisfied,
and see that the liberties of the colonists were not impaired and that
the people were kept contented.

It was not an easy task even for a clear-headed man like Thomas Penn.
He had to arrange for treaties with the Indians and for the purchase of
their lands in accordance with the humane ideas of his father and in the
face of the Scotch-Irish thirst for Indian blood and the French desire
to turn the savages loose upon the Anglo-Saxon settlements. He had to
fight through the boundary disputes with Connecticut, Maryland, and
Virginia, which threatened to reduce his empire to a mere strip of land
containing neither Philadelphia nor Pittsburgh. The controversy with
Connecticut lasted throughout the colonial period and was not definitely
settled till the close of the Revolution. The charter of Connecticut
granted by the British Crown extended the colony