Rules for a Club formerly established in Philadelphia. Previous question, to be answered at every meeting :— Have you read over these queries this morning, in order to consider what you might have to offer to the Junto touching any one of them? viz. 1. Have you met with any thing in the author you last read, remarkable, or suitable to be communicated to the Junto, particularly in history, morality, poetry, physic, travels, mechanics, arts, or other parts of knowledge? 2. What new story have you lately heard, agreeable for telling in conversation? 3. Hath any citizen, in your knowledge, failed in in his business lately, and what have you heard of the cause? 4. Have you lately heard of any citizen's thriving well, and by what means? 5. Have you lately heard how any present rich man, here or elsewhere, got his estate? 6. Do you know of any fellow-citizen who has lately done a worthy action, deserving praise and imitation, or who has lately committed an error proper for us to be warned against and avoid? 7. What unhappy effects of intemperance have you lately observed or heard; of imprudence, of passion, or of any other vice or folly? 8. What happy effects of temperance, of prudence, of moderation, or of any other virtue ? 9. Have you, or any of your acquaintance, been lately sick or wounded? If so, what remedies were used, and what were their effects? 10. Whom do you know that are shortly going voyages or journies, if we should have occasion to send by them? 11. Do you think of any thing, at present, in which the Junto may be serviceable to mankind, to their country, to their friends, or to themselves? 12. Hath any deserying stranger arrived in town since last meeting, that you heard of; and what have you heard or observed of his character or merits; and whether, think you, it lies in the power of the Junto to oblige him, or encourage him as he deserves? 13. Do you know of any deserving young beginner, lately set up, whom it lies in the power of the Junto any way to encourage? 14. Have you lately observed any defect in the laws of your country, (of) which it would be proper to move the legislature for amendment; or do you know of any beneficial law that is wanting? 15. Have you lately observed any encroachment on the just liberties of the people? 16. Hath any body attacked your reputation lately; and what can the Junto do towards securing it? 17. Is there any man whose friendship you want, and which the Junto, or any of them, can procure for you? 18. Have you lately heard any member's character attacked, and how have you defended it? the 19. Hath any man injured you, from whom it is in power of the Junto to procure redress? 20. In what manner can the Junto, or any of them, assist you in any of your honourable designs? 21. Have you any weighty affair in hand, in which you think the advice of the Junto may be of service? 22. What benefits have you lately received from any man not present? 23. Is there any difficulty in matters of opinion, of justice, and injustice, which you would gladly have discussed at this time? 24. Do you see any thing amiss in the present customs or proceedings of the Junto, which might be amended? Any person to be qualified, to stand up, and lay his hand on his breast, and be asked these questions, viz. 1. Have you any particular disrespect to any present members? Answer. I have not. 2. Do you sincerely declare that you love mankind in general, of what profession or religion soever? Answer. I do. 3. Do you think any person ought to be harmed in his body, name, or goods, for mere speculative opinions, or his external way of worship? Answer. No. 4. Do you love truth for truth's sake? and will you endeavour, impartially, to find and receive it yourself, and communicate it to others? Answer. Yes. The business in which Franklin and his friend had embarked succeeded rapidly; all the members of their club exerting themselves to send them work. Breintual alone procured for them, from the Quakers, the printing of forty sheets of their history, the rest being pledged to Keimer. It was a folio, pro patria size, in pica, with long-primer notes. Franklin composed a sheet a day, and Meredith worked it off in the evening; the distribution, and other casual jobs, frequently detaining them afterwards till eleven o'clock. Yet so determined was Franklin in doing his sheet per day, that one night having broken his form by accident, and reduced two pages to pie*, he immediately distributed, and composed it over again, before he went to bed. His application to business was soon notorious. The new printing-office being mentioned at the merchants' club, a general opinion was given that it must fail, there being already two printers in the place; but a Dr Baird observed, "The industry of that Franklin is superior to any thing I ever saw: I see him at work when I go home from the club; and he is at it again before his neighbours are out of bed." One gentleman, who had heard this observation, immediately offered to supply the new house with stationery, &c. George Webb, meeting with a female friend who * Pie-a technical phrase, meaning a mass of types fallen out of their lines or pages into confusion. lent him money to buy out the remainder of his time from Keimer, now offered himself to Franklin and his partner, as a journeyman. They could not employ him; but Franklin incautiously communicated to him one of his most important designs for the future. He told him that he soon intended to begin a newspaper, and should then have work (the only paper in Philadelphia, at that time, being one printed by Bradford; a wretched, uninteresting thing). Notwithstanding he requested Webb not to mention the circumstance, his intentions were told to Keimer, who immediately published proposals for a new paper, and employed Webb to manage it. Franklin was much displeased at this; but the circumstance only contributed to the developement of his powers, and his more complete success, at last, in the object which he had in view. To counteract Keimer's plans, he wrote several amusing pieces for Bradford's paper, under the title of the BUSY BODY." We extract the first of these papers, as a fair specimen of Franklin's attainments at this time in point of style : "THE BUSY BODY. No. 1. "MR ANDREW BRADFORD,-I design this to acquaint you, that I, who have long been one of your courteous readers, have lately entertained some thoughts of setting up for an author myself, not out of the least vanity, I assure you, or desire of showing my parts, but purely for the good of my country. "I have often observed with concern, that your 'Mercury' is not always equally entertaining. The delay of ships expected in, and want of fresh advices from Europe, make it frequently very dull; and I find the freezing of our river has the same effect on news. as on trade. With more concern have I observed the growing vices and follies of my countryfolk; and though reformation is properly the work of every man, that is, every one ought to mend one, yet it is too true, in this case, that what is everybody's business is nobody's business;' and the business is done accordingly. I therefore, upon mature deliberation, think fit to take nobody's whole business into my own hands, and, out of zeal for the public good, design to erect myself into a kind of censor morum, purposing to make use of the Weekly Mercury' as a vehicle in which, with your allowance, my remonstrances shall be conveyed to the world. I am sensible I have, in this particular, undertaken a very unthankful office, and expect little besides my labour for my pains. Nay, it is probable I may displease a great number of your readers, who will not very well like to pay ten shillings a year for being told of their faults. But as most people delight in censure, when they themselves are not the objects of it, if any are offended at my publicly exposing their private vices, I promise they shall have the satisfaction, in a very little time, of seeing their good friends and neighbours in the same circum stances. "However, let the fair sex be assured that I shall always treat them and their affairs with the utmost decency and respect. I intend, now and then, to dedicate a chapter wholly to their service; and if my lectures any way contribute to the embellishment of their minds, and brightening their understandings, without offending their modesty, I doubt not of having their favour and encouragement. "It is certain that no country in the world produces, naturally, finer spirits than ours; men of genius for every kind of science, and capable of acquiring, to perfection, every qualification that is in esteem among mankind. But as few here have the advantage of good books, for want of which good conversation is still more scarce, it would doubtless have been very acceptable to your readers, if, instead of an old out-ofdate article from Muscovy or Hungary, you had entertained them with some well-chosen extract from a good author. This I shall sometimes do, when I happen to have nothing of my own to say, that I think of more consequence. Sometimes I purpose to deliver lectures of morality or philosophy; and, because I am |