BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, LL.D., F.R.S. THIS celebrated patriot, republican, philosopher, and statesman, died in Philadelphia, 17th April, 1790, aged eighty-four years and three months; and on the north side, within a few feet of the northwest corner of Christ Church graveyard, in Arch Street, Philadelphia, may be seen a plain, common tomb, which covers the remains of the venerable and great Franklin, and bears the following very concise inscription: Benjamin On the 10th July, 1749, Thomas Oxnard, Provincial (modern) Grand Master of all North America, appointed Franklin First Provincial Grand Master of Pennsylvania. On the 11th June, 1776, he was appointed by Congress, on the committee with Thomas Jefferson and others, to prepare the Declaration of Independence, of which he was one of the signers. On the 14th September, 1778, Congress elected him Minister to France; being the first regular appointment of a minister plenipotentiary, the former ones being styled commissioners. His statue was placed over the Philadelphia Library door, in South Fifth Street, below Chestnut Street, west side, in 1792. He, like many other distinguished characters, was much indebted to circumstances. It is probable, however, that had his lot thrown him in an older or more refined community than America was in his youth, he would not have been contemplated as the sun of the system. At an early age, he adopted a system of vegetable diet, by which he saved one-half the money allowed for his board; and he states that by abstaining from meat, he found his apprehension quicker, and the faculties of his mind greatly improved. At the age of sixteen, he read Locke on the Human Understanding, the Port Royal Logic, and Xenophon's Memorabilia, with great interest. |