A Benjamin Franklin Reader (8 page)

The next week, as part of his crusade to put Keimer out of business, Franklin launched a series of classic essays for Bradford’s paper, signed Busy-Body. “By this means the attention of the public was fixed on that paper,” Franklin later recalled, “and Keimer’s proposals, which we burlesqued and ridiculed, were disregarded.” The Busy-Body was a scold and a tattler in the tradition of the character “Isaac Bickerstaff” that the English essayist Richard Steele had created, thus adding gossip columnist to the list of Franklin’s American firsts. He readily admitted that much of this was “nobody’s business,” but “upon mature deliberation” and “out of zeal for the public good,” he volunteered “to take nobody’s business wholly into my own hands.”

B
USY
-B
ODY
#1,
T
HE
A
MERICAN
W
EEKLY
M
ERCURY
, F
EBRUARY
4, 1729

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 my self; 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 continually observed the growing vices and follies of my country-folk. And though reformation is properly the concern of every man; that is,
Every one ought to mend One;
yet ’tis too true in this case, that
what is every Body’s Business is no Body’s Business,
and the business is done accordingly. I, therefore, upon mature deliberation, think fit to take
no Body’s Business
wholly into my own hands; and, out of zeal for the public good, design to erect my self into a kind of
censor morum;
proposing with your allowance, to make use of the
Weekly Mercury
as a vehicle in which 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 labor for my pains. Nay, ’tis probable I may displease a great number of your readers, who will not very well like to pay 10
s.
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 neighbors in the same circumstances.

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 of their understandings, without offending their
modesty,
I doubt not of having their favor and encouragement.

’Tis 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-of-date 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 propose to deliver lectures of morality or philosophy, and (because I am naturally inclined to be meddling with things that don’t concern me) perhaps I may sometimes talk politicks. And if I can by any means furnish out a weekly entertainment for the public, that will give a rational diversion, and at the same time be instructive to the readers, I shall think my leisure hours well employed: and if you publish this I hereby invite all ingenious gentlemen and others, (that approve of such an undertaking) to my assistance and correspondence.

’Tis like by this time you have a curiosity to be acquainted with my name and character. As I do not aim at public praise I design to remain concealed; and there are such numbers of our family and relations at this time in the country, that though I’ve signed my name at full length, I am not under the least apprehension of being distinguished and discovered by it. My character indeed I would favor you with, but that I am cautious of praising my self, lest I should be told
my trumpeters dead:
and I cannot find in my heart, at present, to say any thing to my own disadvantage.

It is very common with authors in their first performances to talk to their readers thus,
if this meets with a
suitable
reception;
or,
if this should meet with
due
encouragement, I shall hereafter publish, &c.
This only manifests the value they put on their own writings, since they think to frighten the public into their applause, by threatening, that unless you approve what they have already wrote, they intend never to write again; when perhaps, it may not be a pin matter whether they ever do or no. As I have not observed the critics to be more favorable on this account, I shall always avoid saying any thing of the kind; and conclude with telling you, that if you send me a bottle of ink and a quire of paper by the bearer, you may depend on hearing further from Sir, Your most humble Servant,

The Busy-Body

The excitable Keimer responded with limp doggerel: “With scornful eye, I see your hate, / And pity your unhappy fate.” But Keimer was soon driven out of business, and fled to Barbados. On the way to the boat he sold his paper,
The Pennsylvania Gazette,
to Franklin in October 1729.

There are many types of newspaper editors. Some are crusading ideologues who are blessed with strong opinions, partisan passions, or a desire to bring low authority. Benjamin’s brother James was in this category. Some are the opposite: they like power and their proximity to it, are comfortable with the established order and feel vested in it. The Philadelphia printer Andrew Bradford was such.

And then there are those who are charmed and amused by the world, and delight in charming and amusing others. They tend to be skeptical of both orthodoxies and heresies, and they are earnest in their desire to seek truth and promote public betterment (as well as sell papers). There fits Franklin. He was graced—and afflicted—with the trait so common to journalists, especially ones who have read Swift and Addison once too often, of wanting to participate in the world while also remaining a detached observer. As a journalist he could step out of a scene, even one that passionately engaged him, and comment on it, or on himself, with a droll irony. The depths of his beliefs were often concealed by his knack of engaging in a knowing wink, as was evident in the first editorial he wrote.

T
HE
P
ENNSYLVANIA
G
AZETTE
, O
CTOBER
2, 1729

The Printer to the Reader.

The Pennsylvania Gazette
being now to be carried on by other hands, the reader may expect some account of the method we design to proceed in.

There are many who have long desired to see a good newspaper in Pennsylvania; and we hope those gentlemen who are able, will contribute towards the making this such. We ask assistance, because we are fully sensible, that to publish a good news-paper is not so easy an undertaking as many people imagine it to be. The author of a gazette (in the opinion of the learned) ought to be qualified with an extensive acquaintance with languages, a great easiness and command of writing and relating things cleanly and intelligibly, and in few words; he should be able to speak of war both by land and sea; be well acquainted with geography, with the history of the time, with the several interests of princes and states, the secrets of courts, and the manners and customs of all nations. Men thus accomplished are very rare in this remote part of the world; and it would be well if the writer of these papers could make up among his friends what is wanting in himself.

Upon the whole, we may assure the public, that as far as the encouragement we meet with will enable us, no care and pains shall be omitted, that may make
The Pennsylvania Gazette
as agreeable and useful an entertainment as the nature of the thing will allow.

In a classic canny maneuver, Franklin corrected an early typo—he had reported that someone “died” at a restaurant when he meant to say “dined” at it—by composing a letter from a fictitious “J.T.” that discoursed on other amusing misprints. For example, one edition of the Bible quoted David as saying he was “wonderfully mad” rather than “made,” which caused an “ignorant preacher to harangue his audience for half an hour on the subject of spiritual madness.” Franklin then went on (under the guise of J.T.) to praise Franklin’s own paper, point out a similar typo made by his rival Bradford, criticize Bradford for being generally sloppier, and (with delicious irony) praise Franklin for not criticizing Bradford.

T
HE
P
ENNSYLVANIA
G
AZETTE
, M
ARCH
13, 1730

Sir,

As your last paper was reading in some company where I was present, these words were taken notice of in the article concerning governor belcher, [
after which his excellency, with the gentlemen trading to New England,
died
elegantly at Pontacks
]. The word
died
should doubtless have been
dined,
Pontacks being a noted tavern and eating-house in London for gentlemen of condition; but this omission of the letter (
n
) in that word, gave us as much entertainment as any part of your paper. One took the opportunity of telling us, that in a certain edition of the bible, the printer had, where David says I
am fearfully and wonderfully made,
omitted the letter (
e
) in the last word, so that it was, I
am fearfully and wonderfully mad;
which occasioned an ignorant preacher, who took that text, to harangue his audience for half an hour on the subject of
spiritual madness.
Another related to us, that when the company of stationers in England had the printing of the bible in their hands, the word (
not
) was left out in the seventh commandment, and the whole edition was printed off with
thou shalt commit adultery,
instead of
thou shalt not,
&c. This material
erratum induced the crown to take the patent from them which is now
held by the king’s printer. The
Spectator’s
remark upon this story is, that he doubts many of our modern gentlemen have this faulty edition by E.M., and are not made sensible of the mistake. A third person in the company acquainted us with an unlucky fault that went through a whole impression of common-prayerbooks; in the funeral service, where these words are,
we shall all be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye,
&c. The printer had omitted the (
c
) in
changed,
and it read thus,
we shall all be hanged,
&c. And lastly, a mistake of your brother news-printer was mentioned, in
the speech of James Prouse written the night before he was to have been executed,
instead of I
die a Protestant,
he has put it, I
died a Protestant.
Upon the whole you came off with the more favorable censure, because your paper is most commonly very correct, and yet you were never known to triumph upon it, by publicly ridiculing and exposing the continual blunders of your contemporary. Which observation was concluded by a good old gentleman in company, with this general just remark, that whoever accustoms himself to pass over in silence the faults of his neighbors, shall meet with much better quarter from the world when he happens to fall into a mistake himself; for the satirical and censorious, whose hand is against every man, shall upon such occasions have every man’s hand against him. I am, Sir, your Friend, &c.

J.T.