A Benjamin Franklin Reader (11 page)

Less sexist than most men of his day, Franklin also aimed his barbs at men. Afterwit’s letter was answered two weeks later by one from Celia Single. With the delightful gossipy voice of Franklin’s other female characters, such as Silence Dogood, Single recounts a visit to a friend whose husband is trying to replicate Afterwit’s approach. A raucous argument ensues.

T
HE
P
ENNSYLVANIA
G
AZETTE
, J
ULY
24, 1732

Mr.
Gazetteer,

I must needs tell you, that some of the things you print do more harm than good; particularly I think so of my neighbor the tradesman’s letter in one of your late papers, which has broken the peace of several families, by causing difference between men and their wives: I shall give you here one instance, of which I was an eye and ear witness.

Happening last
Wednesday
morning to be in at Mrs.
C———ss
’s, when her husband returned from market, among other things which he had bought, he showed her some balls of thread.
My dear,
says he, I
like mightily those stockings which I yesterday saw neighbor
Afterwit
knitting for her husband, of thread of her own spinning: I should be glad to have some such stockings my self: I understand that your maid
Mary
is a very good knitter, and seeing this thread in market, I have bought it, that the girl may make a pair or two for me.
Mrs.
Careless
was just then at the glass, dressing her head; and turning about with the pins in her mouth, lord, child, says she,
are you crazy? What time has
Mary
to knit? Who must do the work, I wonder, if you set her to knitting?
Perhaps, my dear,
says he,
you have a mind to knit ’em yourself; I remember, when I courted you, I once heard you say you had learned to knit of your mother. I
knit stockings for you,
says she,
not I truly; there are poor women enough in town, that can knit; if you please you may employ them.
Well, but my dear,
says he,
you know a penny saved is a penny got, a pin a day is a groat a year, every little makes a nickel, and there is neither sin nor shame in knitting a pair of stockings; why should you express such a mighty aversion to it? As to
poor
women, you know we are not people of quality, we have no income to maintain us, but what arises from my labor and industry; methinks you should not be at all displeased, if you have an opportunity to get something as well as my self. I
wonder,
says she,
how you can propose such a thing to me; did not you always tell me you would maintain me like a gentlewoman? If I had married
Capt.———,
he would have scorned even to mention knitting of stockings.
Prithee,
says he, (a little nettled)
what do you tell me of your captains? If you could have had him, I suppose you would; or perhaps you did not very well like him: if I did promise to maintain you like a gentlewoman, I suppose ’tis time enough for that when you know how to behave like one; mean while ’tis your duty to help make me able. How long do you think I can maintain you at your present rate of living?
Pray,
says she, (somewhat fiercely, and dashing the puff into the powder-box)
don’t use me after this manner, for I assure you I won’t bear it. This is the fruit of your poison
newspapers;
there shall come no more here, I promise you.
Bless us,
says he,
what an unaccountable thing is this! Must a tradesman’s daughter, and the wife of a tradesman, necessarily and instantly be a gentlewoman? You had no portion; I am forced to work for a living; if you are too great to do the like, there’s the door, go and live upon your estate, if you can find it; in short, I don’t desire to be troubled—what answer she made, I cannot tell; for knowing that a man and his wife are apt to quarrel more violently when before strangers, than when by themselves, I got up and
went out hastily: but I understood from
Mary,
who came to me of an errand in the evening, that they dined together pretty peaceably, (the balls of thread that had caused the difference, being thrown into the kitchen fire) of which I was very glad to hear.

I have several times in your paper seen severe reflections upon us women, for idleness and extravagance, but I do not remember to have once seen any such animadversions upon the men. If I were disposed to be censorious, I could furnish you with instances enough: I might mention Mr.
Billiard,
who spends more than he earns, at the green table; and would have been in jail long since, were it not for his industrious wife: Mr.
Husselcap,
who often all day long leaves his business for the rattling of halfpence in a certain alley: Mr.
Finikin,
who has seven different suits of fine clothes, and wears a change every day, while his wife and children sit at home half naked: Mr.
Crownhim,
who is always dreaming over the checker-board, and cares not how the world goes, so he gets the game: Mr.
T’otherpot
the tavern-haunter; Mr.
Bookish,
the everlasting reader; Mr.
Tweedledum,
Mr.
Toot-a-toot,
and several others, who are mighty diligent at any thing beside their business. I say, if I were disposed to be censorious, I might mention all these, and more; but I hate to be thought a scandalizer of my neighbors, and therefore forbear. And for your part, I would advise you, for the future, to entertain your readers with something else besides people’s reflections upon one another; for remember, that there are holes enough to be picked in your coat as well as others; and those that are affronted by the satyrs you may publish, will not consider so much who
wrote,
as who
printed:
take not this freedom amiss, from,

Your Friend and Reader,

Celia Single

In his first Busy-Body essay, Franklin had defended the value of nosiness and tattling. Now that he had his own paper, he made it clear that the Gazette was pleased, indeed proud, to continue this service. Using the same tone as the Busy-Body, Franklin wrote an anonymous essay defending gossip and followed it the next week by a fake letter from the aptly named Alice Addertongue urging his paper to print more gossip. Franklin, who was then 26, had Alice identify herself, with an edge of irony, as a “young girl of about thirty-five.”

T
HE
P
ENNSYLVANIA
G
AZETTE
, S
EPTEMBER
7, 1732

There is scarce any one thing so generally spoke against, and at the same time so universally practiced, as
censure
or backbiting. All divines have condemned it, all religions have forbid it, all writers of morality have endeavor’s to discountenance it, and all men hate it at all times, except only when they have occasion to make use of it. For my part, after having frankly declared it as my opinion, that the general condemnation it meets with, proceeds only from a consciousness in most people that they have highly incurred and deserved it, I shall in a very fearless impudent manner take upon me to oppose the universal vogue of mankind in all ages, and say as much in behalf and vindication of this decried virtue, as the usual vacancy in your paper will admit.

I have called it a virtue, and shall take the same method to prove it such, as we commonly use to demonstrate any other action or habit to be a virtue, that is, by showing its usefulness, and the great good it does to society. What can be said to the contrary, has already been said by every body; and indeed it is so little to the purpose, that any body may easily say it: but the path I mean to tread, has hitherto been trod by no body; if therefore I should meet with the difficulties usual in tracing new roads, and be in some places a little at loss, the candor of the reader will the more readily excuse me.

The first advantage I shall mention, arising from the free practice of
censure
or
backbiting,
is, that it is frequently the means of preventing powerful, political, ill-designing men, from growing too popular for the safety of a state. Such men are always setting their best actions to view, in order to obtain confidence and trust, and establish a party: they endeavor to shine with false or borrowed merit, and carefully conceal their real demerit: (that they fear to be evil spoken of is evident from their striving to cover every ill with a specious pretence;) but all-examining censure, with her hundred eyes and her thousand tongues, soon discovers and as speedily divulges in all quarters, every the least crime or foible that is a part of their true character. This clips the wings of their ambition, weakens their cause and party, and reduces them to the necessity of dropping their pernicious designs, springing from a violent thirst of honor and power; or, if that thirst is unquenchable, they are obliged to enter into a course of true virtue, without which real grandeur is not to be attained.

Again, the common practice of
censure
is a mighty restraint upon the actions of every private man; it greatly assists our otherwise weak resolutions of living virtuously.
What will the world say of me, if I act thus?
Is often a reflection strong enough to enable us to resist the most powerful temptation to vice or folly. This preserves the integrity of the wavering, the honesty of the covetous, the sanctity of some of the religious, and the chastity of all virgins. And, indeed, when people once become regardless of censure, they are arrived to a pitch of impudence little inferior to the contempt of all laws humane and divine.

The common practice of
censure
is also exceedingly serviceable, in helping a man to
the knowledge of himself,
a piece of knowledge highly necessary for all, but acquired by very few, because very few sufficiently regard and value the censure past by others on their actions. There is hardly such a thing as a friend, sincere or rash enough to acquaint us freely with our faults; nor will any but an enemy tell us of what we have done amiss,
to our faces;
and enemies meet with little credit in such cases, for we believe they speak from malice and ill-will: thus we might always live in the blindest ignorance of our own folly, and, while every body reproached us in their hearts, might think our conduct irreproachable: but thanks be to providence, (that has given every man a natural inclination to backbite his neighbor) we now hear of many things said
of
us, that we shall never hear said
to
us; (for out of goodwill to us, or ill will to those that have spoken ill of us, every one is willing enough to tell us how we are censured by others,) and we have the advantage of mending our manners accordingly.

Another vast benefit arising from the common practice of backbiting, is, that it helps exceedingly to a thorough
knowledge of mankind,
a science the most useful of all sciences. Could we come to know no man of whom we had not a particular experience, our sphere of knowledge of this sort would certainly be narrow and confined, and yet at the same time must probably have cost us very dear. For the crafty tricking villain would have a vast advantage over the honest undesigning part of men, when he might cheat and abuse almost every one he dealt with, if none would take the liberty to characterize him among their acquaintance behind his back.

Without saying any more in its behalf, I am able to challenge all the orators or writers in the world, to show (with solid reason) that the few trifling inconveniencies attending it, bear any proportion to these vast benefits! And I will venture to assert to their noses, that nothing would be more absurd or pernicious than a law against backbiting, if such a law could possibly take effect; since it would undoubtedly be the greatest encouragement to vice that ever vice met with, and do more towards the increasing it, than would the abolishing of all other laws whatsoever.

I might likewise have mentioned the usefulness of
censure
in society, as it is a certain and an equal punishment for such follies and vices as the common laws either do not sufficiently punish, or have provided no punishment for. I might have observed, that were it not for this, we should find the number of some sorts of criminals increased to a degree sufficient not only to infest, but even to overthrow all good and civil conversation: but it is endless to enumerate every particular advantage arising from this glorious virtue! A virtue, which whoever exerts, must have the largest share of public spirit and self-denial, the highest benevolence and regard to the good of others; since in this he entirely sacrifices his own interest, making not only the persons he accuses, but all that hear him, his enemies; for all that deserve censure (which are by far the greatest number) hate the censorious;

A virtue! Decried by all that fear it, but a strong presumption of the innocence of them that practice it; for they cannot be encouraged to offend, from the least prospect of favor or impunity; their faults or failings will certainly meet with no quarter from others. And whoever practices the contrary, always endeavoring to excuse and palliate the crimes of others, may rationally be suspected to have some secret darling vice, which he hopes will be excused him in return. A virtue! Which however ill people may load it with the opprobrious names of
calumny, scandal,
and
detraction,
and I know not what; will still remain a virtue, a bright, shining, solid virtue, of more real use to mankind than all the other virtues put together; and indeed, is the mother or the protectress of them all, as well as the enemy, the destructress of all kinds of vice. A virtue, innately, necessarily, and essentially so; for——but, dear reader, large folio volumes closely written, would scarce be sufficient to contain all the praises due to it. I shall offer you at present only one more convincing argument in its behalf,
viz.
That you would not have had the satisfaction of seeing this discourse so agreeably short as I shall make it, were it not for the just fear I have of incurring your
censure,
should I continue to be troublesome by extending it to a greater length.

T
HE
P
ENNSYLVANIA
G
AZETTE
, S
EPTEMBER
12, 1732

Mr.
Gazetteer,

I was highly pleased with your last week’s paper upon scandal, as the uncommon doctrine therein preached is agreeable both to my principles and practice, and as it was published very seasonably to reprove the impertinence of a writer in the foregoing Thursday’s
Mercury,
who at the conclusion of one of his silly paragraphs, laments, forsooth, that the
fair sex
are so peculiarly guilty of this enormous crime: every blockhead ancient and modern, that could handle a pen, has I think taken upon him to cant in the same senseless strain. If to
scandalize
be really a
crime,
what do these puppies mean? They describe it, they dress it up in the most odious frightful and detestable colors, they represent it as the worst of crimes, and then roundly and charitably charge the whole race of womankind with it. Are they not then guilty of what they condemn, at the same time that they condemn it? If they accuse us of any other crime, they must necessarily
scandalize
while they do it: but to
scandalize
us with being guilty of
scandal,
is in itself an egregious absurdity, and can proceed from nothing but the most consummate impudence in conjunction with the most profound stupidity.

This, supposing, as they do, that to scandalize is a crime; which you have convinced all reasonable people, is an opinion absolutely erroneous. Let us leave then these idiot mock-moralists, while I entertain you with some account of my life and manners.

I am a young girl of about thirty-five, and live at present with my mother. I have no care upon my head of getting a living, and therefore find it my duty as well as inclination, to exercise my talent at censure, for the good of my country folks. There was, I am told, a certain generous emperor, who if a day had passed over his head, in which he had conferred no benefit on any man, used to say to his friends, in Latin,
diem perdidi,
that is, it seems, I
have lost a day.
I believe I should make use of the same expression, if it were possible for a day to pass in which I had not, or missed, an opportunity to scandalize somebody: but, thanks be praised, no such misfortune has befell me these dozen years.

Yet, whatever good I may do, I cannot pretend that I first entered into the practice of this virtue from a principle of public spirit; for I remember that when a child, I had a violent inclination to be ever talking in my own praise, and being continually told that it was ill manners, and once severely whipped for it, the confined stream formed itself a new channel, and I began to speak for the future in the dispraise of others. This I found more agreeable to company, and almost as much so to my self: for what great difference can there be, between putting your self up, or putting your neighbor down?
Scandal,
like other virtues, is in part its own reward, as it gives us the satisfaction of making our selves appear better than others, or others no better than ourselves.

My mother, good woman, and I, have heretofore differed upon this account. She argued that scandal spoilt all good conversation, and I insisted that without it there could be no such thing. Our disputes once rose so high, that we parted tea-table, and I concluded to entertain my acquaintance in the kitchen. The first day of this separation we both drank tea at the same time, but she with her visitors in the parlor. She would not hear of the least objection to any ones character, but began a new sort of discourse in some such queer philosophical manner as this; I
am mightily pleased sometimes,
says she,
when I observe and consider that the world is not so bad as people out of humor imagine it to be. There is something amiable, some good quality or other in every body. If we were only to speak of people that are least respected, there is
such a one
is very dutiful to her father, and methinks has a fine set of teeth;
such a one
is very respectful to her husband;
such a one
is very kind to her poor neighbors, and besides has a very handsome shape;
such a one
is always ready to serve a friend, and in my opinion there is not a woman in town that has a more agreeable air and gait.
This fine kind of talk, which lasted near half an hour, she concluded by saying, I
do not doubt but every one of you have made the like observations, and I should be glad to have the conversation continued upon this subject.
Just at that juncture I peeped in at the door, and never in my life before saw such a set of simple vacant countenances; they looked somehow neither glad, nor sorry, nor angry, nor pleased, nor indifferent, nor attentive; but, (excuse the simile) like so many blue wooden images of rye dough. I in the kitchen had already begun a ridiculous story of Mr.—’s intrigue with his maid, and his wife’s behavior upon the discovery; at some passages we laughed heartily, and one of the gravest of mamas company, without making any answer to her discourse, got up
to go and see what the girls were so merry about:
she was followed by a second, and shortly after by a third, till at last the old gentlewoman found herself quite alone, and being convinced that her project was impracticable, came her self and finished her tea with us; ever since which
Saul also has been among the prophets,
and our disputes lie dormant.