Benjamin Franklin's writings represent a long career of literary, scientific and political efforts over a lifetime which extended nearly the entire eighteenth century. This volume includes Franklin's reflections on such diverse questions as philosophy and religion, social status, electricity, American national characteristics, war, and the status of women. Nearly sixty years separate the earliest writings from the latest, an interval during which Franklin was continually balancing between the puritan values of his upbringing and the modern American world to which his career served as prologue. This edition provides a new text of the Autobiography, established with close reference to Franklin's original manuscript. It also includes a new transcription of the 1726 journal and several pieces which have recently been identified as Franklin's own work.
Introduction
Chronology
Suggestions for Further Reading
Note on the Text
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
Franklin's Outline of the Autobiography
Essays and Letters
A Receipt to make a New-England Funeral Elegy
Advice to a Friend on Choosing a Mistress
The Speech of Miss Polly Baker
How to secure Houses, &c. from Lightning
The Kite Experiment
The Way to Wealth
An Edict by the King of Prussia
From The Morals of Chess
The Elysian Fields
FromInformation to Those who Would Remove to America
An Address to the Public; From the Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery and the Relief of Free Negroes Unlawfully Held in Bondage
A Miscellany of Franklin's Opinions
Notes
