Consider but a little, Conrad, and you must be of my opinion. If they meet so often to learn good things, they would certainly have learned some before this time. But they are still ignorant. You know our practice. If a white man, in travelling through our country, enters one of our cabins, we all treat him as I do you; we dry him if he is wet, we warm him if he is cold, and give him meat and drink, that he may allay his thirst and hunger; and we spread soft furs for him to rest and sleep on: we demand nothing in return.* But if I go into a white man's house at Albany, and ask for victuals and drink, they say, Where is your money? and if I have none, they say, Get out, you Indian dog. You see that they have not learned those little good things, that we need no meetings to be instructed in, because our mother taught them to us when we were children; and therefore it is impossible their meetings should be, as they say, for any such purpose, or have any such effect; they are only to con trive the cheating of Indians in the price of beaver.' TO MR. DUBOURG. CONCERNING THE DISSENSIONS BETWEEN London, October 2, 1770. I SEE, with pleasure, that we think pretty much alike on the subjects of English America. We of the colonies have never insisted that we ought to be * It is remarkable that, in all ages and countries, hospitality has been allowed as the virtue of those, whom the exempt from contributing to the common expenses necessary to support the prosperity of the empire. We only assert, that having parliaments of our own, and not having representatives in that of Great Britain, our parliaments are the only judges of what we can and what we ought to contribute in this case; and that the English parliament has no right to take our money without our consent. In fact, the British empire is not a single state; it comprehends many; and though the parliament of Great Britain has arrogated to itself the power of taxing the colonies, it has no more right to do so, than it has to tax Hanover. We have the same king, but not the same legislatures. The dispute between the two countries has already lost England many millions sterling, which it has lost in its commerce, and America has in this respect been a proportionable gainer. This commerce consisted principally of superfluities; objects of luxury and fashion, which we can well do without; and the resolution we have formed of importing no more till our grievances are redressed, has enabled many of our infant manufactures to take root; and it will not be easy to make our people abandon them, in future, even should a connexion more cordial than ever succeed the present troubles.-I have, indeed, no doubt, that the parliament of England will finally abandon its present pretentions, and leave us to civilized were pleased to call barbarians; the Greeks celebrated the Scythians for it; the Saracens possessed it eminently; and it is, to this day, the reigning virtue of the wild Arabs. St. Paul, too, in the relation of his voyage and shipwreck, on the island of Melita, says, 'The barbarous people showed us no little kindness; for they kindied a fire, and received us every one, because of the present rain, and because of the cold. This note is taken from a small collection of Franklin's papers, printed for Dilly. S the peaceable enjoyment of our rights and privileges. B. FRANKLIN. A COMPARISON OF THE CONDUCT OF THE ANCIENT JEWS, IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. A ZEALOUS advocate for the proposed Federal Constitution in a certain public assembly said, that 'the repugnance of a great part of mankind to good government was such, that he believed that if an angel from heaven was to bring down a constitution formed there for our use, it would nevertheless meet with violent opposition.'-He was reproved for the supposed extravagance of the sentiment; and he did not justify it.-Probably it might not have immediately occurred to him, that the experiment had been tried, and that the event was recorded in the most faithful of all histories, the Holy Bible; otherwise he might, as it seems to me, have supported his opinion by that unexceptionable authority. The Supreme Being had been pleased to nourish up a single family, by continued acts of his attentive providence, until it became a great people: and having rescued them from bondage by many miracles performed by his servant Moses, he personally delivered to that chosen servant, in presence of the whole nation, a constitution and code of laws for their observance; accompanied and sanctioned with promises of great rewards, and threats of severe punishments, as the consequence of their obedience or disobedience. This constitution, though the Deity himself was to be at its head (and it is therefore called by political writers a theocracy) could not be carried into execution but by means of his ministers: Aaron and his sons were therefore commissioned to be, with Moses, the first established ministry of the new government. One would have thought that the appointment of men, who had distinguished themselves in procuring the liberty of their nation, and had hazarded their lives in openly opposing the will of a powerful monarch who would have retained that nation in slavery, might have been an appointment acceptable to a grateful people; and that a constitution framed for them by the Deity himself, might on that account have been secure of a universal welcome reception. Yet there were, in every one of the thirteen tribes, some discontented, restless spirits, who were continually exciting them to reject the proposed new government, and this from various motives. Many still retained an affection for Egypt, the land of their nativity; and these, whenever they felt any inconvenience, or hardship, through the natural and unavoidable effect of their change of situation, exclaimed against their leaders as the author of their trouble; and were not only for returning into Egypt, but for stoning their deliverers.* Those inclined to idolatry were displeased that their golden calf was destroyed. Many of the chiefs thought the new constitution might be injurious to their particular interests, that the profitable places would *Numbers, chap. xiv. be engrossed by the families and friends of Moses and Aaron, and others equally well born excluded.* -In Josephus, and the Talmud, we learn some particulars, not so fully narrated in the Scripture. We are there told, that Korah was ambitious of the priesthood; and offended that it was conferred on Aaron; and this, as he said, by the authority of Moses only, without the consent of the people. He accused Moses of having, by various artifices, fraudulently obtained the government, and deprived the people of their liberties; and of conspiring with Aaron to perpetuate the tyranny in their family. Thus, though Korah's real motive was the supplanting of Aaron, he persuaded the people that he meant only the public good: and they, moved by his insinuations, began to cry out,-'Let us maintain the common liberty of our respective tribes; we have freed ourselves from the slavery imposed upon us by the Egyptians, and shall we suffer ourselves to be made slaves by Moses? If we must have a master, it were better to return to Pharaoh, who fed us with bread and onions, than to serve this new tyrant, who by his operations has brought us into danger of famine.' Then they called into question the reality of his conferences with God; and objected to the privacy of the meetings, and the preventing any of the people from being present at the colloquies, or even approaching the place, as grounds of great suspicion. They accused Moses also of peculation; as embezzling part of the golden spoons and the silver chargers, that the princes had offered at the *Numbers, chap. xvi. ver. 3, And they gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron, and said unto them, Ye take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them.- Wherefore then lift ye up yourselves above the congregation?' |