The Account he gives of his Riches, is I believe, altogether as fictitious as his Character [of] Lieut.-Colonel and Commissionaire des Etats-U[nis] but that his father and Brother-inlaw are resp[ectable] persons in Pennsylvania is true. Mr. Barclay [has] some Knowledge of them: for their sakes if [the] Punishment of the carcan, which I [hear is] intended for him, could be commuted for [a] less fletrissant, a longer Banishment, or [such] like, I should be glad, and if your Excellency can obtain this for him without too much Trouble I shall, in their Behalf, acknowledge it as a Favour.

With great Respect, I am, sir, your Excellency's most obedient and most humble'Servant.

B. FRANKLIN.

P. S.I return the Letter endors'd. I take it to be written by one Beaumont, his advocate.

1475. TO MRS. GEORGIANA HARE-NAYLOR'

MY DEAR FRIEND,

(L. C.)

Passy, Jan. 25, 1784.

Your Letter of the 12th Inst. came duly to hand. I congratulate you & M Hare on your Marriage, & wish you every Felicity.

I will answer your Enquiries as well as I can. The Cultivators of Land are a respectable Part of our People in Pensilvania, being generally Proprietors of the Land they cultivate, out of whom are chosen the Majority of our Magis

1 Georgiana Shipley, daughter of the Bishop of St. Asaph, married in 1783 Francis Hare-Naylor (1753-1815) of Hurstmonceaux, Sussex, author of plays, novels, and "History of the Helvetic Republics." — ED.

trates, Legislators, &c. And a Year's Residence gives a Stranger all the Rights of a Citizen. I am not much acquainted with Country Affairs, having been always an Inhabitant of Cities; but I imagine a good Plantation ready form'd, with a Dwelling House, &c. may be bought for half the Sum you mention to be now in your Possession, and that the other half would amply furnish the Stock &c. necessary for working the Land to Advantage. A Farm of two or three Hundred Acres, in the hands of a Man who understands Agriculture and will attend to it, is capable of furnishing Subsistence to a Family. If this may be the Case with M' Hare, you see that your 300£ a Year1 will be an accumulating Fund, providing for the Establishment of Children, and for a Retirement of Ease & Comfort in Old Age. The Law is also an honourable Profession with us, and more profitable than Agriculture; and if M' Hare is already acquainted with the English Common Law, which is the Basis of ours, he might be admitted to practice immediately, and would find but little Difficulty in acquiring a Knowledge of our few Additions to, or Variations of that Law; I have known in my time several considerable Estates made by that Profession. But the Study is dry and laborious and long, that is requisite to arrive at Eminence; and if M Hare has not already gone thro' it, he will consider whether he has the Habits of Application, Industry & Perseverance that are necessary. Not knowing his Character & Disposition it is impossible for me to advise well, or to judge whether sitting down quietly in some cheap part of Europe, and living prudently on two-thirds of your Income, may not be preferable to any Scheme in America.

1 An annuity settled upon the Hare-Naylors by the Duchess of Devonshire after the Bishop of St. Asaph had refused to recognize Hare. - ED.

I can only say, that if I should be there when you are, my best Counsels and Services will not be wanting, and to see you happily settled & prosperous there would give me infinite Pleasure; but I have not yet obtained Leave to go home, and am besides in my 80th Year; of course if I ever arrive there my stay can be but short. While I do exist, wherever it is, you will find me with unalterable Esteem & Affection, my dear Friend,

Your Care in sending me the Newspapers is very agreable to me. I received by Capt. Barney those relating to the Cincinnati. My Opinion of the Institution cannot be of much Importance; I only wonder that, when the united Wisdom of our Nation had, in the Articles of Confederation, manifested their Dislike of establishing Ranks of Nobility, by Authority either of the Congress or of any particular State, a Number of private Persons should think proper to distinguish themselves and their Posterity, from their fellow Citizens, and form an Order of hereditary Knights, in direct Opposition to the solemnly declared Sense of their Country! I imagine it must be likewise contrary to the Good Sense of most of those drawn into it by the Persuasion of its Projectors, who have been too much struck with the Ribbands and Crosses they have seen among them hanging to the Buttonholes of Foreign Officers. And I suppose those, who disapprove of

VOL. IX-M

it, have not hitherto given it much Opposition, from a Principle somewhat like that of your good Mother, relating to punctilious Persons, who are always exacting little Observances of Respect; that, "if People can be pleased with small Matters, it is a pity but they should have them."

In this View, perhaps, I should not myself, if my Advice had been ask'd, have objected to their wearing their Ribband and Badge according to their Fancy, tho' I certainly should to the entailing it as an Honour on their Posterity. For Honour, worthily obtain'd (as for Example that of our Officers), is in its Nature a personal Thing, and incommunicable to any but those who had some Share in obtaining it. Thus among the Chinese, the most ancient, and from long Experience the wisest of Nations, honour does not descend, but ascends. If a man from his Learning, his Wisdom, or his Valour, is promoted by the Emperor to the Rank of Mandarin, his Parents are immediately entitled to all the same Ceremonies of Respect from the People, that are establish'd as due to the Mandarin himself; on the supposition that it must have been owing to the Education, Instruction, and good Example afforded him by his Parents, that he was rendered capable of serving the Publick.

This ascending Honour is therefore useful to the State, as it encourages Parents to give their Children a good and virtuous Education. But the descending Honour, to Posterity who could have no Share in obtaining it, is not only groundless and absurd, but often hurtful to that Posterity, since it is apt to make them proud, disdaining to be employ'd in useful Arts, and thence falling into Poverty, and all the Meannesses, Servility, and Wretchedness attending it; which is the present case with much of what is called the Noblesse

in Europe. Or if, to keep up the Dignity of the Family, Estates are entailed entire on the Eldest male heir, another Pest to Industry and Improvement of the Country is introduc'd, which will be followed by all the odious mixture of pride and Beggary, and idleness, that have half depopulated [and decultivated] Spain; occasioning continual Extinction of Families by the Discouragements of Marriage [and neglect in the improvement of estates].1

I wish, therefore, that the Cincinnati, if they must go on with their Project, would direct the Badges of their Order to be worn by their Parents, instead of handing them down to their Children. It would be a good Precedent, and might have good Effects. It would also be a kind of Obedience to the Fourth Commandment, in which God enjoins us to honour our Father and Mother, but has nowhere directed us to honour our Children. And certainly no mode of honouring those immediate Authors of our Being can be more effectual, than that of doing praiseworthy Actions, which reflect Honour on those who gave us our Education; or more becoming, than that of manifesting, by some public Expression or Token, that it is to their Instruction and Example we ascribe the Merit of those Actions.

But the Absurdity of descending Honours is not a mere Matter of philosophical Opinion; it is capable of mathematical Demonstration. A Man's Son, for instance, is but half of his Family, the other half belonging to the Family of his Wife. His Son, too, marrying into another Family, his Share in the Grandson is but a fourth; in the Great Grandson, by the same Process, it is but an Eighth; in the next Generation a Sixteenth; the next a Thirty-second; the next 1 Passages in brackets are not found in the draft in L. C.- ED.