men," and its result verified his own shrewd observation just quoted, for no one now thinks of ascribing its origin to any other source than himself. The academy went into immediate operation, and so flourishing was its condition, that the building it occupied was found inadequate to accommodate the number of scholars demanding admittance, and a new one was obtained through the agency of its projector and steadfast friend, with the understanding that a charitable school should be attached to it. It received a charter 14th May, 1755, from the Proprietaries, conferring upon it collegiate privileges, and considerable additional grants.

In 1765, it was increased by the addition of a medical department, and finally, in 1779, assumed the dignity and title of the University of Pennsylvania. "I have been continued one of the trustees," adds Franklin, "from the beginning, now near forty years, and have had the very great pleasure of seeing a number of the youth, who have received their education in it, distinguished by their improved abilities, servicable in public stations, and ornaments to their country."

His services were considered so valuable to the community in which he lived, that he was called upon to fill many public stations. The Governor made him a justice of the peace at a time when it was considered highly honorable to fill that post; the people elected him to the council, and afterwards selected him as an alderman, and he was returned to fill a seat in the assembly, a post occupied by him for ten consecutive years, and more to his credit, from the circumstance that he never solicited it, or a re-election.

Dr. Thomas Bond, a particular friend of Franklin's, and an associate of his in the Philosophical Society, took up very

ÆT. 45.]

PENNSYLVANIA HOSPITAL.

43

"At

warmly the project of establishing an hospital, but wherever he went he was coldly met with an equivocal answer. length," says Franklin, "he came to me with the compliment that he found there was no such thing as carrying a public spirited project through without my being concerned in it. For, said he, I am often asked by those to whom I propose subscribing, Have you consulted Franklin on this business? And what does he think of it? And when I tell them that I have not, supposing it rather out of your line, they do not subscribe, but say, they will consider it."

The project happened to be in Franklin's "line," and by means of the warm support he gave to his friend, he was enabled by a joint private subscription, and donations from the assembly, to carry it through, and after the lapse of nearly a century, it now presents itself as one of the first institutions of the kind in the United States, and one of the proudest and most praiseworthy monuments of the gifted and public spirited mind, through whose agency it was established. Most truly has he obtained his wish in having posterity say of him, that he lived usefully, if he did not die rich.

But as we have already had repeated occasions to notice, the project need not be necessarily great, to attract his attention. He had the fortune, whether good or bad, of living in a town which was rapidly changing its character from a village to a populous city, and all of the different wants incident to the latter, had yet to be supplied. Street paving and cleansing, were then unknown, and lighting, an experiment to be tried. For each of these, either as the original suggestor or improver of that suggested by others, Philadelphia is indebted to his public spirit.

The affairs of the colonial post-office were in any thing but a prosperous condition at the time when Franklin first became associated with it. The accounts of the different deputies and others engaged in its management, were in a very confused state, and the Postmaster General duly appreciating his strict business qualities, empowered him to regulate the accounts of the various offices. Upon the death of that functionary, which occurred in 1753, he was appointed in connexion with William Hunter, Esq., to succeed him, by the English Government. This official employment caused him to take a journey to New England, and while there he received the honorary degree of Master of Arts from Cambridge College, and likewise the same honor from Yale College. These degrees "were conferred," says Franklin, "in consideration of my improvements and discoveries in the electric branch of natural philosophy."

The improvements and discoveries in electricity to which he alludes, may be best told by following the steps taken by Franklin in this important branch of science, and as his high claims as a philosopher are principally connected with them, it needs no apology for dwelling upon them at some length. Electricity, as a subject of scientific pursuit, does not appear to have attracted his particular attention prior to 1746. In that year he met at Boston a Scotch gentleman named Spence, who had an electrical apparatus, and performed some curious experiments, which being new to Franklin, interested him exceedingly. By a singular coincidence the Philadelphia Library shortly after his return home, received from Peter Collison, of London, and a member of the Royal Society, a present of an electrical glass tube, with instructions

ET. 47.]

LETTERS ON ELECTRICITY.

45

for its use. Franklin, with this instrument, and a few others ordered to be made by himself, commenced a series of experiments, the results of which were detailed in a series of letters to Mr. Collison, beginning with one dated 28th March, 1747. Dr. Priestly, in speaking of these letters, says: "There is hardly any European language into which they have not been translated, and as if this were not sufficient to make them properly known, a translation of them has lately been made into Latin. It is not easy to say, whether we are most pleased with the simplicity and perspicuity with which these letters are written, the modesty with which the author proposes every hypothesis of his own, or the noble frankness with which he relates his mistakes, when they were corrected by subsequent experiments."

Before detailing Franklin's experiments we shall enter into a cursory review of what was known on this subject prior to his time. For a great number of ages philosophers were aware that amber possessed the power, when excited by friction, of attracting certain light bodies, and on this account it was supposed to be endowed with some peculiar living principle. From this substance the name of electricity is derived from the Greek word naɛxrgov (amber). This was all that was known of electricity before Dr. Gilbert, a physician of London, ascertained that other substances besides amber possessed the power of attraction. Dr. Gilbert tried a great variety of experiments, and enlarged considerably the list of articles proven to be capable of attraction, which are enumerated in a Latin treatise written by him, styled “De Magnete." He ascertained that moisture at once arrested the electrical phenomena, and that consequently his experi

ments could not succeed in a damp atmosphere. As might be imagined, some very incongruous notions crept into his treatise, as that glass and other substances lost their virtue after being exposed to a high temperature. In a comparison instituted by him likewise, between electrical and magnetic phenomena, he remarks, that in magnetism both attraction and repulsion are seen, while in electricity attraction is the only power manifested. This work, published about three years before his death, was not only the most complete treatise on the subject then extant, but one of the first attempts made to establish a system of philosophical reasoning founded on actual experiments, so ably defended by Lord Bacon a few years later.

Boyle went a step farther, and discovered that a substance, when electrified, was capable of attracting others not so, without regard to their kind. Thus he attracted particles of non-electrified amber, with electrified amber. He likewise found that the experiments could be performed in vacuo as well as the air, and hence concluded that the air had no agency in their production.

Guericke ascertained about the same time, that when a body was once attracted by an electrized one, it was likewise repelled by it, and did not return until it had touched some other body. He also discovered that a body immersed in an electrical atmosphere, was itself electrified, but with an electricity directly opposite to that of air. Guericke likewise remarked the emission of light and sound in the passage of electricity from one body to another. His experiments were made with a compound globe of glass and sulphur, which latter is now known to be unnecessary in exciting electrical