in my pocket, but I
can draw for a thousand pounds." Burke said of Goldsmith, "He writes
like an angel, but he talks like poor Poll." Franklin was by no means
a bungler in his speech, but he was not fluent. He hesitated, and was
at a loss for words, but whatever he wrote had a wonderful flow of
harmony. The right word was always in the right place. Doubtless had
he devoted as much attention to the acquirement of conversational
ease, as he did to skill in writing, he would have been as successful
in the one art as in the other. From early life it was his great
ambition to be not merely a fine but a forcible writer. He did not
seek splendor of diction, but that perspicuity, that transparency of
expression which would convey the thought most directly to the mind.

An odd volume of the Spectator fell in his way. He was charmed with
the style. Selecting some interesting incident, he would read it with
the closest care; he would then close the book, endeavoring to retain
the thought only without regard to the expression. Then with pen, in
hand, he would sit down and relate the anecdote or the incident in the
most forceful and graphic words his vocabulary would afford. This he
would correct and re-correct, minutely attending to the capitals and
the punctuation until he had made it in all respects as perfect as it
was in his power. He then compared his narrative with that in the
Spectator. Of course he usually found many faults which he had
committed, but occasionally he could not but admit he had improved
upon his original. This encouraged him with the hope that by long
continued practice, he might become an able writer of the English
language. This practice he continued for months, varying it in many
ways. He continued to rhyme, though he admitted that there was little
poetry in his verse. The exercise, however, he thought useful in
giving him a mastery of language.

Though Franklin wrote ballads, he seemed to be mainly interested in
reading books of the most elevated and instructive character. Locke's
"Essay on the Human Understanding," he studied thoroughly. "The Art of
Thinking," by the Messrs. de Port Royal, engrossed all his energies.
But perhaps there was no book, at that time, which produced so deep
and abiding impression on his mind as the "Memorabilia of Socrates,"
by Xenophon.

Franklin was fond of arguing; he was naturally disputatious. With his
keen intellect, he was pretty sure to come off as victor, at least