g a Great Empire to a
Small One." The opening sentences were as follows: "An ancient sage
valued himself upon this, that, though he could not fiddle, he knew how
to make a great city of a little one. The science that I, a modern
simpleton, am about to communicate, is the very reverse;" and with this
introduction the author proceeds to give a detailed account of the
treatment of the colonies by Parliament.

In another paper Franklin reduced certain arguments of the ministry to
the absurd. This was a pretended "Edict of the King of Prussia," in
which Frederick was supposed to announce the same sovereignty over
England, which had been originally settled by Germans, as Parliament
now claimed over America. Speaking of these two papers Franklin says,
in a letter to his son: "I sent you one of the first, but could not get
enough of the second to spare you one, though my clerk went the next
morning to the printer's, and wherever they were sold.... I am not
suspected as the author, except by one or two friends; and have heard
the latter spoken of in the highest terms, as the keenest and severest
piece that has appeared here a long time. Lord Mansfield, I hear, said
of it, that it _was very ABLE and very ARTFUL indeed_; and would do
mischief by giving here a bad impression of the measures of government;
and in the colonies, by encouraging them in their contumacy.... What
made it the more noticed here was, that people in reading it were, as
the phrase is, _taken in_, till they had got half through it, and
imagined it a real edict, to which mistake I suppose the King of
Prussia's _character_ must have contributed. I was down at Lord Le
Despencer's, when the post brought that day's papers. Mr. Whitehead was
there, too (Paul Whitehead, the author of "Manners"), who runs early
through all the papers, and tells the company what he finds remarkable.
He had them in another room, and we were chatting in the breakfast
parlor, when he came running in to us, out of breath, with the paper in
his hand. 'Here!' says he, 'here's news for ye! Here's the King of
Prussia, claiming a right to this kingdom!' All stared, and I as much
as anybody; and he went on to read it. When he had read two or three
paragraphs, a gentleman present said, 'Damn his impudence, I dare say
we shall hear by next post, that he is upon his march with one hundred
thousand men to back this.' Whitehead, who is very shrewd, soon after
began to smoke it, and looking in my face,