leasing consolation to know that you have not lived in vain. And
I flatter myself that it will not be ranked among the least grateful
occurrences of your life to be assured that, so long as I retain my
memory, you will be recollected with respect, veneration, and
affection, by your sincere friend, George Washington."

Congress was in session when Franklin died, and when his death was
announced, on motion of Madison, it was resolved that a badge of
mourning be worn for one month, "as a mark of veneration due to the
memory of a citizen whose native genius was not more an ornament to
human nature than his various exertions of it have been precious to
science, to freedom, and to his country."

In France, Condorcet eulogized him in the Academy of Science, and
Mirabeau in the National Assembly. The latter said: "Antiquity would
have erected altars to this great and powerful genius."

When Rachel was dying, she named her infant son "Ben-oni," which
means, "son of my sorrow," because he was the occasion of her
sufferings and death. But Jacob, his father, called him "Benjamin,"
which signifies "the son of a right hand." There was a time when
Franklin's mother, weeping over her runaway boy, would have called him
"Ben-oni," and it might have appeared to observers that he would turn
out to be such. But the excellent lessons of his early home, and the
good traits of character which he nurtured, caused him to become a
true Benjamin to his parents,--"a son of their right hand." With a
warm, filial heart, he sought to minister to their wants in their
declining years, and, as we have seen, offered the last and highest
tribute of affection in his power, when they were laid in the dust.

In his riper years, Franklin sincerely regretted the doubts of his
youth and early manhood respecting religion. The sentiments that were
poured into his young mind by fond, parental lips, he came to respect
and cherish. He went to the house of God on the Sabbath with great
constancy; and, if recollecting the sin of his youth, he wrote to his
daughter, "_Go constantly to church, whoever preaches._" His own
experience taught him that it was dangerous and wicked to forsake the
sanctuary. He became interested in every good work. His influence and
his purse were offered to sustain Christianity. He appreciated every
benevolent enterprise, and bade them God-speed. On one occasion the
celebrated Whitefield preached in behalf of an orphan asylum, which he
prop