the presentation of an enterprise such as his public
library; that is to say, his advocacy of a cardinal virtue, of acquiring
a piece of knowledge, or of adopting a certain method of procedure in
business, ran upon the same line, namely, the practical usefulness of
the virtue, the knowledge, or the method, for increasing the probability
of a practical success in worldly affairs. Among the articles
inculcating morality which he used to put into his newspaper was a
Socratic Dialogue, "tending to prove that whatever might be his parts
and abilities, a vicious man could not properly be called a man of
sense."

He was forever at this business; it was his nature to teach, to preach,
to moralize. With creeds he had no concern, but took it as his function
in life to instruct in what may be described as _useful morals_, the
gospel of good sense, the excellence of common humanity. About the time
in his career which we have now reached this tendency of his had an
interesting development in its relationship to his own character. He
"conceiv'd the bold and arduous project of arriving at moral
perfection." It is impossible to recite the details of his scheme, but
the narration constitutes one of the most entertaining and
characteristic parts of the autobiography. Such a plan could not long be
confined in its operation to himself alone; the teacher must teach;
accordingly he designed to write a book, to be called "The Art of
Virtue," a title with which he was greatly pleased, as indicating that
the book was to show "the means and manner of obtaining virtue" as
contradistinguished from the "mere exhortation to be good, that does not
instruct or indicate the means." A receipt book for virtues! Practical
instructions for acquiring goodness! Nothing could have been more
characteristic. One of his Busy-Body papers, February 18, 1728, begins
with the statement that: "It is said that the Persians, in their ancient
constitution, had public schools in which virtue was taught as a liberal
art, or science;" and he goes on to laud the plan highly. Perhaps this
was the origin of the idea which subsequently became such a favorite
with him. It was his

"design to explain and enforce this doctrine: that vicious actions
are not hurtful because they are forbidden, but forbidden because
they are hurtful, the nature of man alone considered; that it was
therefore every one's interest to be virtuous who wished to be
happy even i