Franklin made a number of appearances in England on behalf of both his territory and the colonies as a whole.
His anger was driven in part by the proprietors’ refusal to be taxed to support the formation of Pennsylvania’s militia, whose primary responsibility was to defend the citizens of the proprietors’ lands. His initial political battles were against Pennsylvania’s proprietors, the Penns Franklin strove to have Pennsylvania recognized and treated as a regular colony of the British Empire. He considered himself a loyal British subject for many years. Demonstrating remarkable energy and creativity, he immersed himself in a number of scientific experiments and inventions, revealing that he was more brilliant in dealing with practical exercises than he was in wallowing in theoretical abstractions. Isaacson traces Franklin’s amazing series of vocations and avocations, beginning with his apprenticeship as a printer for his brother in Boston he eventually owned his own print shop in Philadelphia, where he developed his skills as a social commentator, journalist, and satirist. While Edwards’ world view promoted religious rigidity and a “sense of social class and hierarchy,” Franklin felt that religion should be benevolent and tolerant he was “unabashedly striving and upwardly mobile.”-with a vision of an American national character based on “the virtues and values of the middle class.” To arrive at an accurate picture of Benjamin Franklin, claims biographer Walter Isaacson, “we must rescue from the schoolbook caricature of a genial codger flying kites…and spouting homespun maxims… critics who would confine him with the character he carefully crafted in his Autobiography.” We must not view him, as some commentators have, as the personification of the American character, but rather as a representative of “…one side of a national dichotomy that has existed since the days when he and Jonathan Edwards stood as contrasting cultural figures.” Edwards spoke of an “anointed elect and salvation through God’s grace alone.” Franklin spoke of salvation through good works. New York: Simon and Schuster Paperbacks, 2003.
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