The First American: The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin

by H.W. Brands

The Morals of Chess, printed on his Passy press, was more serious than some of the other bagatelles, but hardly ponderous. “Life is a kind of chess,” he explained, “in which we have often points to gain, and competitors and adversaries to contend with, and in which there is a vast variety of good and evil events that are, in some degree, the effects of prudence or the want of it.” In playing chess a person could learn foresight. “If I move this piece, what will be the advantages of my new situation? What use can my adversary make of it to annoy me?” Likewise circumspection, “which surveys the whole chessboard, or scene of action, the relations of the several pieces and situations, the dangers they are respectively exposed to.” Also caution, in that once a piece was touched, that piece must be moved, and once a piece was set down, there it must stand. “If you have incautiously put yourself into a bad and dangerous position, you cannot obtain your enemy’s leave to withdraw your troops and place them more securely; but you must abide all the consequences of your rashness.”