The First American: The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin

by H.W. Brands

In the summer of 1779 the obscure Adams fell into conversation with a French gentleman, a “Mr. M.,” who remarked that in France foreign ambassadors were free to hold religious services in their own way. “But Mr. Franklin never had any,” the Frenchman said, with evident surprise. “No, said I, laughing,” Adams recorded in his diary, “because Mr. F. had no—I was going to say, what I did not say, and will not say here. I stopped short and laughed.” “No, said Mr. M., Mr. F. adores only great nature, which has interested a great many people of both sexes in his favour.” “Yes, said I, laughing, all the atheists, deists and libertines, as well as the philosophers and ladies are in his train—another Voltaire and Hume.” “Yes, said Mr. M., he is celebrated as the great philosopher and the great legislator of America.” “He is, said I, a great philosopher, but as a legislator of America he has done very little. It is universally believed in France, England and all Europe that his electric wand has accomplished all this revolution, but nothing is more groundless. He has done very little. It is believed that he made all the American constitutions, and their confederation. But he made neither. He did not even make the constitution of Pennsylvania, bad as it is.”