George Whately had remarked on what remained at the end of a long life, and had sent an epitaph written by Pope, which included a line scoffing at worldly praise: “He ne’er cared a pin/What they said or may say of the mortal within.” Franklin was skeptical. “It is so natural to wish to be spoken well of, whether alive or dead, that I imagine he could not be quite exempt from that desire; and that he at least wished to be thought a wit, or he would not have given himself the trouble of writing so good an epitaph to leave behind him.” For himself, Franklin said, he preferred the sentiment of a
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