The lives of men like James Logan ennoble the pages of history and make its study an elevating pursuit and a reinforcement to the resources of public morality. This man was worthy the compliment which the great vicegerent Shikellamy paid him, when he named his son in his honor; he was worthy to have been the trusted friend of William Penn, and to have had Benjamin Franklin for his printer.
The world has not produced many men, who, after forty years spent in the whirl and muddy currents of active business and intense political strife, can, with clean hands and unsullied reputation, calmly step aside out of the turmoil and retire to the company of his books, to endow a library and make a translation of Cicero’s “De Senectute,” printing it, as the writer himself pleasantly says, “in a large and fair character so that old men may not be vexed by the defective eyesight in reading what was so appropriate to their years.”
James Logan was born in Lurgan, Ireland, October 28, 1674. His father, Patrick Logan, grandson of Sir Robert Logan of Restairig, Scotland, sprang from that stock of proud Scottish lairds, distinguished for long pedigrees and barren acres, whose children have lent their genius to the service of the world.
James Logan was a lad of precocious mind—at sixteen he knew Latin, Greek and Hebrew, and made rapid progress in mathematics. He afterwards mastered French, Italian and Spanish, and probably Dutch and German. He became familiar with several Indian dialects.
He went into trade as a linen-draper’s apprentice in Dublin, then in the Bristol trade for himself.
At Bristol, in 1698, he met William Penn, and became his private secretary and devoted follower ever after.
In the year 1699, he sailed with William Penn on his second visit to his province in America. In mid-ocean another ship came into sight, and as England and France were at war, all feared that the strange vessel might be an enemy. The crew prepared for action. Penn and his friends, who did not believe in warfare, went below. Only one of Penn’s party remained on deck to help defend the ship, James Logan.
Soon Logan went below to tell Penn that the strange vessel was English, when Penn reproved him for undertaking to engage in fighting, as he was a Quaker. The young man replied with spirit: “Why did thee not order me to come down? Thee was willing enough that I should stay and help to fight, when thee thought there was danger!”
Penn expected to stay in Pennsylvania the rest of his life, but on his visit he was able to spend less than two years here. But during his stay, Logan had become not only a helper but also an intimate friend.