“We met on Friday evenings. The rules that I drew up required that every member, in his turn, should produce one or more queries on any point of Morals, Politics, or Natural Philosophy, to be discuss’d by the company; and once in three months produce and read an essay of his own writing, on any subject he pleased. Our debates were to be under the direction of a president, and to be conducted in the sincere spirit of inquiry after truth, without fondness for dispute, or desire of victory; and, to prevent warmth, all expressions of positiveness in opinions, or direct contradiction, were after some time made contraband, and prohibited under small pecuniary penalties.”
From other sources we learn that when a new member was initiated he stood up and, with his hand on his breast, was asked the following questions:
“1. Have you any particular disrespect to any present member? Answer: I have not.
“2. Do you sincerely declare that you love mankind in general of what profession or religion soever? Answer: I do.
“3. Do you think any person ought to be harmed in his body, name, or goods for mere speculative opinions or his external way of worship? Answer: No.
“4. Do you love truth for truth’s sake, and will you endeavor impartially to find and receive it yourself and communicate it to others? Answer: Yes.”
At every meeting certain questions were read, with a pause after each one; and these questions might very well have been suggested by those of the Mather benefit societies. The first six are sufficient to give an idea of them all:
“1. Have you met with anything in the author you last read, remarkable or suitable to be communicated to the Junto, particularly in history, morality, poetry, physic, travels, mechanic arts, or other parts of knowledge?
“2. What new story have you lately heard, agreeable for telling in conversation?
“3. Hath any citizen in your knowledge failed in his business lately, and what have you heard of the cause?
“4. Have you lately heard of any citizen’s thriving well, and by what means?
“5. Have you lately heard how any present rich man, here or elsewhere, got his estate?
“6. Do you know of a fellow-citizen, who has lately done a worthy action, deserving praise and imitation; or who has lately committed an error, proper for us to be warned against and avoid?”
The number of members was limited to twelve, and Franklin always opposed an increase. Instead of adding to the membership, he suggested that each member form a similar club, and five or six were thus organized, with such names as The Vine, The Union, The Band. The original club is said to have continued for forty years. But it did not keep up its old character. Its original purpose had been to educate its members, to supply the place of the modern academy or college; but when the members became older and their education more complete, they cared no longer for self-imposed tasks of essay-writing and formal debate on set questions. They turned it into a social club, or, rather, they dropped its educational and continued its social side,—for it had always been social, and even convivial, which was one of the means adopted for keeping the members together and rendering their studies easy and pleasant.
A list of some of the questions discussed by the Junto has been preserved, from which a few are given as specimens:
“Is sound an entity or body?
“How may the phenomena of vapors be explained?
“Is self-interest the rudder that steers mankind?
“Which is the best form of government, and what was that form which first prevailed among mankind?
“Can any one particular form of government suit all mankind?
“What is the reason that the tides rise higher in the Bay of Fundy than in the Bay of Delaware?”
The young men who every Friday evening debated such questions as these were certainly acquiring an education which was not altogether an inferior substitute for that furnished by our modern institutions endowed with millions of dollars and officered by plodding professors prepared by years of exhaustive study. But the plodding professors and the modern institutions are necessary, because young men, as a rule, cannot educate themselves. The Junto could not have existed without Franklin. He inspired and controlled it. His personality and energy pervaded it, and the eleven other members were but clay in his hands. His rare precocity and enthusiasm inspired a love for and an interest in study which money, apparatus, and professors often fail to arouse.