"The Boston people pretending to interfere with the manufactures of this country, make a great clamour here against America in general. I have endeavoured, therefore, to palliate matters a little in several public papers. It would, as you justly observe, give less umbrage if we meddled only with such manufactures as England does not attend to. That of linen might be carried on more or less in every family, (perhaps it can only do in a family way) and silk I think in most of the colonies. But there are many manufactures that we cannot carry on to advantage, though we were at entire liberty. And after all, this country is fond of manufactures beyond their real value: for the true source of riches is husbandry. Agriculture is truly productive of new wealth; manufacturers only change forms; and whatever value they give to the materials they work upon, they in the meantime consume an equal value in provisions, &c.; so that riches are not increased by manufacturing; the only advantage is, that provisions in the shape of manufactures, are more easily carried for sale to foreign markets, and where the provisions cannot be easily carried to market, 'tis well so to transform them for our own use as well as foreign sale. In families also, where the children and servants of farmers have some spare time, 'tis well to employ it in making something; and in spinning, or knitting, &c. to gather up the fragments of time, that nothing be lost; for these fragments though small in themselves, amount to something great in the year, and the family must eat whether they work or are idle. But this nation seems to have increased the number of its manufactures beyond reasonable bounds, (for there are bounds to every thing,) whereby provisions are now risen to an exorbitant price by the demand for supplying home mouths; so that there must be an importation from foreign countries: but the expense of bringing provisions from abroad to feed manufacturers here, will so enhance the price of the manufactures, that they may be made cheaper where the provisions grow, and the mouths will go to the meat.
"With many thanks for your good wishes, I am, dear friend, affectionately yours,
B. FRANKLIN.
"Dr. Cadwallader Evans."
FOR THE RURAL MAGAZINE.
THE DESULTORY REMARKER.—No. I.
At lucre or renown let others aim,
I only wish to please the gentle mind,
Whom Nature's charms inspire, and lore of humankind.
Beattie.
Perhaps there is no nation existing, amongst whom there is so large a proportion of readers, as may be found in the United States. The freedom of our form of government, and its appropriate concomitant, the freedom of the press, impart the requisite facilities for a wide dissemination of knowledge, and furnish the motives and the means for cultivating it with success. Of newspapers, we have, if not a redundant, at least a copious supply. They are introduced into almost every nook and by-place of our extensive territory; and no individual who can read, need deny himself the gratification, of poring over their pages, and learnedly descanting on their contents. The moral influence of these popular vehicles of intelligence, may therefore from these facts, be properly estimated, and the importance of their being judiciously conducted, will at once be acknowledged. It is not the ponderous volume, the learned and elaborate dissertation, the abstruse researches of the ontologist, that moulds the sentiments of the great mass of any people, and implants in their bosoms the every-day principles of action; for to these they are utter strangers, and the laborious student may continue to monopolize them, without exciting in their minds the slightest regret: that however, which is brief, and simple, and practical, in other words, that which will be generally read, cannot fail to produce a deep and lasting impression on the public mind.