From Benjamin Franklin to William Temple Franklin, 25 August 1784
To William Temple Franklin
ALS: American Philosophical Society
Passy, Augt. 25. 1784 Wednesday.—
My dear Child,
Nothing very material has happen’d since you left us.7 The D. [Duke] of Dorset call’d yesterday, and enquir’d if I had heard from you, supposing you had been gone a Week. Mr Adams & Family, Made D’andelot and other Friends have visited me, & Made Saurin who is return’d from England.8 We din’d with her yesterday. She says Made. D’hauteville will be glad to see you in England, wishes you would call upon her, and has given me her Address, which I enclose.—9 We dine, Ben & I, today with M. de Chaumont, & Saturday with Mr Adams.
The Report is publish’d1 and makes a great deal of Talk. Every body agrees that it is well written; but many wonder at the Force of Imagination describ’d in it, as occasioning Convulsions, &c. and some fear that Consequences may be drawn from it by Infidels to weaken our Faith in some of the Miracles of the New Testament. I send you two more Copies. You would do well to give one to the French Ambassador,2 if he has not had it.— Some think it will put an End to Mesmerism. But there is a wonderful deal of Credulity in the World, and Deceptions as absurd, have supported themselves for Ages.
I send you a few more Letters,3 and am Your affectionate Grandfather
B. Franklin
P.S. Mrs Holt, Printer to the State in N York, is punctual since her Husband’s Death,4 in sending me News Papers by every Packet. At the Entrance of the Exchange is a little Shop where they sell all the London Newspapers. I would have you buy a few of the latest and send to her, and let her know it is by my Order. You will find a Bag up in the New York Coffee-House, in which you can put the Packet directed to her.
W. T. Franklin
Addressed: Wm. T. Franklin, Esqr / London
Notation: B. Franklin Augt. 25. 1784.—
7. WTF left Passy on Aug. 23. He had planned to leave the day before, but BF had not yet finished his dispatches: BFB’s journal, entries of Aug. 22 and 23. WTF carried 13 letters by BF that have been located. Those to Benjamin Vaughan, July 26[—Aug. 15], and to Mary Hewson, Aug. 15, are in XLII, 441–8, 509. In the present volume are letters to WF and Richard Price, Aug. 16; John Walter and Benjamin West, Aug. 17; Lord Howe and James Hutton, Aug. 18; William Strahan, Aug. 19; Joseph Banks, John Calder, and George Whatley, Aug. 21; and Jonathan Shipley, Aug. 22. WTF also carried a letter from Fitzmaurice to Lord Shelburne; from Walterstorff to two unnamed recipients; and from Staël von Holstein to the baron von Nolcken, the Swedish envoy in London: Fitzmaurice to WTF, Aug. 12, 1784; Walterstorff to WTF, Aug. 13, 1784; Stael von Holstein to WTF, Aug. 20, 1784; all at the APS.
8. JA and his family moved into a house in Auteuil on Aug. 17; see XLII, 466n. On the morning of Aug. 24, JA, his wife, and their daughter, Abigail, called on BF. The younger Abigail noted that BF “is now near 80 years old and looks in good health”: [Caroline A. Smith de Windt, ed.], Journal and Correspondence of Miss Adams, Daughter of John Adams … (2 vols., New York and London, 1841–42), 1, 16. We have no record of when the comtesse d’Andlau, Mme Helvétius’ daughter, visited. BF had dined at the home of Mme Saurin (Sorin) on July 25: XLII, 378.
9. The enclosure is missing. Mme d’Hauteville was Ferdinand Grand’s niece Louise-Claudine (1745–1796), who in 1781 had married Jean-Louis Cannac d’Hauteville, a military officer: [Frédéric S. Grand d’Hauteville], Le Chateau d’Hauteville et la baronnie de St-Légier et La Chiésaz (Lausanne, 1932),pp. 85, 203, 212–13.
1. The report of the royal commission on animal magnetism. WTF must have known it was published, as he carried a packet of six copies to deliver to Joseph Banks from Le Roy; see the annotation of BF to Banks, Aug. 21.
2. The comte d’Adhémar: XL, 14n.
3. The only one WTF received was BF’s Aug. 25 letter to Shelburne: WTF to BF, Sept. 2, below.
4. John Holt (v, 441n), a newspaper publisher who also became the official printer of New York in 1777, died on Jan. 30, 1784. His widow, Elizabeth Hunter Holt (XV, 289n), inherited the title of state printer and continued his publishing operations for a few more years: ANB and DAB, both under John Holt; Charles R. Hildeburn, Sketches of Printers and Printing in Colonial New York (New York, 1895), pp. 96, 98.