Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 4.djvu/372

338 ruins and evolved a new social order from the agonies of universal overthrow. And there stood, in his embrace, Franklin, the calm, serene, benignant apostle of common-sense—the child of a society in itself unembarrassed and unhampered by the oppressions and tyrannies of the past; a society of equals all engaged in productive work to better their fortunes; no traditional social structure in their way to be destroyed; their welfare dependent only upon a wise development of existing conditions; he himself the philosopher of utility; his mind constantly at work to make the life of his fellow-beings more comfortable and happy, in small things as well as great; his ideal of revolution and liberty not “that the last King should be strangled with the guts of the last priest,” but that his people should not be taxed without their own consent; that they should shake off the yoke of a distant power seeking so to tax them, and then be free quietly to regulate their own affairs,—his whole being toleration, benevolence and light.

It is certain that Voltaire never could have been Voltaire had he grown up in America; and it is equally certain that Franklin, while he highly respected Voltaire as a “Literary Patriarch” and all that, had no conception at all of the revolutionary significance of Voltaire's work. It is remarkable that in Franklin's large correspondence not a single utterance is to be found indicating that he saw in the French people and in the movement of ideas any symptoms of an approaching political and social earthquake. It was not Solon and Sophocles that embraced, but the genius of American self-government and the genius of the French revolution, utterly incapable of understanding and appreciating one another.

The phenomenal popularity of the philosopher was, of course, a great aid to the diplomat. But Franklin possessed in the highest degree that invaluable diplomatic