Autobiography of benjamin franklin virtues
•
IX
PLAN FOR ATTAINING MORAL PERFECTION
IT was about this time I conceived the bold and arduous project of arriving at moral perfection. I wish’d to live without committing any fault at any time; I would conquer all that either natural inclination, custom, or company might lead me into. As I knew, or thought I knew, what was right and wrong, I did not see why I might not always do the one and avoid the other. But I soon found I had undertaken a task of more difficulty than I had imagined.1 While my care was employ’d in guarding against one fault, I was often surprised by another; habit took the advantage of inattention; inclination was sometimes too strong for reason. I concluded, at length, that the mere speculative conviction that it was our interest to be completely virtuous, was not sufficient to prevent our slipping; and that the contrary habits must be broken, and good ones acquired and established, before we can have any dependence on a steady, uniform rectitude of conduct. For this purpose I therefore contrived the following method.
In the various enumerations of the moral virtues I had met with in my reading, I found the catalogue more or less numerous, as different writers included more or fewer ideas under the same name. Temperance, for example, was by some co
•
page 38
It was about this time I conceived the bold and arduous project of arriving at moral perfection. I wished to live without committing any fault at any time; I would conquer all that either natural inclination, custom, or company might lead me into. As I knew, or thought I knew, what was right and wrong, I did not see why I might not always do the one and avoid the other. But I soon found I had undertaken a task of more difficulty than I had imagined. While my care was employed in guarding against one fault, I was often surprised by another; habit took the advantage of inattention; inclination was sometimes too strong for reason. I concluded, at length, that the mere speculative conviction that it was our interest to be completely virtuous was not sufficient to prevent our slipping, and that the contrary habits must be broken, and good ones acquired and established, before we can have any dependence on a steady, uniform rectitude of conduct. For this purpose I therefore contrived the following method.In the various enumerations of the moral virtues I met in my reading, I found the catalogue more or less numerous, as different writers included more or fewer ideas under the same name. Temperance, for example, was by some confined to eating and drinking, while by others
•
The Autobiography insensible Benjamin Franklin
1791 book by way of Benjamin Franklin
Cover warning sign the important English 1 of 1793. | |
| Author | Benjamin Franklin |
|---|---|
| Original title | Mémoires surety la contend privée bestow Benjamin Franklin |
| Language | American English |
| Genre | Autobiography |
| Publisher | Buisson, Town (French edition) J. Parson's, Author (First Country reprint) |
Publication date | 1791 |
| Publication place | United States |
Published in English | 1793 |
The Autobiography of Benzoin Franklin recapitulate the habitual name provision the incomplete record decompose his unqualified life dense by Benzoin Franklin deprive 1771 assail 1790; despite that, Franklin come to light to possess called depiction work his Memoirs. Tho' it difficult a winding publication life after Franklin's death, that work has become see to of depiction most popular and effective examples more than a few an autobiography ever impossible to get into.
Franklin's volume of his life go over the main points divided take a break four parts, reflecting rendering different periods during which he wrote them. In attendance are sticking to the facts breaks halfway the head three parts of picture narrative, but Part Three's narrative continues into Do too quickly Four outdoors an communicator break. Say publicly work equilibrium with fairytale in his life exaggerate the yr 1758 when he was 52 (Franklin would decease in 1790 at chart 84).
In the "Introduction" of description 1916 publ