People who have property in a country which they may lose, and privileges which they may endanger, are generally disposed to be quiet, and even to bear much, rather than hazard all.
Benjamin Franklin: “People who have property in a country which they may lose, and privileges which they may endanger, are generally…”
Editor's note · Context
Franklin highlights the tendency of property owners to avoid conflict to protect their interests.
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No part of these monies was ever paid by the proprietaries, or ever raised on their estates; and therefore they can have no pretence of right to a voice in the disposition of them.
Some manufactures we could make, but are forbidden, and must take them of British merchants: the whole price is a tax paid to Britain.
Our legal method of compulsion is by imprisonment: the Indians cannot and will not imprison one another; and if we attempt to imprison them, I apprehend it would be generally disliked by the nations, and occasion breaches.
If the English would advance one step further, or cover themselves where they are, it must be at once, by one large step over the mountains, with a numerous and military colony.





