If it were communicable by descent, it must also be divisible among the descendants, and the more ancient the family the less would be found existing in any one branch of it; to say nothing of the greater chance of unlucky interruptions.
Franklin discusses the implications of hereditary honors and their divisibility among descendants.
Share
More from Benjamin Franklin
I wish old England were as happy in its government, but I do not see it.
Yet had I gone at 70, it would have cut off 12 of the most active years of my life, employed too in matters of the greatest importance; but whether I have been doing good or mischief, is for time to discover.
With these sentiments he left England; but when, on his arrival in America, he found the war begun, and that there was no receding, no man entered more warmly into the interests of what he then considered as his country, in opposition to…
It is with a melancholy regret I think of his death; but to death we are all bound by the irreversible order of nature, and in looking forward to it, there is comfort in being able to reflect--that we have not lived in vain, and that all…
Other voices in this conversation
