Agit8r
Gold Member
- Dec 4, 2010
- 12,141
- 2,209
- 245
"if my Countrymen should ever wish for the Honour of having among them a Gentry enormously wealthy, let them sell their Farms and pay rack'd Rents; the Scale of the Landlords will rise as that of the Tenants is depress'd who will soon become poor, tattered, dirty, and abject in Spirit. Had I never been in the American Colonies, but was to form my Judgment of Civil Society by what I have lately seen [in Ireland and Scotland], I should never advise a Nation of Savages to admit of Civilisation: For I assure you, that in the Possession and Enjoyment of the various Comforts of Life, compar'd to these People every Indian is a Gentleman: And the Effect of this kind of Civil Society seems only to be, the depressing Multitudes below the Savage State that a few may be rais'd above it"
-- Benjamin Franklin; from letter to Joshua Babcock (Jan. 13. 1772)
-
-- Benjamin Franklin; from letter to Joshua Babcock (Jan. 13. 1772)
-