to keep the fecret till the arrival of the materials, and I was in the mean time to procure work, if poffible, in another printing-houfe; but there was no place vacant, and I remained idle. After fome days, Keimer having the expectation of being employed to print fome New-Jerfey money-bills, that would require types and engravings which I only could furnish, and fearful that Bradford by engaging me might deprive him of the undertaking, fent me very civil meffage telling me that old friends ought not to be difunited on account of a few words which were the effect only of a momentary paffion and invited me to return to him. Meredith per fuaded me to comply with the invitation, particu larly as it would afford him more opportunities of improving himself in the bufinefs by means of my inftructions. I did fo, and we lived upon better terms than before our feparation. He obtained the New-Jerfey bufinefs; and, in order to execute it, I conftructed a copper-plate printing-prefs; the first that had been seen in the country. I engraved various ornaments and vig nettes for the bills; and we repaired to Burlington together, where I executed the whole to the gene ral fatisfaction; and he received a fum of money for this work, which enabled him to keep his head above water for a confiderable time longer. At Burlington I formed acquaintance with the principal perfonages of the province; many of whom were commiflioned by the affembly to fu perintend the prefs, and to fee that no more bills were printed than the law had prefcribed. Accor dingly they were conftantly with us, each in his turn; and he that came commonly brought with him a friend or two to bear him company. My mind was more cultivated by reading than Keimer's; and it was for this reason, probably, that they fet more value on my converfation. They took me to their houses, introduced me to their friends and treated me with the greatest civility; while Keimer, though mafter, faw himfelf a little neglected. He was, in fact, a ftrange animal, ignorant of the common modes of life, apt to oppose with rudeness generally received opinions, an enthufiaft in certain points of religion, difguftingly unclean in his perfon, and a little knavith withal. He We remained there nearly three months; and at the expiration of this period I could conclude in the lift of my friends, Judge Allen, Samuel Buftil, fecretary of the province, Ifaac Pearfon, Joseph Cooper, feveral of the Smiths, all members of the affembly, and Ifaac Deacon, infpector-general. The laft was a fhrewd and fubtle old man. told me, that, when a boy, his firft employment had been that of carrying clay to brick-makers: that he did not learn to write till he was fome what ad vanced in life; that he was afterwards employed as an underling to a furveyor, who taught him his trade, and that by industry he had at laft acquired a competent fortune. "I forefee," faid he one day to me, "that you will foon fupplant this man," fpeaking of Keimer, "and get a fortune in the bufinefs at Philadelphia." He was totally ig norant at the time of my intention of establishing myfelf there, or any where elfe. Thefe friends were very ferviceable to me in the end, as was I alfo upon occafion to fome of them; and they have continued ever fince their esteem for me. Before Lrelate the particulars of my entrance into bufinefs, it may be proper to inform you what VOL. I. H was at that time the ftate of my mind as to moral principles that you may fee the degree of influence they had upon the fubfequent events of my life. My parents had given me betimes religious impreffions; and I received from my infancy a pious education in the principles of Calvanism. But fcarcely was I arrived at fifteen years of age, when, after having doubted in turn of different tenets, according as I found them combated in the different books that I read, I began to doubt of revela tion itself. Some volumes against deism fell into my hands. They were faid to be the substance of fermons preached at Boyle's lecture. It happened that they produced on me an effect precifely the reverse of what was intended by the writers; for the arguments of the deifts, which were cited. in order to be refuted, appeared to me much more forcible than the refutation itself. In a word, I foon became a perfect deift. My arguments perverted fome other young perfons; particularly Collins and Ralph. But in the fequel, when I recollected that they had both ufed me extremely ill, without the left remorfe; when I confidered the behaviour of Keith, another freethinker, and my own conduct towards Vernon and Mils Read, which at times gave me much uneafines, I was led to fufpect that this doctrine, though it might be true, was not very useful. I began to entertain a lefs favourable opinion of my London pamphlet, to which I had prefixed, as a motto, the following lines of Dryden; 2 Whatever is, is right; tho' purblind man, and of which the object was to prove, from the attributes of God, his goodness, wifdom, and power, that there could be no fuch thing as evil in the world; that vice and virtue did not in reality exift and were nothing more than vain diftinctions. I no longer regarded it as fo blamelefs a work as I had formerly imagined; and I fufpected that fome error must have imperceptibly have glided into my argument, by all the inferrences I had drawn from it had been affected as frequently happens in metaphyfical reafonings. In a word, I was at laft convinced that truth, probity, and fincerity, in tranfactions between man and man, were of the utmost importance to the happiness of life; and I refolved from that moment, and wrote the refolution in my journal, to practise them as long as I lived. Revelation indeed, as fuch, had no influence on my mind; but I was of opinion that, though certain actions could not be bad merely becaufe revelation prohibited them, or good because it enjoined them, yet it was probable that those actions were prohibited because they were bad for us, or enjoined because advantageous in their nature, all things confidered. This perfuafion, divine providence, or fome guardian angel, and perhaps a concurrence of favourable circumftances co-operating, preferved me from all immorality, or grofs and voluntary injuftice, to which my want of religion was calculated to expofe me, in the dangerous period of youth and in the hazardous fituations in which I fometimes found myself, among strangers, and at a distance from the eye and admonitions of my father. I may fay voluntary, because the errors into which I had fallen, had been in a manner the ་ forced refult either of my own inexperience, or the difhonefty of others. Thus, before I entered on my new career, I had imbibed folid principles, and a character of probity. I knew their value; and I made a folemn engagement with myfelf never to depart from them. I had not long returned from Burlington before our printing materials arrived from London. I fettled my accounts with Keimer, and quitted him, with his own confent, before he had any knowledge of our plan. We found a houfe to let near the market. We took it; and to render the rent lefs burthenfome (it was then twenty-four pounds a-year, but I have fince known it to let for feventy,) we admitted Thomas Godfrey, a glazier, with his family, who eafed us of a confiderable part of it; and with him we agreed to board. We had no fooner unpacked our letter, and put our prefs in order, than a perfon of iny acquaintance, George Houfe brought us a countryman, whom he had met in the streets enquiring for a printer. Our money was almoft exhaufted by the number of things we had been obliged to procure. The five fhillings we received from this country. man the first fruit of our earnings, coming fo fea donably, gave me more pleasure than any fum I have fince gained: and the recollection of the gratitude I felt on this occafion to George House, has rendered me often more difpofed, than perhaps I should otherwife have been, to encourage young beginners in trade. There are in every country morofe beings, who are always prognofticating ruin. There was one of this ftamp in Philadelphia. He was a man of fortune, declined in years, had an air of wifdəm, |