72 Choate: Franklin 



till 1785, when he arrived home from Paris, bringing his 

 sheaves with him in the shape of one of the most im- 

 portant and beneficent treaties ever signed between na- 

 tions, he was always the diplomatist, the foremost of his 

 time, or, as I think, of any time. It is not in the nature 

 of things to divide Franklin into three distinct sections 

 or compartments, as our program of to-day invites us 

 to do, and find in each a distinct being labelled " philan- 

 thropist," " philosopher " and " statesman," because he 

 was everywhere and always the same Franklin, unique 

 and indivisible, and the same qualities which made him 

 great in the other relations of life, in which he has just 

 been depicted, made him also the great statesman. It 

 was that marvellous common sense in uncommon propor- 

 tions, that powerful and active brain, capable almost 

 from childhood of dealing with any subject, his tireless 

 industry, self-denial, tact, thrift and good nature, and 

 his unfailing interest in human afifairs, his courage and 

 wit and self-assertion that made this all-round man pre- 

 eminently fit for any service, public or private. 



He had one vast advantage over all the other chief 

 founders of our republic, in his superior age and expe- 

 rience and public prestige. When Franklin had already 

 snatched the lightning from the clouds, and taken his 

 place among the most famous of the earth, Washington 

 was still following the modest career of a surveyor in 

 the Alleghany hills and valleys. John Adams was still 



