Advice on your 228th Birthday

by Poor Richard Saunders (A.K.A. Ben Franklin, guest of Mr. Ted Mallory)


Seeing as I am a good seventy years your elder, I’d like to pass on some advice. Not that I’m so wise, but frankly, I’ve noticed that you seem to be going through a bit of a mid-life crisis lately.

Before my 214 year-long sabbatical from writing I often advocated seven virtues:

1. An aversion to tyranny

A tyrant wields their power unjustly and arbitrarily. Tyrants seek absolute power. They assume they are above reproach and beyond scrutiny. Be vigilant against collective tyrants- for a tyrant may be a movement or a way of thinking just as easily as it may be a person.

Don’t let your leaders taste too much power for too long, lest they glut themselves upon it at the expense of your liberties. “Throw the bums out, I say. It may be perfectly responsible to vote against all incumbents on occasion, regardless of their party or what good they have done in office. In order to work right democracy needs balance. Balance is achieved by what scientists call “dynamic tension,” I call it change and struggle.

A hallmark of middle-age is becoming just like your parents. When you think you’ve lost your way, think back to how Britain treated you, and make sure you don’t behave that same way toward others.

2. A Free press

It could be your best defense against tyranny. Unfortunately reporters have become parasites. They don’t challenge politicians because they don’t want to be cut off.

Today’s media is a slave to money. In my day, journalism was a public service, today it’s big business. Rather than covering what’s important, they cover what sells.

3. A sense of humor

If you laugh about your faults before your adversaries even have a chance to point them out, you have disarmed them. When you take yourself too seriously you fall under the tyranny of your own self righteousness.

Of course, a spoonful of sugar also helps the medicine go down. People are much more likely to listen and learn, even be persuaded if they’re also given a laugh.

4. Humility

What makes you think you know everything there is to know and that you are always right about everything? “Pride goeth before the fall.” If I truly believe that “All men are created equal,” then I have no right to think that anyone is beneath me. Jesus himself chose to be the servant of all. Perhaps we’d do well to imitate him more closely.

5. A healthy balance of idealism and realism

Pray like it all depends on God, then work like it all depends on you. Practical people base their decisions on observation, evidence and what works. If you base your decisions on your passions, you’ll shipwreck your life. On the other hand, people without principles are like ships without anchors. Nature demands balance. What good is it to try to fly a kite without holding onto it by a string?

Richard Nixon was effective, but unprincipled. Jimmy Carter has noble character, but people perceive him as ineffective. Besides, one person’s ideas always seem to be at odds with someone else’s. If one believes in civil rights and social justice, another will believe in state’s rights and criminal justice. Both will accuse the other of being immoral.

As Scripture says, “be shrewd as serpents yet as innocent as doves.”

6. Compromise

People don’t remember that Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence that slavery was immoral and should end. Southern Congressmen refused to pass the Declaration unless we removed that paragraph. John Adams was fit to be tied! I’d been against slavery for decades, but I had to convince Jefferson and Adams to let it go. Compromise is an ugly business and there are certainly times to stand your ground, but more good has been done by compromise than by bull-headed stubbornness.

7. Tolerance

Why has this become such a dirty word lately? There wouldn’t be a Fourth of July if we hadn’t compromised on slavery. The self-righteous New Englanders had to tolerate the self-righteous Southerners and vice versa. We all have the same Maker, alike objects of His care, equally designed for happiness, whether plantation-owning pompous-asses or Boston fish-wipes! If we are to get anywhere in this life we must agree to disagree and allow each other to peacefully coexist.

Only when you start with the assumption that everyman is your equal can you begin to talk about what ideas and policies are right and wrong, rather than which person or group is good and bad. Then maybe we’ll live up to our motto- “E Pluribus Unum,” one from many.

Let the Maker sort out the good from the bad, that’s not our place but His anyway. Trust that in due time He’ll intervene on behalf of just causes, just as He did for the cause of American Independence.

Happy Birthday, old girl!

Your friend and servant,

R Saunders