Review: Literary Miscellany: containing Select Pieces by Dr. Franklin

Literary Miscellany: containing Select Pieces by Dr. Franklin by Benjamin Franklin
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is a lively collection of Franklin's jocular wisdom, much of it in the Poor Richard mold, even explicitly so. This publication is undated. Is it one of William Hilliard's collections? I think it 1790+, maybe early 19th Century:

1. Qualitatively, the lack of long s and the high printing accuracy and quality makes me think it is well after 1790
2. on Page. 33 There is one piece dated 1760s and one 1770s. I doubt both are typos.
3. The back cover, attached, advertises multiple pieces I believe will be found to be published in the late 18th Century.
3a. Moral tales. The shrubbery, and The triumph of beauty, by. T. Potter 179x
3b. Sarah phillips from st. lambert 178x

Personally, may guess is 181x.

Anyway, the first 25, or over half, the content is in praise of frugality with much quips of the "penny saved..." form. After that, it is a wide gamut from praise of chess, the benefits of nudism in the privacy of the home ( a cold air bath, by Franklin ) and a peculiar period piece on preparing for sea travel. Franklin says don't bother to bring live poultry as feeding them is too much effort and expect the whole experience to by uncomfortable. There is an article suggesting using bell towers to start each day at daybreak, sort of a daylight savings time approach. The final two pieces were bits of Christian mysticism that came across as quite sincere and worshipful. They were very explicit calls to the Creator and not what I would expect from a deist.

(Deists believed God did not intervene in the lives of his human creation. He did not perform miracles, answer prayer, or sustain the world by his providence. Religious belief was based on reason rather than divine revelation. In his The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, Franklin wrote that a series of lectures, published by the estate of British scientist Robert Boyle, designed to counter the influence of Deism "wrought an Effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by them: For the Arguments of the Deists which were quoted to be refuted, appeared to me much Stronger than the Refutation." He claimed he had become a "thorough Deist." These pieces seem to belie that or perhaps are from before that.)

Thanks to #RemnantTrust for making this available for me to read. Me reading this book:

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