for this reason, for the great spiritual forces fail when they neglect the
material foundations imposed on mortals. Franklin was as necessary as
Jonathan Edwards. Franklin knew the importance of those foundation habits,
without which higher morality is not possible. He impressed on men the
necessity of being regular, temperate, industrious, saving, of curbing
desire, and of avoiding vice. The very foundations of character rest on
regularity, on good habits so inflexibly formed that it is painful to break
them. Franklin's success in laying these foundations was phenomenal. His
_Poor Richard's Almanac_, begun in 1733, was one of his chief agencies in
reaching the common people. They read, reread, and acted on such proverbs
as the following, which he published in this _Almanac_ from year to year:--

[Footnote: The figures in parenthesis indicate the year of publication.]

"He has changed his one ey'd horse for a blind one" (1733).

"Three may keep a secret, if two of them are dead" (1735).

"Wealth is not his that has it, but his that enjoys it" (1736).

"Fly pleasures and they'll follow you" (1738).

"Have you somewhat to do to-morrow; do it to-day" (1742).

"Tart words make no friends: a spoonful of honey will catch more flies than
a gallon of vinegar" (1744).

In 1757 Franklin gathered together what seemed to him the most striking of
these proverbs and published them as a preface to the _Almanac_ for 1758.
This preface, the most widely read of all his writings, has since been