fortune, for the attributes of his talents, imitate his errors, and
imagine that, by copying the blemishes of his conduct, they possess what
is illustrious in his mind. Such men are incapable of appreciating the
self-denial which Benjamin West made it a duty to impose upon himself on
entering the world; but to those who are truly conscious of possessing
the means of attracting the admiration of their contemporaries and
posterity, the voluntary abstinence of a youth of genius will afford them
delight in the contemplation, even though they may be happily free from
the obligation of practising it themselves.

When it was determined among the Friends that Benjamin West should be
allowed to cultivate the art of Painting, he went to Lancaster, but he was
hastily recalled by a severe domestic misfortune. His mother was seized by
a dangerous illness, and being conscious that she could not live long, she
requested that he might be sent for home. Benjamin hastily obeyed the
summons, but, before he reached the house, her strength was exhausted, and
she was only able to express by her look the satisfaction with which she
saw him approach the bed, before she expired. Her funeral, and the
distress which the event naturally occasioned to her family, by all of
whom she was very tenderly beloved, detained the young Artist some time at
his father's. About the end of August, in 1756, however, he took his
final departure, and went to Philadelphia. But, before proceeding with
the narrative of his professional career, it is necessary to advert to
some of the public transactions of that period, by which his sensibility
was powerfully excited. Indeed it will appear throughout the whole of
these singular memoirs, that the subject of them was, perhaps, more
immediately affected by the developement of national events, than usually
falls to the lot of any individual so little connected with public men,
and so far remote from the great thoroughfare of political occurrences.