It was at the time thought to be the highest praise that could be conferred upon a man when Turgot, in his celebrated epigram, said of Franklin: “Eripuit cœlo fulmen, sceptrumque tyrannis” (“He snatched the lightning from the heavens, and the scepter from the hand of the tyrants”). In one respect this poetic compliment, however great, was not large enough. For it might well be added that Franklin also stripped science of its mystery and virtue of its terrors.
He was the greatest of Americans; one of the great men in history, and, with all his greatness, a most genuine man of the people.
FROM HORACE WHITE
Confidential.
My dear Schurz: My interview with Governor Cleveland has left this impression on my mind; that his present inclination is to appoint Bayard, Secretary of State, Whitney, Secretary of Treasury, Garland, Attorney-General and J. Q. Adams,[1] Postmaster-General or something else. He asked my opinion of Trumbull without being led up to it by me in any way. So I infer that he had had Trumbull in his mind for some time. I did lead up to Adams, and he said that he had mentioned Adams to some of his friends without, however, intending that any inference should be drawn from it. Then he added that the name of Adams would go a great way in any Cabinet and that since J. Q. had been a consistent Democrat from the war period down, no objection could be raised against him on that score. He holds the same opinion of Judge Abbott that you do and expressed it in almost the same words.
I used every argument that could be thought of against the appointment of Whitney—in a temperate way of course. I need not recapitulate them to you. He met them all with counter-arguments, or rather he stated whatever was to be
- ↑ Eldest son of Chas. Francis Adams, Sr.
