THE celebrated DR. BENJAMIN FRANKLIN was born, January 17, 1706, at Boston, in New England. He was the youngest son of a very numerous family; and his father, a tallow-chandler, took him from school, at the age of ten, to assist in the business. He preferred being a sailor; but was, at length, bound apprentice to one of his brothers, a printer. Anxious to improve his mind, he confined himself to vegetable diet, that he might save sufficient to buy books, out of his allowance for board; and found his apprehension much quicker, by temperance in eating and drinking. At the age of seventeen, thus early in life eager for independence, he fled from the despotism of his fraternal master, to Philadelphia, where he obtained employ as a journeyman; and, soon attracting the notice of governor Keith, was advised to commence business for himself. With this view, he came to England, December 24, 1724: but, finding the governor had given him fallacious hopes of procuring materials, after working two years in London, he returned to Philadelphia as a merchant's clerk. In 1727, his employer dying, he again followed his own business; till, in partnership with a young man, whose father supplied capital, he commenced printing and publishing the second newspaper in Philadelphia. In 1730, he was united to a young woman whom he had courted before her first marriage. Availing himself, with his pen, of the powers of a newspaper, he became acquainted with most of the chief people in the province, and soon rose to consideration. He had established a club, under the name of the Junto; whose members discussed various points of morals, politics, and natural philosophy, and read essays which they purposely composed. Out of this emanated, in 1731, a subscription library, for which a charter was finally obtained, proving the mother of all the numerous North American subscription libraries, and their important consequences.

In 1736, he was appointed clerk to the general assembly; in 1737, post-master of Philadelphia; and, in the war of 1744, proposed the plan of a volunteer association, which was signed by 10,000 persons. About this period, he commenced those electrical experiments, which were published, in London, under the title of New Experiments and Observations on Electricity, made at Philadelphia, in America. In 1747, he was chosen a representative of Philadelphia in the general assembly of Pennsylvania; and, though no orator, was soon regarded as the head of the opposition.

In 1757, having been previously, in 1753, appointed deputy postmaster general, he came to England with a petition to the king and council; and, succeeding to the satisfaction of the state, remained as agent for Pennsylvania, and also for Massachusett's, Maryland, and Georgia. He now divided his time between philosophy and politics: and was admitted a fellow of the royal society; and honoured with the degree of doctor of laws, by the university of Oxford. In 1766, he was examined at the bar of the house of commons, respecting the stamp act, which was shortly after repealed; and, on the 29th of January 1774, before the privy council, on a petition against governor Hutchinson: soon after which, he was removed from his office of postmaster general of America.

He returned home in 1775; and being elected a member of the congress, had a principal share in effecting the independence of the united states. He was employed, in 1778, to negociate a treaty of offensive and defensive alliance with the French, which produced the war between England and France. In 1783, he signed the definitive treaty of peace; and, in 1785, returned to America, where he was twice chosen president of the supreme council. In 1788, he requested and obtained permission to retire; and died the 17th of April 1790: leaving one son, the late governor Franklin, a zealous loyalist; and one daughter, married to a merchant in Philadelphia.

FREDERIC THE GREAT,

KING OF PRUSSIA.

FOR genius, for enterprise, and for heroism, no monarch of modern times may be put in competition with the late Charles Frederic, commonly stiled Frederic II. third King of Prussia; who filled the throne for nearly half a century, and gave his country a weight in the scale of empires, which at once awed and astonished Europe.

This magnanimous prince, the eldest son of Frederic William, by Sophia Dorothea, daughter of George I. King of England, was born on the 24th of January 1712. His early years were embittered by the tyranny of his father, who was equally avaricious and austere. At the age of twenty-one, he was married, against his will, to a princess with whom he never could be induced to live, though he always treated her with respect.

His knowledge in every branch of science was inconceivable; he wrote exquisite verses, composed several beautiful pieces of music, and was one of the finest performers on the German flute in the whole world. To which may be added that, besides his proficiency in the dead languages, he spoke most of the modern ones with fluency and grace. On the death of his father, in 1740, he resolved to govern with little ministerial assistance. He tolerated all religions; and continued that correspondence with learned men, which he commenced when a prince.

In the milder pursuits of polite literature, however, he had not neglected to study the necessary operations of war; and the magnanimity with which he carried his theory into effect, during the long and frequent conflicts in which he was engaged, is known to all the world. Few have fought so many battles with such general success, fewer still been so little depressed by occasional defeat. He rose superior to all misfortunes, and his alliance was courted by every power in Europe.

His life was one continued scene of activity. Artists and ingenious men of every nation were invited into his dominions; he erected innumerable public edifices; formed a variety of national establishments; and made upwards of three hundred towns and villages arise as by enchantment, on marshes, waste lands, and desarts. In short, he amended defective laws, made commercial regulations, and civilized and polished the rudeness and barbarism of his subjects.

This illustrious monarch possessed almost every characteristic of greatness. He was, at once, a hero, a philosopher, an historian, a legislator, a poet, a musician, and a wit. In either of these endowments, he had sufficient ability to have formed singly a distinguished character.

Frederic the Great, as he was often deservedly called, died of a lethargy, on the 17th of August 1786.

The King of Prussia's writings are so extensive, that they fill, including his epistolary correspondence with Fontenelle, Rollin, Voltaire, D'Alembert, Condorcet, &c. no less than nineteen volumes in octavo; and so various, that they embrace almost every branch of polite literature. With respect to his Military Memoirs, however, it has been shrewdly remarked, that he appears more impartial in his acccounts of his campaigns, than in assigning the motives for his wars, or estimating the merits of his antagonists. History must decide, on a profound consideration of all circumstances, how far the aggrandizement of his own country, by the seizure of Silesia, &c. and his share in the partition of Poland, may be regarded as affecting the true dignity of his monarchial character.

DAVID GARRICK, our immortal and inimitable actor, whose ability to represent was only equalled by the genius of Shakspeare to create, all the variable characters of the drama, and who also possessed no inconsiderable portion of poetic excellence, was born the 20th of February 1716, in the city of Hereford; where his father, Captain Peter Garrick, who usually resided at Lichfield, happened then to be with a recruiting party. He was early admired, as a most sprightly and diverting boy; engaging the attention of all who knew him, by his singular questions, smart repartees, and frolicsome actions. At the age of about ten years, he was sent to Lichfield grammar-school; where, though remarkable for declining puerile diversions, he did not apply himself with any assiduity to his books. His passion for theatrical representation, in the mean time, soon discovered itself; for, before he had reached his twelfth year, he contrived to get up the Recruiting Officer, and performed the part of Serjeant Kite with astonishing spirit and vivacity. Not long after, he went to his uncle, a wine-merchant at Lisbon; where the English merchants, with whom he often dined, usually placed him on the table, after dinner, to recite speeches from plays. On his return from Portugal, being intended for the bar, he again went to Lichfield-school; and, in 1736, became a pupil of the celebrated Dr. Johnson, who was little more inclined to teaching than Garrick to be taught. When some exercise or theme was expected to be finished, he produced several scenes of a new comedy which had occupied his attention; being, as he said, his third attempt at dramatic poetry: and Johnson himself having written the tragedy of Irene, both of them, finally, the pupil, perhaps, in this instance becoming the preceptor, agreed to visit the metropolis. It was not, however, till the summer of 1741, that Garrick, having lost both parents, "hitherto restrained by nothing but tenderness for so dear a relation as a mother," resolved fairly to try his fortune, under the name of Lyddal, on the Ipswich stage.

Such, and so rapid, was his celebrity, that, on the 19th of October, in the same year, he appeared before a London audience, at the theatre in Goodman's Fields; when his wonderful excellence made such an impression on the public, that the carriages of the nobility and gentry are said to have often filled up the space from Temple Bar to Whitechapel. In 1742, he was engaged by Mr. Fleetwood, patentee of Drury Lane; from whom, in 1747, he and Mr. Lacy purchased the patent of that theatre, which opened with Dr. Johnson's famous prologue written for the occasion. About two years after, he married Mademoiselle Violetti; with whom, from 1763 to 1765, he travelled in France and Italy. In 1769, he conducted the memorable Shakspeare Jubilee, at Stratfordupon-Avon: but Mr. Lacy dying, he disposed of his share of the patent, in 1776, to Mr. Sheridan, Mr. Linley, and Dr. Ford; and, after gratifying his admirers, by appearing in many favourite characters, took a most affectionate and affecting leave of the public.

To enumerate the talents of Mr. Garrick would require a volume. He was, to speak generally, the most chaste actor, both in tragedy and comedy, that ever trod the stage; and there are no less than thirty-seven dramatic pieces, most of them on the stock-list, which he either originally wrote, translated, or judiciously altered, and adapted to the taste of modern times. For assistance of the latter description, even Shakspeare himself stands indebted to him. Mr. Garrick died, January 20, 1779; and his funeral was attended by many of the nobility, and persons of distinguished talents: who saw his remains deposited in Westminster Abbey, beneath the monument of his adored Shakspeare; an honour which no person ever better merited. Mrs. Garrick still survives, but they never had any offspring.