Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography: Greatest Works That Inspire People (Essay Sample)

Student’s Name Professor’s Name Institution Course Date Benjamin Franklin’s Autobiography Introduction The autobiography of Benjamin Franklin is made of different facts. It is composed of several teachings, especially towards the end. The autobiography was written using the formation of a continuous stretch but was pasted together from different fragments which were written separately years apart from one another. The work is considered to be taking an arrogant tone but still praised the virtue of humanity. The most conspicuous of them all is the part of Ben's life that is full of historical significance where the American Revolution is extracted from the work. The mentioning of real events is not evident in the autobiography after 1760, which was fifteen years before the war, at that particular year, the autobiography stops. First, the autobiography still remains to be one of the greatest works that inspire people from its establishment of a literary form of the American dream fulfillment. Franklin demonstrates the chances and possibilities of life in the New World using his own experience of rising from lower middle class as a normal youth to the most admired people as an adult (Leary, Lewis, and Farrand, 492). Moreover, he maintains that he achieved this success through his solid work ethic. Also, he proved that even those people who are not distinguished in Boston through the industry later rose to become people of importance in America. When the thoughts about the American Dream presently, the ability to rise from one state of poverty to riches by means of hard work the first person that comes to our minds is Franklin in his autobiography. The second reason why the autobiography has classic teachings is through its historical reasons. The work was among the first premier autobiographies in the English language. The autobiography as a literary form emerged first at the time lived by Franklin, where there was no religion format. The autobiography defined and carried a secular literary tradition, and also established his autobiography as a work meant to tell someone's life and educate the readers in ways that make them live better lives. Therefore, the format has been embraced throughout the history of America. The tradition that was established by Franklin in this autobiography mentored others like classics of Frederick Douglass in his Narrative and Henry Adams' and Then Education of Henry Adams used the bigger part of Franklin's style and format (Conn, 2). The second part of the autobiography is complete with the list of the different virtues and means through which someone can possibly achieve them. Through these virtues, many readers have been influenced especially from the last two centuries and also helping them spawn the entire genre of the mainstream self-help book. In addition to these teachings, the autobiography also explains to us what life used to be in American in the 18th century and how we can compare to the present way of life. Naturally, the story in the autobiography is told from the perspective of only one person, though at a particular age when there were low levels of literacy where writing was not so conversant to people. In such circumstances of illiteracy, any document that existed by them was held with high esteem and was so significant to the historians who were trying to look at the way people are living from day to day. The book is rich with other specifics about colonial America and this is key information that is crucial to anyone who wishes to learn more on that specific time period. One must know that the life of Franklin was not considered life for everyone else, but represented only one person from thousands of other people. Furthermore, the autobiography is also a reflection of the idealism of the 18th century, commonly referred to as the Age of Reason. This century was the age of different men such as John Locke and Isaac Newton. In addition, intellectualism was also experienced together with scientific interventions and other advances in the thoughts of politics. Several people held the belief that through a man's optimism, they could be perfected through the progress of politics and science. Franklin subscribes to these beliefs evidenced in Part Two of his autobiography, showing him trying to leave them out. The autobiography has endured because, despite being muddled, it is the preeminent work that has been used to bring myths of a hero of the American Revolution. Franklin has always been introduced in the elementary school to children as a Renaissance man, a person who according to them seemed to master all the fields of knowledge (Huang, Nian-Sheng and Mulford, 145). Franklin was among other things considered to be an inventor, a scientist, a writer, and a statesman. Through all these capabilities, and all his ambitions, so many people can borrow relevant things in his achievements that can be used to benefit other generations. The autobiography is one of the only enduring tokens that has enriched the facets of all his diverse nature, where it presents the Americans today as having a great hero from the past who was assisting in the development of the American Dream. Different critics have thus referred to Franklin as the ‘first American' where his autobiography pr...