Benjamin Franklin | "Science suffers with you"

Benjamin Franklin

Autograph letter signed (“BFranklin”) to Giambatista Beccaria (“Dear Sir”), one page (225 x 188 mm) on a bifolium of laid paper (watermarked C & I Honig), “Passy, near Paris,” 19 February 1781, thanking him for copies of his works and regretting that diplomatic affairs prevent him from indulging his interest in science. Black morocco folding-case gilt, chemise.

“Giambatista Beccaria (1716–1781), of the teaching order of Piarists, professor of experimental physics at Turin since 1748, learned about [Franklin’s] discoveries in June 1752, and by July 2 had drawn electricity from the atmosphere by means of a conductor on his house. His experimentation proceeded so rapidly and successfully that the next year he published Dell’elettricismo artificiale e naturale, which contained (pp. 144–8) a letter to Nollet rebutting his attack on [Franklin’s] work. Priestley (History of Electricity, London, 1767, p. 339) praised his work in the highest terms: ‘All that was done by the French and English electricians, with respect to lightning and electricity, fell far short of what was done by Signior Beccaria at Turin’" (Papers 5:394–396, note 9). 

The French physicist Jean-Antoine Nollet had developed a theory of simultaneous effluence and affluence of electrical particles that conflicted with the hypothesis Franklin published in Experiments and Observations. Nollet attacked Franklin’s theory in Lettres sur l’électricité (Paris, 1753). While Franklin was distressed, he declined to respond, and so was particularly gratified that Beccaria took up his banner.

In this final epistolary entry of what Antonio Pace termed “a scientific friendship,” Franklin thanks the Italian physicist for the recent publications he had delivered through the offices of a former pupil, Count Ottone Ponte di Scarnafigi, ambassador of the Kingdom of Sardinia to France. Beccaria died in May 1781, just three months after he would have received this letter.

“I received lately through the hands of your Ambassador, the several ingenious Pieces of your Writing, which you did me the honour to send me. At present I am so engag’d in publick Affairs, that I cannot give the Attention I wish to philosophical Subjects, which used to afford so much Pleasure. It grieves me to hear of the long Continuance of your Illness. Science suffers with you. I beg leave to recommend the Bearer, M. Steinsky, to your Civilities. He is Professor of Physics at Prague. With good & unalterable Esteem, I have the honour to be, Reverend & dear Sir, Your most obedient & most humble Servant.”

Franklin’s response was carried by François Steinsky, who was then on a sabbatical sponsored by Maria Theresa, Archduchess of Austria, travelling through Switzerland, Holland, England, France, and Italy. However, until recently the original recipient’s letter was thought not to have survived, and Franklin’s text was known only by the press copy in the Library of Congress.

Implicit in Franklin’s letter is his gratitude for Beccaria’s long championing of his own work on electricity. The preface to Beccaria’s Dell'elettricismo artificiale e naturale (1753) “candidly admits … his profound debt to that ‘most celebrated writer on electricity, Benjamin Franklin.’ His treatise is, however, no servile imitation. Applying a rigorous experimental and inductive technique within a framework suggested by mathematical exposition, Beccaria was able to develop Franklin's brilliant but disorganized insights to a point which amazed his contemporaries and to lay the foundations for later quantitative studies. Priestley's appraisal of the significance of Beccaria's work has already been noted. [Franklin] was among the very first to acknowledge the Artificial and Natural Electricity as by all odds the most profound and organic study that had appeared on the subject of electricity, and who continued to follow the Turinese professor's work with keen interest until the latter's death in 1781” (Pace, pp. 51–52).

Franklin himself noted to Peter Collinson in 1754, “I am much pleased with Mr. Beccarias Book on Electricity for his curious experiments, Clear Expression, and Excellent Methods. I beg the favour of you to present Him my sincere Thanks for the Countenance he has afforded my Opinions and the handsome defence he has made of some of them, against the Attacks of Mr. Nollet. Our Different experiments and Observations on Lightening have led us both to the same strange opinion vizt: that Thunder Strokes are frequently from the Earth to the Clouds —which Opinion I imagine will be found true by such as examine it with the requisite attention” (Papers 5:394–396).

Franklin and Beccaria exchanged fourteen letters, according to The Papers of Benjamin Franklin, but this is one of only about four—and the only one by Franklin—to survive in its original holograph.

REFERENCES

Papers of Benjamin Franklin, ed. Oberg, 34:380–381 (not locating the original; text taken from the press copy in the Library of Congress); Antonio Pace, “Chapter III. A Scientific Friendship: Giambatista Beccaria,” pp. 49–70, in Benjamin Franklin and Italy (American Philosophical Society, 1958)

PROVENANCE

A private collection in Milan