Our family had lived in the village of Ecton, Northamptonshire, for 300 years, the eldest son being always bred to the smith's business. I was the youngest son of the youngest son for five generations back. My father married young, and carried his wife and three children to New England, about 1682, in order that they might there enjoy their Non-conformist religion with freedom. He married a second time, and had in all seventeen children.
I had but little schooling, being taken home at ten years to help my father's business of tallow-chandler. I disliked the trade, and desired to go to sea; living near the water in our home at Boston, I learned to swim well, and to manage boats. From a child I was fond of reading, and laid out all my little money on books, such as Bunyan's works, which I sold to get Burton's "Historical Collections"; and in my father's little library there were Plutarch's "Lives," De Foe's "Essays on Projects," and Mather's "Essays to do Good." This bookish inclination determined my father to bind me apprentice to my brother James, a printer in Boston, and in a little time I became very proficient. I had access to more books, and often sat up most of the night reading. I had also a fancy to poetry, and made some little pieces; my brother printed them, and sent me about the town to sell them.
I now took in hand the improvement of my writing by various exercises in prose and verse, being extremely ambitious to become a good English writer. My time for these exercises was at night and on Sundays. At about 16 years of age, meeting with a book on the subject, I took to a vegetable diet, and thus not only saved an additional fund to buy books, but also gained greater clearness of head. I now studied arithmetic, navigation, geometry, and read Locke "On the Human Understanding," the "Art of Thinking," by Messrs. du Port Royal, and Xenophon's "Memorable Things of Socrates." From this last I learned to drop my abrupt contradiction and positive argumentation, and to put on the humble inquirer and doubter.
My brother had begun to print a newspaper, "The New England Courant," the second that appeared in America. Some of his friends thought it not likely to succeed, one newspaper being enough for America; yet at this time there are not less than five-and-twenty. To this paper I began to contribute anonymously, disguising my hand, and putting my MSS. at night under the door of the printing-house. These were highly approved, until I claimed their authorship.
