The Speckled Axe

From The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin
Anecdote of the man who, weary of turning the grindstone to polish a whole axe, decides he likes a speckled axe best—Franklin's image for settling for imperfect virtue rather than the exhausting pursuit of perfection.
Part 2, on the virtue of Order

One of the most anthologized passages; Franklin's wry concession that moral perfection is unattainable and perhaps undesirable.

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