But he was too well known at court, and suspected of knowledge of and participation in some of the questionable acts of King James, so that after the latter's dethronement, and an intimation that Penn had communicated with the exiled monarch, Penn was deprived of his title to Pennsylvania, for which he had twice paid.
Penn was a constant sufferer at the hands of his associates, who sought to injure him in every way. He rounded out a life of suffering by marrying the second time in 1695.
In 1708 he was on the verge of bankruptcy, owing to the villany and mismanagement of his agent, and was thrown into Fleet Street Prison, a jail in which he had never before been confined. His health gave way afterwards, and this remarkable man died July 30, 1718.
Philadelphia was founded in 1683 and work begun on a beautiful building known as the City Hall. Work has steadily progressed on this building from time to time since then, and at this writing it is so near completion as to give promise of being one of the most perfect architectural jobs ever done by the hand of man.
In two years Philadelphia had sprung from a wilderness, where the rank thistle nodded in the wind, to a town of over two thousand people, exclusive of Indians not taxed. In three years it had gained more than New York had in fifty years. This was due to the fact that the people who came to Philadelphia had nothing to fear but the Indians, while settlers in New York had not only the Indians to defend themselves against, but the police also.
Penn and his followers established the great law that no one who believed in Almighty God should be molested in his religious belief.
Even the Indians liked Penn, and when the nights were cold they would come and crawl into his bed and sleep with him all night and not kill him at all. The Great Chief of the Tribes, even, did not feel above this, and the two used frequently to lie and talk for hours, Penn doing the talking and the chief doing the lying.
It is said that, with all the Indian massacres and long wars between the red men and the white, no drop of Quaker blood was ever shed. I quote this from an historian who is much older than I, and with whom I do not wish to have any controversy.
After Penn's death his heirs ran the Colony up to 1779, when they disposed of it for five hundred thousand dollars or thereabouts, and the State became the proprietor.