Benjamin Franklin was born on January 17,1706 in Boston，America. In his life he built a successful printing and publishing business in Philadelphia；he conducted scientific studies of electricity and made several important discoveries；he was a diplomat (外交官) and statesman；he helped establish Pennsylvania’s first university and America’s first city hospital；he also organized the country’s first subscription library (收费图书馆)．
Franklin was also unequaled in America as an inventor until Thomas Edison. Ben had poor eyesight and needed glasses to read. He got tired of always taking them off and putting them back on，so he decided to figure out a way to make his glasses let him see both near and far. He had two pairs of glasses cut in half and put half of them together. Today，we call them bifocals (双光眼镜)．Another invention of his，an iron stove，allowed people to warm their homes.
He loved to learn about new things. He also thought it was important to make life better with the things that he invented. Electricity was one of the things he experimented with when he retired from his business. Ben discovered that lightning (闪电) and electricity were the same thing. The lightning rod was an important invention that we still use today to protect buildings and ships from lightning damage.
Franklin preferred to have his inventions used freely for the comfort and convenience of everyone. Thomas Jefferson，the third president of America，called Benjamin Franklin “the greatest man of the age and country in which he lived”．To Benjamin Franklin there was no greater purpose in life than to “live usefully”．
小题1:Benjamin Franklin was NOT a________.
A．diplomat
B．scientist
C．businessman
D．president小题2:The underlined word “unequaled” in Paragraph 2 means________.
A．better than any other
B．worse than any other
C．the same as others
D．confident as others小题3:Which of the following is NOT Benjamin’s invention?
A．Bifocals.
B．The iron stove.
C．Printing.
D．The lightning rod.小题4:What was Benjamin Franklin’s purpose in life?
A．To live comfortably every day.
B．To be useful to others.
C．To be a famous person in the world.
D．To earn a lot by inventing things.
