The Selected Writings of Benjamin Rush

This volume of letters, articles, and speeches displays the deep wisdom and varied concerns of this influential yet little-known Founding Father.

A physician and humanitarian from Pennsylvania, Benjamin Rush was both a learned intellectual and a radical revolutionary. He was a signatory to the Declaration of Independence and a Continental Congress attendee. And unlike many of his more famous contemporaries, he was a early and vehement opponent of slavery and the death penalty.

This collection of Rush’s writings shows a wide range of interest and knowledge embracing agriculture and the mechanical arts, chemistry and medicine, political science, and theology. Included are letters he wrote in an effort to dispel prejudice, to fight oppression, and to elevate the lot of the lowly.