034.Why Did Benjamin Franklin State that He Regarded Confucius as His Example

Benjamin Franklin stated in his letter to George Whitefield in 1749 that he regarded Confucius as his example. Franklin's statement raised two quesionts for us. The first one is that why did he regard Confucius as his example and the second why did he not state in his widely read autobiography that he would imitate Confucius (he did state that he would imitate Jesus and Socrates). This seemed a contradiction. Who could provide us with satisfied answers to the above two quesions?