“I conceiv'd the bold and arduous project of arriving at moral perfection.”

From 📕 The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin. The sentence opens It was about this time; I start at the verb. The spelling conceiv'd is the edition's, following his manuscript.

I love the confidence of it and the comedy that follows: thirteen virtues, a little book ruled in red ink, one virtue a week, and an honest admission later that he never arrived. 📖 Franklin on the thirteen virtues has the detail.

I tried my own version, 🧪 Franklin's chart for one value a week, and stopped after three weeks.