Chapter X…

Chapter X

WASHINGTON MAINTAINS THE TREATY-MAKING POWER OF THE EXECUTIVE. 1795-1796.

The first session of the Fourth Congress commenced on the 7th of December, 1795. Although the ratification of the treaties with Spain and Algiers had not been officially announced at the meeting of Congress the state of the negotiations with both powers was sufficiently well understood to enable Washington with confidence to assure the Legislature, in his speech at the opening of the session, that those negotiations were in a train which promised a happy issue.

After expressing his gratification at the prosperous state of American affairs the various favorable events which have been already enumerated were detailed in a succinct statement, at the close of which he mentioned the British treaty, which, though publicly known, had not before been communicated officially to the House of Representatives.

"This interesting summary of our affairs," continued the speech, "with regard to the powers between whom and the United States controversies have subsisted, and with regard also to our Indian neighbors with whom we have been in a state of enmity or misunderstanding, opens a wide field for consoling and gratifying reflections. If by prudence and moderation on every side, the extinguishment of all the causes of external discord which have heretofore menaced our tranquility, on terms compatible with our national faith and honor, shall be the happy results, how firm and how precious a foundation will have been laid for accelerating, maturing, and establishing the prosperity of our country!"

After presenting an animated picture of the situation of the United States, and recommending several objects to the attention of the Legislature, Washington concluded with observing: "Temperate discussion of the important subjects that may arise in the course of the session, and mutual forbearance where there is a difference in opinion, are too obvious and necessary for the peace, happiness, and welfare of our country to need any recommendation of mine."

In the Senate an address was reported which echoed back the sentiments of the speech.

In this House of Representatives, as in the last, the party in opposition to the administration had obtained a majority. This party was unanimously hostile to the treaty with Great Britain, and it was expected that their answer to the speech of the President would indicate their sentiments on a subject which continued to agitate the whole American people. The answer reported by the committee contained a declaration that the confidence of his fellow-citizens in the chief magistrate remained undiminished.

On a motion to strike out the words importing this sentiment is was averred that the clause asserted an untruth; that it was not true that the confidence of the people in the President was undiminished; that by a recent transaction it had been considerably impaired, and some gentlemen declared that their own confidence in him was lessened.

By the friends of the administration this motion was opposed with great zeal, and the opinion that the confidence of the people in their chief magistrate remained unshaken, was maintained with ardor. But they were outnumbered.

To avoid a direct vote on the proposition it was moved that the address should be recommitted. This motion succeeded and, two members being added to the committee, an answer was reported, in which the clause objected to was so modified as to be free from exception.

That part of the speech which mentioned the treaty with Great Britain was alluded to in terms which, though not directly expressive of disapprobation, were sufficiently indicative of the prevailing sentiment.

Early in the month of January (1796) Washington transmitted to both houses of Congress a message, accompanying certain communications from the French government which were well calculated to cherish those ardent feelings that prevailed in the Legislature.

It was the fortune of Mr. Monroe to reach Paris soon after the death of Robespierre and the fall of the Jacobins. On his reception as the minister of the United States, which was public, and in the convention, he gave free scope to the genuine feelings of his heart, and, at the same time, delivered to the president of that body, with his credentials, two letters addressed by the Secretary of State to the committee of public safety. These letters were answers to one written by the committee of safety to the Congress of the United States. The executive department being the organ through which all foreign intercourse was to be conducted, each branch of the Legislature had passed a resolution directing this letter to be transmitted to the President with a request that he would cause it to be answered in terms expressive of their friendly dispositions toward the French republic.

So fervent were the sentiments expressed on this occasion that the convention decreed that the flag of the American and French republics should be united together and suspended in its own hall in testimony of eternal union and friendship between the two people. To evince the impression made on his mind by this act, and the grateful sense of his constituents, Mr. Monroe presented to the convention the flag of the United States, which he prayed them to accept as a proof of the sensibility with which his country received every act of friendship from its ally, and of the pleasure with which it cherished every incident which tended to cement and consolidate the union between the two nations.

The committee of safety again addressed Congress in terms adapted to that department of government which superintends its foreign intercourse and expressive, among other sentiments, of the sensibility with which the French nation had perceived those sympathetic emotions with which the American people had viewed the vicissitudes of her fortune. Mr. Adet, who was to succeed Mr. Fauchet at Philadelphia, and who was the bearer of this letter, also brought with him the colors of France, which he was directed to present to the United States. He arrived in the summer, but, probably in the idea that these communications were to be made by him directly to Congress, did not announce them to the executive until late in December (1795).

The first day of the new year (1796) was named for their reception, when the colors were delivered to Washington, and the letter to Congress also was placed in his hands.

In executing this duty Mr. Adet addressed a speech to the President, which, in the glowing language of his country, represented France as struggling not only for her own liberty, but for that of the human race. "Assimilated to, or rather identified with, free people by the form of her government, she saw in them," he said, "only friends and brothers. Long accustomed to regard the American people as her most faithful allies she sought to draw closer the ties already formed in the fields of America, under the auspices of victory, over the ruins of tyranny."

To answer this speech was a task of some delicacy. It was necessary to express feelings adapted to the occasion without implying sentiments with respect to the belligerent powers which might be improper to be used by the chief magistrate of a neutral country. With a view to both these objects Washington made the following reply:

"Born, sir, in a land of liberty; having early learned its value; having engaged in a perilous conflict to defend it; having, in a word, devoted the best years of my life to secure its permanent establishment in my own country, my anxious recollections, my sympathetic feelings, and my best wishes are irresistibly attracted, when-so-ever, in any country, I see an oppressed nation unfurl the banners of freedom. But, above all, the events of the French revolution have produced the deepest solicitude as well as the highest admiration. To call your nation brave were to pronounce but common praise. Wonderful people! ages to come will read with astonishment the history of your brilliant exploits, I rejoice that the period of your toils and of your immense sacrifices is approaching. I rejoice that the interesting revolutionary movements of so many years have issued in the formation of a constitution designed to give permanency to the great object for which you have contended. I rejoice that liberty, which you have so long embraced with enthusiasm--liberty, of which you have been the invincible defenders, now finds an asylum in the bosom of a regularly organized government--a government which, being formed to secure the happiness of the French people, corresponds with the ardent wishes of my heart, while it gratifies the pride of every citizen of the United States by its resemblance to their own. On these glorious events accept, sir, my sincere congratulations."

"In delivering to you these sentiments I express not my own feelings only, but those of my fellow-citizens in relation to the commencement, the progress, and the issue of the French revolution, and they will certainly join with me in purest wishes to the Supreme Being that the citizens of our sister republic, our magnanimous allies, may soon enjoy in peace that liberty which they have purchased at so great a price, and all the happiness that liberty can bestow."

"I receive, sir, with lively sensibility the symbol of the triumphs and of the enfranchisement of your nation, the colors of France, which you have now presented to the United States. The transaction will be announced to Congress and the colors will be deposited with the archives of the United States, which are at once the evidence and the memorials of their freedom and independence. May these be perpetual! and may the friendship of the two republics be commensurate with their existence!"

The address of Mr. Adet, the answer of the President, and the colors of France, were transmitted to Congress with the letter from the committee of safety.

In the House of Representatives a resolution was moved, requesting the President to make known to the representatives of the French republic the sincere and lively sensations which were excited by this honorable testimony of the existing sympathy and affections of the two republics; that the House rejoiced in an opportunity of congratulating the French republic on the brilliant and glorious achievements accomplished during the present afflictive war, and hoped that those achievements would be attended with a perfect attainment of their object--the permanent establishment of the liberty and happiness of that great and magnanimous people.

In February (1796) the treaty with Great Britain was returned, in the form advised by the Senate, ratified by his Britannic majesty. The constitution declaring a treaty, when made, the supreme law of the land, the President announced it officially to the people in a proclamation, requiring from all persons its observance and execution, a copy of which was transmitted to each House on the 1st of March.

The opposition having openly denied the right of the President to negotiate a treaty of commerce was not a little dissatisfied at his venturing to issue this proclamation before the sense of the House of Representatives had been declared on the obligation of the instrument.

This dissatisfaction was not concealed. On the 2d of March Mr. Livingston laid upon the table a resolution requesting the President "to lay before the House a copy of the instructions to the minister of the United States, who negotiated the treaty with the King of Great Britain, communicated by his message of the 1st of March, together with the correspondence and other documents relative to the said treaty."

On the 7th of March he amended this resolution by adding the words, "excepting such of the said papers as any existing negotiation may render improper to be disclosed."

The friends of the administration maintained that a treaty was a contract between two nations, which, under the constitution, the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, had a right to make, and that it was made when, by and with such advice and consent, it had received his final act. Its obligations then became complete on the United States, and to refuse to comply with its stipulations was to break the treaty and to violate the faith of the nation.

The opposition contended that the power to make treaties, if applicable to every object, conflicted with powers which were vested exclusively in Congress; that either the treaty-making power must be limited in its operation, so as not to touch objects committed by the constitution to Congress, or the assent and cooperation of the House of Representatives must be required to give validity to any compact, so far as it might comprehend those objects. A treaty, therefore, which required an appropriation of money, or any act of Congress to carry it into effect, had not acquired its obligatory force until the House of Representatives had exercised its powers in the case. They were at full liberty to make, or to withhold, such appropriation or other law, without incurring the imputation of violating any existing obligation or of breaking the faith of the nation.

The debate on this question was animated, vehement, and argumentative, all the party passions were enlisted in it, and it was protracted until the 24th of March (1796), when the resolution was carried in the affirmative by sixty-two to thirty-seven votes. The next day, the committee appointed to present it to the chief magistrate reported his answer which was, "that he would take the resolution into consideration."

The situation in which this vote placed the President was peculiarly delicate. In an elective government, the difficulty of resisting the popular branch of the Legislature is at all times great, but is particularly so when the passions of the public have been strongly and generally excited. The popularity of a demand for information, the large majority by which that demand was supported, the additional force which a refusal to comply with it would give to suspicions already insinuated, that circumstances had occurred in the negotiation which the administration dared not expose, and that the President was separating himself from the representatives of the people, furnished motives of no ordinary force for complying with the request of the House of Representatives.

But Washington viewed every question which came before him with a single eye to the performance of his duty to the country. Hitherto, on more than one occasion, he had proved himself the defender of the constitution, but he had never been called upon to defend it against so formidable an attack as that which was now made.

That the future diplomatic transactions of the government might be seriously and permanently affected by establishing the principle that the House of Representatives could demand, as a right, the instructions given to a foreign minister, and all the papers connected with a negotiation, was too apparent to be unobserved. Nor was it less obvious that a compliance with the request now made would go far in establishing this principle. The form of the request, and the motives which induced it, equally led to this conclusion. It left nothing to the discretion of the President with regard to the public interests, and the information was asked for the avowed purpose of determining whether the House of Representatives would give effect to a public treaty.

It was also a subject for serious reflection that, in a debate unusually elaborate, the House of Representatives had claimed a right of interference in the formation of treaties, which, in the judgment of the President, the constitution had denied them. Duties the most sacred requiring that he should resist this encroachment on the department which was particularly confided to him, he could not hesitate respecting the course it became him to take, and on the 30th of March he returned to the House the following answer to their resolution:

"With the utmost attention I have considered your resolution of the 24th instant, requesting me to lay before your House a copy of the instructions to the minister of the United States, who negotiated the treaty with the King of Great Britain, together with the correspondence and other documents relative to that treaty, excepting such of the said papers as any existing negotiation may render improper to be disclosed.

"In deliberating upon this subject it was impossible for me to lose sight of the principle which some have avowed in its discussion, or to avoid extending my views to the consequences which must flow from the admission of that principle.

"I trust that no part of my conduct has ever indicated a disposition to withhold any information which the constitution has enjoined it upon the President as a duty to give or which could be required of him by either House of Congress as a right, and with truth I affirm, that it has been, as it will continue to be, while I have the honor to preside in the government, my constant endeavor to harmonize with the other branches thereof, so far as the trust delegated to me by the people of the United States, and my sense of the obligation it imposes to preserve, protect and defend the constitution will permit.

"The nature of foreign negotiations requires caution, and their success must often depend on secrecy, and even when brought to a conclusion, a full disclosure of all the measures, demands, or eventual concessions which may have been proposed or contemplated, would be extremely impolitic, for this might have a pernicious influence on future negotiations or produce immediate inconveniences, perhaps danger and mischief to other persons. The necessity of such caution and secrecy was one cogent reason for vesting the power of making treaties in the President with the advice and consent of the Senate, the principle on which that body was formed confining it to a small number of members.

"To admit, then, a right in the House of Representatives to demand and to have as a matter of course, all the papers respecting a negotiation with a foreign power, would be to establish a dangerous precedent.

"It does not occur that the inspection of the papers asked for can be relative to any purpose under the cognizance of the House of Representatives, except that of an impeachment, which the resolution has not expressed. I repeat, that I have no disposition to withhold any information which the duty of my station will permit or the public good shall require to be disclosed, and, in fact, all the papers affecting the negotiation with Great Britain were laid before the Senate, when the treaty itself was communicated for their consideration and advice.

"The course which the debate has taken on the resolution of the House, leads to some observations on the mode of making treaties under the constitution of the United States.

"Having been a member of the general convention and knowing the principles on which the constitution was formed, I have ever entertained but one opinion upon this subject, and from the first establishment of the government to this moment my conduct has exemplified that opinion--that the power of making treaties is exclusively vested in the President by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, provided two-thirds of the senators present concur, and that every treaty so made and promulgated, thenceforward becomes the law of the land. It is thus that the treaty-making power has been understood by foreign nations, and in all the treaties made with them, we have declared, and they have believed, that when ratified by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate, they became obligatory. In this construction of the constitution every House of Representatives has heretofore acquiesced, and, until the present time, not a doubt or suspicion has appeared, to my knowledge, that this construction was not a true one. Nay, they have more than acquiesced, for until now, without controverting the obligation of such treaties, they have made all the requisite provisions for carrying them into effect.

"There is also reason to believe that this construction agrees with the opinions entertained by the State conventions when they were deliberating on the constitution, especially by those who objected to it because there was not required, in commercial treaties, the consent of two-thirds of the whole number of the members of the Senate, instead of two-thirds of the senators present, and because, in treaties respecting territorial and certain other rights and claims, the concurrence of three-fourths of the whole number of the members of both Houses respectively was not made necessary.

"It is a fact declared by the general convention and universally understood, that the constitution of the United States was the result of a spirit of amity and mutual concession. And it is well known that under this influence the smaller States were admitted to an equal representation in the Senate with the larger States, and that this branch of the government was invested with great powers, for on the equal participation of those powers the sovereignty and political safety of the smaller States were deemed essentially to depend.

"If other proofs than these, and the plain letter of the constitution itself, be necessary to ascertain the points under consideration, they may be found in the journals of the general convention, which I have deposited in the office of the Department of State. In these journals it will appear that a proposition was made 'that no treaty should be binding on the United States which was not ratified by a law,' and that the proposition was explicitly rejected.

"As, therefore, it is perfectly clear to my understanding that the assent of the House of Representatives is not necessary to the validity of a treaty, as the treaty with Great Britain exhibits in itself all the objects requiring legislative provision--and on these the papers called for can throw no light, and as it is essential to the due administration of the government that the boundaries fixed by the constitution between the different departments should be preserved, a just regard to the constitution and to the duty of my office, under all the circumstances of this case, forbids a compliance with your request."

The terms in which this decided, and, it would seem, unexpected negative to the call for papers was conveyed, appeared to break the last cord of that attachment which had theretofore bound some of the active leaders of the opposition to Washington. Amidst all the agitations and irritations of party a sincere respect and real affection for him, the remnant of former friendship, had still lingered in the bosoms of some who had engaged with ardor in the political contests of the day. But, if the last spark of this affection was not now extinguished, it was at least concealed under the more active passions of the moment.

Washington's message was referred to a committee of the whole house. It was severely criticized and resolutions were adopted, by a vote of fifty-seven to thirty-five, declaring the sense of the House on this matter, and claiming the right to deliberate on the expediency of carrying into effect stipulations made by treaty on subjects committed by the constitution to Congress.

In March the subject came up incidentally. The treaties with the King of Spain and with the Dey of Algiers were ratified by the President and laid before Congress. On the 13th of April (1796), Mr. Sedgwick moved, "that provision ought to be made by law for carrying into effect with good faith the treaties lately concluded with the Dey and Regency of Algiers, the King of Great Britain, the King of Spain, and certain Indian tribes northwest of the Ohio." After much altercation on the subject of thus joining all these treaties together, a division was made, and the question taken on each. The resolution was amended by a majority of eighteen so as to read, "that it is expedient to pass the laws necessary for carrying into effect," &c.

The subject of the British treaty was again taken up on the 15th of April. Its friends urged an immediate decision of the question, alleging that every member had made up his mind already, and that dispatch was necessary, in case the treaty was to be carried into effect. The posts were to be delivered up on the 1st of June, and this required previous arrangements on the part of the American government. They appear to have entertained the opinion that the majority would not dare to encounter the immense responsibility of breaking the treaty without previously ascertaining that the great body of the people were willing to meet the consequences of the measure. But its opponents, though confident of their power to reject the resolution, called for its discussion.

The minority soon desisted from urging an immediate decision of the question, and the spacious field which was opened by the propositions before the House was entered into with equal avidity and zeal by both parties. Gallatin, Madison, Giles, Nicholas, Preston, and other eminent members of the republican party, in animated terms opposed the execution of the treaty and entered fully into the discussion of its merits and demerits. Fisher Ames, Dwight, Foster, Harper, Lyman, Dayton, and other men of note among the Federalists, urged every possible argument in its favor.

The debate on this occasion is one of the most celebrated which has ever taken place in Congress. Fisher Ames' speech is acknowledged to have been the most remarkable and effective which he ever made. So completely was the House carried away by his eloquence that an adjournment was carried for the avowed reason that it was not possible to decide calmly on the question until the members should have taken time for reflection. Reflection convinced not only the members of Congress, but the people, that the opposition to the execution of the treaty was ill advised and unreasonable. The length of time consumed in the debates was favorable to a just view of the subject, and finally a majority of the members who had been opposed to the treaty yielded to the exigency of the case and united in passing the laws which were necessary for its fulfillment.

On the 29th of April (1796) the question was taken in committee of the whole and was determined by the casting vote of the chairman in its favor. The resolution was finally carried in the House by a vote of fifty-one to forty-eight.

Besides the acts which arose out of the treaties, Congress passed others, regulating the dealings of the inhabitants of the western frontier with the Indians; authorizing the survey of certain public lands, with a view to the sale of them; ordaining measures for the protection and relief of American seamen, and equalizing the pay of members of both Houses of Congress. There were some $6,000,000, which was not quite the full amount of the income, appropriated to the public service and the interest of the debt. But there were so many other demands upon the treasury that, after vainly endeavoring to obtain another loan, part of the bank stock was sold, a procedure which was reprobated by Hamilton as a violation of system. The opposition party would not agree to raise further revenue by indirect internal taxation, and only that augmenting the duty on pleasure carriages was passed into a law. Equally strenuous was their opposition to a naval force. Even under the pressure of the Algerine piracies, the bill providing a decent naval force in the Mediterranean could not be carried through the House without inserting a section which should suspend all proceedings under the act in case the contest with Algiers was brought to an end. That event having occurred, not a single frigate could be completed without further authority from the Legislature. Although no peace had been concluded with Tunis or Tripoli it was with the utmost difficulty that a bill for the completion of three, instead of six, frigates could be carried. On the 1st of June (1796) this long and important session of Congress was brought to its close.

Before Congress rose Washington had written (May 22, 1796) to Thomas Pinckney, the American minister in England, who had desired his recall. In this letter he refers to the recent debate in Congress on passing the laws necessary to give effect to the treaty: "A long and animated discussion," he writes, "in the House of Representatives respecting the treaty of amity, commerce, and navigation with Great Britain took place and continued in one shape or another till the last of April, suspending in a manner all other business, and agitating the public mind in a higher degree than it has been at any period since the Revolution. And nothing, I believe, but the torrent of petitions and remonstrances, which were pouring in from all the eastern and middle States and were beginning to come pretty strongly from that of Virginia, requiring the necessary provisions for carrying the treaty into effect, would have produced a division (fifty-one to forty-eight) in favor of the appropriation.

"But as the debates, which I presume will be sent to you from the Department of State, will give you a view of this business more in detail than I am able to do, I shall refer you to them. The enclosed speech, however, made by Mr. Ames at the close of the discussion, I send to you, because, in the opinion of most who heard it delivered or have read it since, his reasoning is unanswerable.

"The doubtful issue of the dispute and the real difficulty in finding a character to supply your place at the court of London, has occasioned a longer delay than may have been convenient or agreeable to you. But as Mr. King of the Senate, who, it seems, had resolved to quit his seat at that board, has accepted the appointment, and will embark as soon as matters can be arranged, you will soon be relieved.

"In my letter of the 20th of February I expressed in pretty strong terms my sensibility on account of the situation of the Marquis de Lafayette. This is increased by the visible distress of his son, who is now with me, and grieving for the unhappy fate of his parents. This circumstance, giving a poignancy to my own feelings, has induced me to go a step further than I did in the letter above mentioned, as you will perceive by the enclosed address (a copy of which is also transmitted for your information) to the Emperor of Germany, to be forwarded by you in such a manner, and under such auspices, as in your judgment shall be deemed best, or to be withheld, if from the evidence before you, derived from former attempts, it shall appear clear that it would be of no avail to send it. [1]

"Before I close this letter permit me to request the favor of you to embrace some favorable occasion to thank Lord Grenville, in my behalf, for his politeness in causing a special permit to be sent to Liverpool for the shipment of two sacks of field peas and the like quantity of winter vetches, which I had requested our consul at that place to send me for seed, but which it seems could not be done without an order from government, a circumstance which did not occur to me or I certainly should not have given the trouble of issuing one for such a trifle."

Rufus King, senator from New York, above referred to, had been nominated to the Senate as minister to London on the 19th of May, three days before the date of Washington's letter to Mr. Pinckney. Hamilton, writing to Washington respecting him, thus describes his character: "Mr. King is a remarkably well-informed man, a very judicious one, a man of address, a man of fortune and economy, whose situation affords just ground of confidence; a man of unimpeached probity where he is known, a firm friend to the government, a supporter of the measures of the President; a man who cannot but feel that he has strong pretensions to confidence and trust."

In June (1796) the President went to Mount Vernon where he continued for more than two months. He kept up a constant correspondence with his secretaries, and held himself ever in readiness to return to the seat of government, if his presence should be needed.

During this visit to Mount Vernon the following letter was written to Thomas Jefferson. It brought the correspondence, which, from time to time, had taken place between them, to a final close.

"MOUNT VERNON, July 6, 1796.

"DEAR SIR:--When I inform you that your letter of the 19th ultimo went to Philadelphia and returned to this place before it was received by me, it will be admitted, I am persuaded, as an apology for my not having acknowledged the receipt of it sooner.

"If I had entertained any suspicions before that the queries which have been published in Bache's paper proceeded from you the assurances you have given of the contrary would have removed them, but the truth is, I harbored none. I am at no loss to conjecture from what source they flowed, through what channel they were conveyed, and for what purpose they and similar publications appear. They were known to be in the hands of Mr. Parker in the early part of the last session of Congress. They were shown about by Mr. Giles during the session and they made their public exhibition about the close of it.

"Perceiving, and probably hearing, that no abuse in the gazettes would induce me to take notice of anonymous publications against me, those who were disposed to do me such friendly offices have embraced, without restraint, every opportunity to weaken the confidence of the people, and, by having the whole game in their hands, they have scrupled not to publish things that do not, as well as those which do exist, and to mutilate the latter, so as to make them subserve the purposes which they have in view.

"As you have mentioned the subject yourself, it would not be frank, candid, or friendly to conceal that your conduct has been represented as derogating from that opinion I had conceived you entertained of me, that to your particular friends and connections you have described, and they have denounced, me as a person under a dangerous influence, and that if I would listen more to some other opinions all would be well. My answer invariably has been that I had never discovered anything in the conduct of Mr. Jefferson to raise suspicions in my mind of his insincerity; that, if he would retrace my public conduct while he was in the administration, abundant proofs would occur to him that truth and right decisions were the sole objects of my pursuit; that there were as many instances within his own knowledge of my having decided against as in favor of the opinions of the person evidently alluded to, and, moreover, that I was no believer in the infallibility of the politics or measures of any man living. In short, that I was no party man myself, and the first wish of my heart was, if parties did exist, to reconcile them.

"To this I may add, and very truly, that, until within the last year or two I had no conception that parties would, or even could, go the length I have been witness to, nor did I believe until lately that it was within the bounds of probability, hardly within those of possibility, that, while I was using my utmost exertions to establish a national character of our own, independent, as far as our obligations and justice would permit, of every nation of the earth, and wished, by steering a steady course, to preserve this country from the horrors of a desolating war, I should be accused of being the enemy of one nation and subject to the influence of another, and, to prove it, that every act of my administration would be tortured and the grossest and most insidious misrepresentations of them be made, by giving one side only of a subject, and that too in such exaggerated and indecent terms as could scarcely be applied to a Nero, a notorious defaulter, or even to a common pickpocket. But enough of this. I have already gone further in the expression of my feelings than I intended."

The queries referred to in the above letter were those which had been addressed to the Cabinet by Washington previous to the arrival of Mr. Genet. As they were strictly confidential and could not have been obtained for publication without treachery somewhere, Jefferson had written to Washington to exculpate himself. It will be seen that Washington, with his usual magnanimity, accepts the explanation of Jefferson; but, as the party of which the latter was the acknowledged leader were constantly carrying on the war of politics by abusing and misrepresenting the former's motives and purposes, it is not surprising that their correspondence should have terminated at this time.

Of the numerous misrepresentations and fabrications which, with unwearied industry, were passed upon the public in order to withdraw the confidence of the nation from its chief, no one marked more strongly the depravity of that principle which justifies the means by the end, than the republication of certain forged letters, purporting to have been written by General Washington in the year 1776.

These letters had been originally published in the year 1777, and in them were interspersed, with domestic occurrences which might give them the semblance of verity, certain political sentiments favorable to Britain in the then existing contest.

But the original fabricator of these papers missed his aim. It was necessary to assign the manner in which the possession of them was acquired, and, in executing this part of his task, circumstances were stated so notoriously untrue, that, at the time, the meditated imposition deceived no person.

In the indefatigable research for testimony which might countenance the charge that the executive was unfriendly to France and under the influence of Britain, these letters were drawn from the oblivion into which they had sunk, it had been supposed forever, and were republished as genuine. The silence with which Washington treated this as well as every other calumny, was construed into an acknowledgment of its truth, and the malignant commentators on this spurious text would not admit the possibility of its being apocryphal.

Those who labored incessantly to establish the favorite position that the executive was under other than French influence, reviewed every act of the administration connected with its foreign relations, and continued to censure every part of the system with extreme bitterness. Not only the treaty with Great Britain, but all those measures which had been enjoined by the duties of neutrality, were reprobated as justly offensive to France, and no opinion which had been advanced by Mr. Genet, in his construction of the treaties between the two nations, was too extravagant to be approved. The most ardent patriot could not maintain the choicest rights of his country with more zeal than was manifested in supporting all the claims of the French republic upon the United States. This conduct of the opposition increased the disposition of the French government to urge charges against that of this country, and the French minister regulated his proceedings accordingly.

In the anxiety which was felt by Washington to come to a full and immediate explanation with the French Directory on the treaty with Great Britain, Colonel Monroe, the American minister at Paris, had been furnished, even before its ratification, and still more fully afterwards, with ample materials for the justification of his government. But, misconceiving the views of the administration, he reserved these representations until complaints should be made, and omitted to urge them while the Directory was deliberating on the course it should pursue. Meanwhile, his letters kept up the alarm with regard to the dispositions of France, and intelligence from the West Indies served to confirm it. Washington received information that the special agents of the Directory in the islands were about to issue orders for the capture of all American vessels laden in whole or in part with provisions and bound for any port within the dominions of the British Crown.

Knowing well that the intentions of the executive had been at all times friendly to the French republic, Washington had relied with confidence on early and candid communications for the removal of any prejudices or misconceptions. That the Directory would be disappointed at the adjustment of those differences which threatened to embroil the United States with Great Britain, could not be doubted, but, as neither this adjustment, nor the arrangements connected with it had furnished any real cause of complaint, he had cherished the hope that it would produce no serious consequences if the proper means of prevention should be applied in time. He was therefore dissatisfied with delays which he had not expected, and seems to have believed that they originated in a want of zeal to justify a measure which neither the minister himself, nor his political friends, had ever approved. To insure an earnest and active representation of the true sentiments of the executive, Washington was inclined to depute an envoy extraordinary for the particular purpose, who should be united with the actual minister, but an objection, drawn from the constitution, was suggested to the measure. It was doubted whether the President could, in the recess of the Senate, appoint a minister when no vacancy existed. From respect to this construction of the constitution, the resolution was taken to appoint a successor to Colonel Monroe. The choice of a person calculated for this mission was not without its difficulty. While a disposition friendly to the administration was indispensable, it was desirable that the person employed should have given no umbrage to the French government.

After some deliberation, Washington selected Gen. Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, of South Carolina, for this critical and important service. In the early part of the French revolution, he had felt and expressed all the enthusiasm of his countrymen for the establishment of the republic, but, after the commencement of its contests with the United States, he stood aloof from both those political parties which divided America.

He was recommended to the President by an intimate knowledge of his worth, by a confidence in the sincerity of his personal attachment to the chief magistrate, by a conviction that his exertions to effect the objects of his mission would be ardent and sincere, and that, whatever might be his partialities for France, he possessed a high and delicate sense of national as well as individual honor, was jealous for the reputation of his country, and tenacious of its rights. [2]

In July, immediately after the appointment of General Pinckney, letters were received from Colonel Monroe communicating the official complaints which had been made against the American government in March, by M. de la Croix, the minister of exterior relations, with his answer to those complaints. He had effectually refuted the criminations of M. de la Croix, and the executive was satisfied with his answer. But the Directory had decided on their system, and it was not by reasoning that their decision was to be changed.

Washington's correspondence with the members of the Cabinet during his summer residence at Mount Vernon was incessant. In his letters to James McHenry, Secretary of War, we find evidence of his attention to minute details of business, and his care of the public funds. In his letters of the 8th of August, we find, besides a reference to the fact of the delivery of the posts on the frontier by Great Britain, under the treaty, some curious details respecting the army:

"Your letter of the 3d instant," he writes, "with the information of our possession of Fort Ontario, lately occupied by the troops of Great Britain, and the correspondence between Captain Bruff of the United States troops, and Captain Clarke of the British, was brought to me by the last post. Several matters are submitted by the former for consideration--among them, the mode of supplying the garrison with firewood, and furnishing it with a seine. With respect to the first of these, providing it with a horse or pair of horses and a batteau, as the fuel is to be transported so far, seems to be a matter of necessity, but the practice of the American army should be consulted for precedents, before the British allowance is made to the soldiers for cutting and transporting it to the fort, when the means by which it is done are furnished by the public. If no allowance of this sort has been made heretofore in towns, where wood was to be bought, which, if I remember rightly, was the case invariably while I commanded the army, it would be a dangerous innovation to begin it now, for it would instantly pervade all the garrisons and the whole army, be their situation what it may. In time of peace, where no danger is to be apprehended, and where the duty is light, I see no hardship in the soldiers providing fuel for their own use and comfort. With regard to a seine, as the expense would be small if it is taken care of, and the convenience great, I think the garrison should be indulged with one." He had always an eye to the comfort of the soldier as well as to economy in the expenditure of the public money. The garrison might have horses for draught, a batteau, and a seine to catch fish in the lake, but in time of peace they were not to have extra pay for cutting wood to keep themselves warm.

1. Footnote: This letter, dated May 15, 1796, contained an affecting statement of Lafayette's case, and a request that he might be permitted to come to the United States. The letter was transmitted to Mr. Pinckney, to be conveyed to the Emperor through his minister at London. How far it operated in mitigating immediately the rigor of Lafayette's confinement, or in obtaining his liberation, remains unascertained.

2. Footnote: Before offering the appointment of minister to France to General Pinckney, Washington had offered it to Gen. John Marshall, afterward chief justice; but the situation of his private affairs would not permit its acceptance.

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XI. WASHINGTON RETIRES FROM THE PRESIDENCY. 1796-1797

Washington's fixed determination to retire from office at the end of his second term had long been known to his confidential friends. Many of them had opposed it from an apprehension of a political crisis arising from the hostile demonstrations of France and the strong support given to French pretensions by the opposition party in this country. When, in July (1796), Washington proposed to declare publicly his determination, Hamilton wrote to him, "If a storm gathers, how can you retreat? This is a most serious question." Washington, yielding to the wishes of Hamilton and other intimate friends, delayed the announcement of his purpose. As the time for a new election approached the people, uncertain of his intentions, became extremely anxious. The strong hold, says Marshall, which Washington had taken of the affections of his countrymen was, on this occasion, fully evinced. In districts where the opposition to his administration was most powerful, where all his measures were most loudly condemned, where those who approved his system possessed least influence, the men who appeared to control public opinion on every other subject found themselves unable to move it on this. Even the most popular among the leaders of the opposition were reduced to the necessity of surrendering their pretensions to a place in the electoral body or of pledging themselves to bestow their suffrage on the actual President. The determination of his fellow-citizens had been unequivocally manifested, and it was believed to be apparent that the election would again be unanimous when he announced his fixed resolution to withdraw from the honors and the toils of office.

Having long contemplated this event and having wished to terminate his political course with an act which might be at the same time suitable to his own character and permanently useful to his country, he had prepared for the occasion a valedictory address in which, with the solicitude of a person who, in bidding a final adieu to his friends, leaves his affections and his anxieties for their welfare behind him, he made a last effort to impress upon his countrymen those great political truths which had been the guides of his own administration and could alone, in his opinion, form a sure and solid basis for the happiness, the independence, and the liberty of the United States.

This interesting paper was published on the 17th of September, at a time when hopes were entertained that the discontents of France might be appeased by proper representations. It contains precepts to which the American statesman cannot too frequently recur.

WASHINGTON'S FAREWELL ADDRESS.

TO THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES.

FRIENDS AND FELLOW CITIZENS:--The period for a new election of a citizen to administer the executive government of the United States being not far distant, and the time actually arrived when your thoughts must be employed in designating the person who is to be clothed with that important trust, it appears to me proper, especially as it may conduce to a more distinct expression of the public voice, that I should not apprise you of the resolution I have formed, to decline being considered among the number of those out of whom the choice is to be made.

I beg you at the same time to do me the justice to be assured that this resolution has not been taken without a strict regard to all the considerations appertaining to the relation which binds a dutiful citizen to his country, and that in withdrawing the tender of service, which silence in my situation might imply, I am influenced by no diminution of zeal for your future interest, no deficiency of grateful respect for your past kindness, but am supported by a full conviction that the step is compatible with both.

The acceptance of, and continuance hitherto in, the office to which your suffrages have twice called me, have been a uniform sacrifice of inclination to the opinion of duty and to a deference for what appeared to be your desire. I constantly hoped that it would have been much earlier in my power, consistently with motives which I was not at liberty to disregard, to return to that retirement from which I had been reluctantly drawn. The strength of my inclination to do this, previous to the last election, had even led to the preparation of an address to declare it to you, but mature reflection on the then perplexed and critical posture of our affairs with foreign nations, and the unanimous advice of persons entitled to my confidence, impelled me to abandon the idea.

I rejoice that the state of your concerns, external as well as internal, no longer renders the pursuit of inclination incompatible with the sentiment of duty or propriety, and am persuaded, whatever partiality may be retained for my services, that in the present circumstances of our country, you will not disapprove of my determination to retire.

The impressions with which I first undertook the arduous trust were explained on the proper occasion. In the discharge of this trust I will only say that I have, with good intentions, contributed toward the organization and administration of the government the best exertions of which a very fallible judgment was capable. Not unconscious, in the outset, of the inferiority of my qualifications, experience in my own eyes, perhaps still more in the eyes of others, has strengthened the motives to diffidence of myself, and every day the increasing weight of years admonishes me more and more that the shade of retirement is as necessary to me as it will be welcome. Satisfied that if any circumstances have given peculiar value to my services, they were temporary, I have the consolation to believe, that while choice and prudence invite me to quit the political scene, patriotism does not forbid it.

In looking forward to the moment which is to terminate the career of my political life, my feelings do not permit me to suspend the deep acknowledgment of that debt of gratitude which I owe to my beloved country for the many honors it has conferred upon me; still more for the steadfast confidence with which it has supported me, and for the opportunities I have thence enjoyed of manifesting my inviolable attachment by services faithful and persevering, though in usefulness unequal to my zeal. If benefits have resulted to our country from these services, let it always be remembered to your praise and as an instructive example in our annals, that, under circumstances in which the passions, agitated in every direction, were liable to mislead--amidst appearances sometimes dubious--vicissitudes of fortune often discouraging--in situations in which not unfrequently want of success has countenanced the spirit of criticism--the constancy of your support was the essential prop of the efforts and a guarantee of the plans by which they were effected. Profoundly penetrated with this idea, I shall carry it with me to my grave, as a strong incitement to unceasing wishes, that Heaven may continue to you the choicest tokens of its beneficence--that your union and brotherly affection may be perpetual--that the free constitution, which is the work of your hands, may be sacredly maintained--that its administration in every department may be stamped with wisdom and virtue--that, in fine, the happiness of the people of these States, under the auspices of liberty, may be made complete, by so careful a preservation and so prudent a use of this blessing, as will acquire to them the glory of recommending it to the applause, the affection, and the adoption of every nation which is yet a stranger to it.

Here, perhaps, I ought to stop. But a solicitude for your welfare which cannot end but with my life and the apprehension of danger natural to that solicitude, urge me, on an occasion like the present, to offer to your solemn contemplation and to recommend to your frequent review, some sentiments, which are the result of much reflection of no inconsiderable observation and which appear to me all-important to the permanency of your felicity as a people. These will be offered to you with the more freedom, as you can only see in them the disinterested warnings of a parting friend, who can possibly have no personal motive to bias his counsel. Nor can I forget, as an encouragement to it, your indulgent reception of my sentiments on a former and not dissimilar occasion.

Interwoven as is the love of liberty with every ligament of your hearts, no recommendation of mine is necessary to fortify or confirm the attachment.

The unity of government, which constitutes you one people, is also now dear to you. It is justly so, for it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real independence, the support of your tranquility at home, your peace abroad, of your safety, of your prosperity, of that very liberty which you so highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee that from different causes and from different quarters, much pains will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds the conviction of this truth, as this is the point in your political fortress against which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most constantly and actively (though often covertly and insidiously) directed, it is of infinite moment that you should properly estimate the immense value of your national union to your collective and individual happiness, that you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attachment to it, accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of the palladium of your political safety and prosperity, watching for its preservation with jealous anxiety, discountenancing whatever may suggest even a suspicion that it can in any event be abandoned, and indignantly frowning upon the first dawning of every attempt to alienate any portion of our country from the rest, or to enfeeble the sacred ties which now link together the various parts.

For this you have every inducement of sympathy and interest. Citizens by birth or choice of a common country, that country has a right to concentrate your affections. The name of American, which belongs to you in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of patriotism, more than any appellation derived from local discriminations. With slight shades of difference, you have the same religion, manners, habits, and political principles. You have in a common cause fought and triumphed together; the independence and liberty you possess are the work of joint councils and joint efforts of common dangers, sufferings, and successes.

But these considerations, however powerfully they address themselves to your sensibility, are greatly out-weighed by those which apply more immediately to your interest. Here every portion of our country finds the most commanding motives for carefully guarding and preserving the union of the whole.

The North, in an unrestrained intercourse with the South, protected by the equal laws of a common government, finds in the productions of the latter, great additional resources of maritime and commercial enterprise, and precious materials of manufacturing industry. The South, in the same intercourse, benefiting by the agency of the North, sees its agriculture grow and its commerce expand. Turning partly into its own channels the seamen of the North, it finds its particular navigation invigorated--and while it contributes, in different ways, to nourish and increase the general mass of the national navigation, it looks forward to the protection of a maritime strength to which itself is unequally adapted. The East, in like intercourse with the West, already finds and in the progressive improvement of interior communications by land and water, will more and more find a valuable vent for the commodities which it brings from abroad or manufactures at home. The West derives from the East supplies requisite to its growth and comfort, and, what is perhaps of still greater consequence, it must of necessity owe the secure enjoyment of indispensable outlets for its own productions, to the weight, influence, and the future maritime strength of the Atlantic side of the Union, directed by an indissoluble community of interest as one nation. Any other tenure by which the West can hold this essential advantage, whether derived from its own separate strength or from an apostate and unnatural connection with any foreign power, must be intrinsically precarious.

While, then, every part of our country thus feels an immediate and particular interest in union, all the parts combined cannot fail to find in the united mass of means and efforts, greater strength, greater resource, proportionally greater security from external danger, a less frequent interruption of their peace by foreign nations, and, what is of inestimable value, they must derive from union an exemption from those broils and wars between themselves which so frequently afflict neighboring countries, not tied together by the same government, which their own rivalships alone would be sufficient to produce, but which opposite foreign alliances, attachments, and intrigues would stimulate and embitter. Hence likewise they will avoid the necessity of those overgrown military establishments, which, under any form of government, are inauspicious to liberty, and which are to be regarded as particularly hostile to republican liberty. In this sense it is that your union ought to be considered as a main prop of your liberty and that the love of the one ought to endear to you the preservation of the other.

These considerations speak a persuasive language to every reflecting and virtuous mind and exhibit the continuance of the Union as a primary object of patriotic desire. Is there a doubt whether a common government can embrace so large a sphere? Let experience solve it. To listen to mere speculation in such a case were criminal. We are authorized to hope that a proper organization of the whole, with the auxiliary agency of governments for the respective subdivisions will afford a happy issue to the experiment. It is well worth a fair and full experiment. With such powerful and obvious motives to union affecting all parts of our country, while experience shall not have demonstrated its impracticability, there will always be reason to distrust the patriotism of those who, in any quarter, may endeavor to weaken its bands.

In contemplating the causes which may disturb our union, it occurs as matter of serious concern, that any ground should have been furnished for characterizing parties by geographical discriminations--northern and southern--Atlantic and western, whence designing men may endeavor to excite a belief that there is a real difference of local interests and views. One of the expedients of party to acquire influence, within particular districts, is to misrepresent the opinions and aims of other districts. You cannot shield yourselves too much against the jealousies and heart burnings which spring from these misrepresentations; they tend to render alien to each other those who ought to be bound together by fraternal affection. The inhabitants of our western country have lately had a useful lesson on this head. They have seen, in the negotiation by the executive and in the unanimous ratification by the Senate of the treaty with Spain, and in the universal satisfaction at that even throughout the United States, a decisive proof how unfounded were the suspicions propagated among them of a policy in the general government and in the Atlantic States, unfriendly to their interests in regard to the Mississippi. They have been witnesses to the formation of two treaties, that with Great Britain and that with Spain, which secure to them everything they could desire in respect to our foreign relations toward confirming their prosperity. Will it not be their wisdom to rely for the preservation of these advantages on the Union by which they were procured? Will they not henceforth be deaf to those advisers, if such there are, who would sever them from their brethren and connect them with aliens?

To the efficacy and permanency of your Union a government for the whole is indispensable. No alliances, however strict, between the parts can be an adequate substitute; they must inevitably experience the infractions and interruptions which all alliances in all times have experienced.

Sensible of this momentous truth you have improved upon your first essay by the adoption of a constitution of government, better calculated than your former, for an intimate union, and for the efficacious management of your common concerns. This government, the offspring of our own choice, uninfluenced and unawed, adopted upon full investigation and mature deliberation, completely free in its principles, in the distribution of its powers uniting security with energy, and containing within itself a provision for its own amendments, has a just claim to your confidence and your support. Respect for its authority, compliance with its laws, acquiescence in its measures, are duties enjoined by the fundamental maxims of true liberty. The basis of our political systems is the right of the people to make and to alter their constitutions of government. But the constitution which at any time exists, until changed by an explicit and authentic act of the whole people, is sacredly obligatory upon all. The very idea of the power and the right of the people to establish a government, presupposes the duty of every individual to obey the established government.

All obstructions to the execution of the laws, all combinations and associations, under whatever plausible character, with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the regular deliberations and action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction; to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put in the place of the delegated will of the nation, the will of a party, often a small, but artful and enterprising minority of the community, and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans, digested by common councils and modified by mutual interests.

However combinations or associations of the above description may now and then answer popular ends they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterward the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.

Toward the preservation of your government and the permanency of your present happy state, it is requisite not only that you steadily discountenance irregular oppositions to its acknowledged authority, but also that you resist with care the spirit of innovation upon its principles, however specious the pretexts. One method of assault may be to effect in the forms of the constitution alterations which will impair the energy of the system, and thus to undermine what cannot be directly overthrown. In all the changes to which you may be invited remember that time and habit are at least as necessary to fix the true characters of governments as of other human institutions--that experience is the surest standard by which to test the real tendency of the existing constitution of a country--that facility in changes upon the credit of mere hypothesis, and opinion exposes to perpetual change from the endless variety of hypothesis and opinion--and remember, especially, that for the efficient management of your common interests, in a country so extensive as ours, a government of as much vigor as is consistent with the perfect security of liberty is indispensable. Liberty itself will find in such a government, with powers properly distributed and adjusted, its surest guardian. It is, indeed, little else than a name, where the government is too feeble to withstand the enterprises of faction, to confine each member of the society within the limits prescribed by the laws, and to maintain all in the secure and tranquil enjoyment of the rights of person and property.

I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the State, with particular reference to the founding of them on geographical discriminations. Let me now take a more comprehensive view and warn you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party generally.

This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind. It exists under different shapes in all governments, more or less stifled, controlled, or repressed but in those of the popular form it is seen in its greatest rankness and is truly their worst enemy.

The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries which result gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual, and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation on the ruins of public liberty.

Without looking forward to an extremity of this kind (which nevertheless ought not to be entirely out of sight) the common and continual mischiefs of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it.

It serves always to distract the public councils and enfeeble the public administration. It agitates the community with ill-founded jealousies and false alarms; kindles the animosity of one part against another; foments occasional riot and insurrection. It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which find a facilitated access to the government itself, through the channel of party passions. Thus the policy and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and will of another.

There is an opinion that parties in free countries are useful checks upon the administration of the government and serve to keep alive the spirit of liberty. This, within certain limits, is probably true, and in governments of a monarchical cast patriotism may look with indulgence, if not with favor, upon the spirit of party. But in those of the popular character, in governments purely elective, it is a spirit not to be encouraged. From their natural tendency it is certain there will always be enough of that spirit for every salutary purpose, and, there being constant danger of excess, the effort ought to be, by force of public opinion, to mitigate and assuage it. A fire not to be quenched, it demands a uniform vigilance to prevent its bursting into a flame, lest, instead of warming, it should consume.

It is important, likewise, that the habits of thinking in a free country should inspire caution in those entrusted with its administration to confine themselves within their respective constitutional spheres, avoiding, in the exercise of the powers of one department, to encroach upon another. The spirit of encroachment tends to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one, and thus to create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism. A just estimate of that love of power, and proneness to abuse it, which predominate in the human heart, is sufficient to satisfy us of the truth of this position. The necessity of reciprocal checks in the exercise of political power, by dividing and distributing it into different depositories and constituting each the guardian of the public weal against invasions of the others, has been evinced by experiments ancient and modern, some of them in our country and under our own eyes. To preserve them must be as necessary as to institute them. If, in the opinion of the people, the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way which the constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpation, for though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed. The precedent must always greatly overbalance, in permanent evil, any partial or transient benefit which the use can at any time yield.

Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness--these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked, where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principles. It is substantially true, that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. This rule indeed extends with more or less force to every species of free government. Who that is a sincere friend to it can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric?

Promote, then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion it is essential that public opinion should be enlightened.

As a very important source of strength and security, cherish public credit. One method of preserving it is to use it as sparingly as possible, avoiding occasions of expense by cultivating peace, but remembering also, that timely disbursements to prepare for danger, frequently prevent much greater disbursements to repel it; avoiding likewise the accumulation of debt, not only by shunning occasions of expense, but by vigorous exertions in time of peace to discharge the debts which unavoidable wars may have occasioned, not ungenerously throwing upon posterity the burden which we ourselves ought to bear. The execution of these maxims belongs to your representatives, but it is necessary that public opinion should cooperate. To facilitate to them the performance of their duty, it is essential that you should practically bear in mind, that toward the payment of debts there must be revenue; that to have revenue there must be taxes; that no taxes can be devised which are not more or less inconvenient and unpleasant; that the intrinsic embarrassment inseparable from the selection of the proper objects (which is always a choice of difficulties), ought to be a decisive motive for a candid construction of the conduct of the government in making it, and for a spirit of acquiescence in the measures for obtaining revenue, which the public exigencies may at any time dictate.

Observe good faith and justice toward all nations, cultivate peace and harmony with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct, and can it be that good policy does not equally enjoin it? It will be worthy of a free, enlightened, and, at no distant period, a great nation, to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence. Who can doubt, that, in the course of time and things, the fruits of such a plan would richly repay any temporary advantages which might be lost by a steady adherence to it? Can it be, that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a nation with its virtue? The experiment, at least, is recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature. Alas! is it rendered impossible by its vices?

In the execution of such a plan nothing is more essential than that permanent inveterate antipathies against particular nations, and passionate attachments for others, should be excluded, and that, in place of them, just and amicable feelings toward all should be cultivated. The nation which indulges toward another an habitual hatred, or an habitual fondness, is in some degree a slave. It is a slave to its animosity or to its affection, either of which is sufficient to lead it astray from its duty and its interest. Antipathy in one nation against another disposes each more readily to offer insult and injury, to lay hold of slight causes of umbrage and to be haughty and intractable when accidental or trifling occasions of dispute occur.

Hence, frequent collisions, obstinate, envenomed and bloody contests. The nation, prompted by ill will and resentment, sometimes impels to war the government, contrary to the best calculations of policy. The government sometimes participates in the national propensity and adopts through passion what reason would reject; at other times it makes the animosity of the nation subservient to projects of hostility instigated by pride, ambition, and other sinister and pernicious motives. The peace often, sometimes perhaps the liberty of nations has been the victim.

So, likewise, a passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite nation, facilitating the illusion of an imaginary common interest in cases where no real common interest exists and infusing into one the enmities of the other, betrays the former into a participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter, without adequate inducements or justification. It leads also to concessions to the favorite nation of privileges denied to others, which are apt doubly to injure the nation making the concessions by unnecessary parting with what ought to have been retained, and by exciting jealousy, ill will, and a disposition to retaliate, in the parties from whom equal privileges are withheld, and it gives to ambitious, corrupted, or deluded citizens (who devote themselves to the favorite nation), facility to betray or sacrifice the interests of their own country, without odium, sometimes even with popularity, gilding with the appearances of a virtuous sense of obligation to a commendable deference for public opinion or a laudable zeal for public good, the base or foolish compliances of ambition, corruption, or infatuation.

As avenues to foreign influence in innumerable ways, such attachments are particularly alarming to the truly enlightened and independent patriot. How many opportunities do they afford to tamper with domestic factions, to practice the arts of seduction, to mislead public opinion, to influence or awe the public councils! Such an attachment of a small or weak, toward a great and powerful nation, dooms the former to be the satellite of the latter.

Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow-citizens), the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake, since history and experience prove that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government. But that jealousy, to be useful, must be impartial, else it becomes the instrument of the very influence to be avoided, instead of a defense against it. Excessive partiality for one foreign nation and excessive dislike of another cause those whom they actuate to see danger only on one side, and serve to veil and even second the arts of influence on the other. Real patriots who may resist the intrigues of the favorite are liable to become suspected and odious, while its tools and dupes usurp the applause and confidence of the people to surrender their interests.

The great rule of conduct for us, in regard to foreign nations, is, in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible. So far as we have already formed engagements, let them be fulfilled with perfect good faith. Here let us stop.

Europe has a set of primary interests which to us have none, or a very remote, relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies, the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves, by artificial ties, in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities.

Our detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a different course. If we remain one people, under an efficient government, the period is not far off when we may defy material injury from external annoyance, when we may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality we may at any time resolve upon to be scrupulously respected, when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving us provocation, when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall counsel.

Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor, or caprice?

It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world, so far, I mean, as we are now at liberty to do it, for let me not be understood as capable of patronizing infidelity to existing engagements. I hold the maxim no less applicable to public than to private affairs, that honesty is always the best policy. I repeat it, therefore, let those engagements be observed in their genuine sense. But, in my opinion, it is unnecessary, and would be unwise to extend them.

Taking care always to keep ourselves, by suitable establishments, on a respectable defensive posture, we may safely trust to temporary alliances for extraordinary emergencies.

Harmony and a liberal intercourse with all nations are recommended by policy, humanity, and interest. But even our commercial policy should hold an equal and impartial hand, neither seeking nor granting exclusive favors or preferences; consulting the natural course of things; diffusing and diversifying, by gentle means, the streams of commerce, but forcing nothing; establishing, with powers so disposed--in order to give trade a stable course, to define the rights of our merchants, and to enable the government to support them--conventional rules of intercourse, the best that present circumstances and mutual opinion will permit, but temporary, and liable to be from time to time abandoned or varied, as experience and circumstances shall dictate, constantly keeping in view that it is folly in one nation to look for disinterested favors from another; that it must pay with a portion of its independence for whatever it may accept under that character; that by such acceptance it may place itself in the condition of having given equivalents for nominal favors and yet of being reproached with ingratitude for not giving more. There can be no greater error than to expect or calculate upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an illusion which experience must cure, which a just pride ought to discard.

In offering to you, my countrymen, these counsels of an old and affectionate friend, I dare not hope they will make the strong and lasting impression I could wish; that they will control the usual current of the passions or prevent our nation from running the course which has hitherto marked the destiny of nations. But if I may even flatter myself that they may be productive of some partial benefit, some occasional good; that they may now and then recur to moderate the fury of party spirit; to warn against the mischiefs of foreign intrigue; to guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism, this hope will be a full recompense for the solicitude for your welfare by which they have been dictated.

How far, in the discharge of my official duties, I have been guided by the principles which have been delineated, the public records and other evidences of my conduct must witness to you and to the world. To myself the assurance of my own conscience is that I have at least believed myself to be guided by them.

In relation to the still subsisting war in Europe my proclamation of the 22d of April, 1793, is the index to my plan. Sanctioned by your approving voice and by that of your representatives in both Houses of Congress, the spirit of that measure has continually governed me, uninfluenced by any attempts to deter or divert me from it.

After deliberate examination, with the aid of the best lights I could obtain, I was well satisfied that our country, under all the circumstances of the case, had a right to take, and was bound in duty and interest to take, a neutral position. Having taken it I determined, as far as should depend upon me, to maintain it with moderation, perseverance, and firmness.

The considerations which respect the right to hold this conduct it is not necessary on this occasion to detail. I will only observe that, according to my understanding of the matter, that right, so far from being denied by any of the belligerent powers, has been virtually admitted by all.

The duty of holding a neutral conduct may be inferred, without anything more, from the obligation which justice and humanity impose on every nation, in cases in which it is free to act, to maintain inviolate the relations of peace and amity toward other nations.

The inducements of interest for observing that conduct will best be referred to your own reflections and experience. With me a predominant motive has been to endeavor to gain time to our country to settle and mature its yet recent institutions and to progress, without interruption, to that degree of strength and consistency which is necessary to give it, humanely speaking, the command of its own fortunes.

Though in reviewing the incidents of my administration I am unconscious of intentional error, I am, nevertheless, too sensible of my defects not to think it probable that I may have committed many errors. Whatever they may be, I fervently beseech the Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which they may tend. I shall also carry with me the hope that my country will never cease to view them with indulgence, and, after forty-five years of my life dedicated to its service, with an upright zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be consigned to oblivion, as myself must soon be to the mansions of rest.

Relying on its kindness in this as in other things, and actuated by that fervent love toward it, which is so natural to a man who views in it the native soil of himself and his progenitors for several generations, I anticipate with pleasing expectation that retreat, in which I promise myself to realize, without alloy, the sweet enjoyment of partaking, in the midst of my fellow-citizens, the benign influence of good laws under a free government, the ever favorite object of my heart and the happy reward, as I trust, of our mutual cares, labors, and dangers.

UNITED STATES, September 17, 1796.

The sentiments of veneration with which this farewell address was generally received were manifested in almost every part of the Union. Some of the State Legislatures directed it to be inserted at large in their journals, and nearly all of them passed resolutions expressing their respect for the person of the President, their high sense of his exalted services, and the emotions with which they contemplated his retirement from office. Although the leaders of party might rejoice at this event it produced solemn and anxious reflections in the great body, even of those who belonged to the opposition.

The person in whom alone the voice of the people could be united having declined a re-election, the two great parties in America brought forward their respective chiefs, and every possible effort was made by each to obtain the victory. Mr. John Adams and Mr. Thomas Pinckney, the late minister at London, were supported as President and Vice-President by the Federalists; the whole force of the opposite party was exerted in favor of Mr. Jefferson.

Motives of vast influence were added on this occasion to those which usually impel men in a struggle to retain or acquire power. The continuance or the change, not only of those principles on which the internal affairs of the United States had been administered, but of the conduct which had been observed toward foreign nations, was believed to depend on the choice of a chief magistrate. By one party the system of neutrality pursued by the existing administration with regard to the belligerent European powers, had been uniformly approved; by the other it had been as uniformly condemned. In the contests, therefore, which preceded the choice of electors, the justice of the complaints which were made on the part of the French republic were minutely discussed, and the consequences which were to be apprehended from her resentment or from yielding to her pretensions were reciprocally urged as considerations entitled to great weight in the ensuing election.

In such a struggle it was not to be expected that foreign powers could feel absolutely unconcerned. In November, while the parties were so balanced that neither scale could be perceived to preponderate, Mr. Adet addressed a letter to Colonel Pickering, the Secretary of State, in which he recapitulated the numerous complaints which had been urged by himself and his predecessors against the government of the United States, and reproached that government in terms of great asperity with violating those treaties which had secured its independence, with ingratitude to France, and with partiality to England. These wrongs, which commenced with the "insidious" proclamation of neutrality, were said to be so aggravated by the treaty concluded with Great Britain that Mr. Adet announced the orders of the Directory to suspend his ministerial functions with the Federal government. "But the cause," he added, "which has so long restrained the just resentment of the Executive Directory from bursting forth, now tempered its effects. The name of America, notwithstanding the wrongs of its government, still excited sweet sensations in the hearts of Frenchmen, and the Executive Directory wished not to break with a people whom they loved to salute with the appellation of friend." This suspension of his functions, therefore, was not to be regarded "as a rupture between France and the United States, but as a mark of just discontent, which was to last until the government of the United States returned to sentiments and to measures more conformable to the interests of the alliance, and to the sworn friendship between the two nations." "Let your government return to itself," concluded Mr. Adet, "and you will still find in Frenchmen faithful friends and generous allies."

As if to remove any possible doubt respecting the purpose for which this extraordinary letter was written, a copy was transmitted, on the day of its date, to a printer for publication.

This open and direct appeal of a foreign minister to the American people, in the critical moment of their election of a chief magistrate, did not effect its object. Reflecting men, even among those who had condemned the course of the administration, could not approve this interference in the internal affairs of the United States, and the opposite party resented it as an attempt to control the operations of the American people in the exercise of one of the highest acts of sovereignty, and to poison the fountain of their liberty and independence by mingling foreign intrigue with their elections. The reader of history, however, is familiar with the fact that the course of Adet in this affair was in strict accordance with the uniform practice of the new rulers of France at that time. Their agents endeavored to prejudice the people of every country in Europe against their respective governments, and never hesitated to interfere directly between the people and the government, wherever there was any prospect of introducing French ascendency by such proceedings. The people of the United States, on the present occasion, resented the officious interference of Adet in the pending election as a gross insult, and it undoubtedly aided the party which it was intended to defeat. Congress met on the 5th of December (1796). There was not a sufficient number of senators present on that day to form a quorum. In the House of Representatives, among the new members who presented themselves was Andrew Jackson, from Tennessee, the future President of the United States.

On the 7th of December Washington, for the last time, met the national Legislature in the hall of the House of Representatives. His address was comprehensive, temperate, and dignified. No personal consideration could restrain him from recommending those great national measures which he believed would be useful to his country, although open and extensive hostility had been avowed to them.

After presenting a full view of the situation of the United States and the late transactions of the executive, he added: "To an active external commerce the protection of a naval force is indispensable--this is manifest with regard to wars in which a State is itself a party; but, besides this, it is in our own experience that the most sincere neutrality is not a sufficient guard against the depredations of nations at war. To secure respect to a neutral flag requires a naval force, organized and ready to vindicate it from insult or aggression; this may even prevent the necessity of going to war by discouraging belligerent powers from committing such violations of the rights of the neutral party as may, first or last, leave no other option. From the best information I have been able to obtain, it would seem as if our trade to the Mediterranean, without a protecting force, will always be insecure, and our citizens exposed to the calamities from which numbers of them have but just been relieved."

The speech next proceeded earnestly to recommend the establishment of national works for manufacturing such articles as were necessary for the defense of the country, and also for an institution which should grow up under the patronage of the public and be devoted to the improvement of agriculture. The advantages of a military academy and of a national university were also urged, and the necessity of augmenting the compensation to the officers of the United States in various instances was explicitly stated.

The President, in adverting to the dissatisfaction which had been expressed by one of the great powers of Europe, said: "It is with much pain and deep regret I mention that circumstances of a very unwelcome nature have lately occurred. Our trade has suffered, and is suffering, extensive injuries in the West Indies from the cruisers and agents of the French republic, and communications have been received from, its minister here which indicate the danger of a further disturbance of our commerce by its authority."

After stating his constant and earnest endeavors to maintain cordial harmony and a perfectly friendly understanding with that republic, and that his wish to maintain them remained unabated, he added: "In pursuing this course, however, I cannot forget what is due to the character of our government and nation, or to a full and entire confidence in the good sense, patriotism, self-respect, and fortitude of my countrymen."

After some other communications, the speech was concluded in the following terms:

"The situation in which I now stand, for the last time, in the midst of the representatives of the people of the United States, naturally recalls the period when the administration of the present form of government commenced; and I cannot omit the occasion to congratulate you and my country on the success of the experiment, nor to repeat my fervent supplications to the Supreme Ruler of the Universe and Sovereign Arbiter of Nations that His providential care may still be extended to the United States; that the virtue and happiness of the people may be preserved, and that the government which they have instituted for their protection may be perpetual."

The answer of the Senate embraced the various topics of the speech and approved all the sentiments it contained.

It expressed the ardent attachment of that body to their chief magistrate, and its conviction that much of the public prosperity was to be ascribed to the virtue, firmness, and talents of his administration. After expressing the deep and sincere regret with which the official ratification of his intention to retire from the public employments of his country was received, the address proceeded to say: "The most effectual consolation that can offer for the loss we are about to sustain arises from the animating reflection that the influence of your example will extend to your successors, and the United States thus continue to enjoy an able, upright, and energetic administration."

In the House of Representatives a committee of five had been appointed to prepare a respectful answer to the speech, three of whom were friends to the administration.

Hoping that the disposition would be general to avow in strong terms their attachment to the person and character of the President, the committee united in reporting an answer which promised, in general terms, due attention to the various subjects recommended to their consideration, but was full and explicit in the expression of attachment to himself and of approbation of his administration.

The unanimity which prevailed in the committee did not extend to the House.

After amplifying and strengthening the expressions of the report, which stated regret that any interruption should have taken place in the harmony which had subsisted between the United States and France, and modifying those which declared their hope for the restoration of that harmony, so as to avoid any implication that its rupture was exclusively ascribable to France, a motion was made by Mr. Giles to expunge all those paragraphs which expressed attachment to the person and character of the President, approbation of his administration, or regret at his retiring from office.

After a very animated debate the motion to strike out was lost and the answer was carried by a great majority.

Early in the session Washington communicated to Congress the copy of a letter addressed by the Secretary of State to General Pinckney, containing a minute and comprehensive detail of all the points of controversy which had arisen between the United States and France, and defending the measures which had been adopted by America with a clearness and a strength of argument believed to be irresistible. The letter was intended to enable General Pinckney to remove from the government of France all impressions unfavorable to the fairness of intention which had influenced the conduct of the United States, and to efface from the bosoms of the great body of the American people all those unjust and injurious suspicions which had been entertained against their own administration. Should its immediate operation on the executive of France disappoint his hopes, Washington persuaded himself that he could not mistake its influence in America; and he felt the most entire conviction that the accusations made by the French Directory against the United States would cease, with the evidence that these accusations were supported by a great portion of the American people.

The letter and its accompanying documents were communicated to the public, but, unfortunately, their effect at home was not such as had been expected, and they were, consequently, inoperative abroad.

The measures recommended by Washington, in his speech at the opening of the session, were not adopted, and neither the debates in Congress nor the party publications with which the nation continued to be agitated, furnished reasonable ground for hope that the political intemperance which had prevailed from the establishment of the republican form of government in France, was about to be succeeded by a more conciliatory spirit. It was impossible for Washington to be absolutely insensible to the bitter invectives and malignant calumnies of which he had long been the object. Yet in one instance only did he depart from the rule he had prescribed for his conduct regarding them. Apprehending permanent injury from the republication of certain spurious letters, which have been already noticed, he, on the day which terminated his official character, addressed a letter to the Secretary of State, declaring them to be forgeries and stating the circumstances under which they were published.

On the 8th of February (1797) the votes for the President and Vice-President were opened and counted in the presence of both Houses, and John Adams announced the fact from the chair of the Vice-President that he himself had received 71 votes, Thomas Jefferson 68, Thomas Pinckney 59, Aaron Burr 30, and that the balance of the votes were given in varying small numbers to Samuel Adams, Oliver Ellsworth, John Jay, etc. The total number of electors was 138. Thus John Adams became the second President of the United States, and by some mismanagement on the part of the Federalists Pinckney missed the Vice-Presidency, and the man of all others most dreaded by the Federal party was placed in the very front rank of the Republicans, and with the clear presage of success in the future.

Washington's feelings on the immediate prospect of retirement from office are expressed in the following extract from a letter to General Knox, dated March 2, 1797: "To the wearied traveler who sees a resting-place and is bending his body to lean thereon, I now compare myself, but to be suffered to do this in peace is too much to be endured by some. To misrepresent my motives, to reprobate my politics, and to weaken the confidence which has been reposed in my administration are objects which cannot be relinquished by those who will be satisfied with nothing short of a change in our political system. The consolation, however, which results from conscious rectitude and the approving voice of my country, unequivocally expressed by its representatives, deprive their sting of its poison and place in the same point of view both the weakness and malignity of their efforts.

"Although the prospect of retirement is most grateful to my soul, and I have not a wish to mix again in the great world or to partake in its politics, yet I am not without my regrets at parting with (perhaps never more to meet) the few intimates whom I love. Among these, be assured, you are one."

Bishop White has given the following anecdote, illustrating the strong feelings of regret awakened among Washington's friends by his approaching retirement from public life:

"On the day before President Washington retired from office a large company dined with him. Among them were the foreign ministers and their ladies, Mr. and Mrs. Adams, Mr. Jefferson, and other conspicuous persons of both sexes. During the dinner much hilarity prevailed, but on the removal of the cloth it was put an end to by the President, certainly without design. Having filled his glass, he addressed the company, with a smile, as nearly as can be recollected, in the following words: 'Ladies and gentlemen, this is the last time I shall drink your health as a public man. I do it with sincerity, wishing you all possible happiness.' There was an end of all pleasantry. He who gives this relation accidentally directed his eye to the lady of the British minister, Mrs. Liston, and tears were running down her cheeks."

Mr. Gibbs, in his "Administrations of Washington and Adams," refers to the parting levee in the following terms:

"Just before his final retirement, Washington held his last formal levee. An occasion more respectable in simplicity, more imposing in dignity, more affecting in the sensations which it awakened, the ceremonials of rulers never exhibited. There were the great chiefs of the republic of all parties and opinions; veterans of the War of Independence, weather-stained and scarred; white-haired statesmen, who, in retirement, were enjoying the fruits of former toil; there were his executive counselors and private friends; ministers of foreign governments, whose veneration approached that of his countrymen; citizens who came to offer the tribute of a respect, sincere and disinterested. Little was there of the pageantry of courts, little of the glitter which attends the receptions of royalty, yet in the grave assemblage that stood in that unadorned chamber there was a majesty which these knew not. The dignitaries of a nation had come together to bid farewell to one who, at their own free call, by their own willing trust--not as an honor to be coveted, but as a duty to be discharged--had, in turn, led their armies and executed their laws; one who now, his last task worthily fulfilled, was to take his place again among them, readier to relinquish than he had been to undertake power; a soldier without stain upon his arms; a ruler without personal ambition; a wise and upright statesman; a citizen of self-sacrificing patriotism; a man pure, unblemished, and true in every relation he had filled; one to whom all ages should point as the testimony that virtue and greatness had been and could be united.

"And he who was the object of this gathering--what thoughts crowded upon his mind; what recollections filled the vista of the sixty odd years which had passed over him; what changes of men, opinions, society, had he seen! Great changes, indeed, in the world and its old notions; the growing dissatisfaction of certain English emigrants at customary tyrannies and new intended ones had taken form and shape, embodied itself into principles, and vindicated them; blazed up an alarming beacon in the world's eyes as the Sacred Right of Rebellion; fought battles; asserted independence and maintained it at much cost of bloodshed; made governments after its own new-fangled fashion; impressed a most unwilling idea on history--the doctrine of popular sovereignty--one which had proved contagious and had been adopted elsewhere, running riot indeed in its novelty. And out of all this confusion there had arisen the nation which he had presided over, already become great, and factious in its greatness, with a noble birthright, noble virtues, energies, and intellect; with great faults and passions that, unchecked, would, as in lusty individual manhood, lead to its ruin.

"What was to be the future of that nation? Dark clouds hung over it, dangers threatened it, enemies frowned upon it--the worst enemy was within. License might blast, in a few hours, the growth of years; faction destroy the careful work of the founders. On this he had left his great solemn charge, like the last warning of a father to his children."

The relation in which the secretaries had stood with the President had been one of respectful but affectionate intimacy. The most cordial and unreserved friendship was extended to all whom he trusted and esteemed. The Secretaries of State and War (Pickering and McHenry) had been his fellow-soldiers; the Secretary of the Treasury (Wolcott) had, as it were, grown up under his eye. The simplicity and military frankness of Pickering, the kindly nature and refinement of McHenry, the warm-heartedness and bonhommie of Wolcott, all won upon his regard. On their part there was a no less sincere love for their chief. There are those devotion to whom is no degradation. Washington was such a one, and to him it was rendered in the spirit of men who respected themselves. Among all connected with him, either in military or civil life, this sentiment was retained. His death hallowed his memory in their hearts to a degree and with a sanctity which none can know who have not heard from their own lips--none can feel Who were not of them. And in likewise the wife and family of Washington were cherished. They had been universally beloved on their own account, and the hand of fate, in depriving them of a husband and father, as it were, bequeathed them to the tender care of a nation. There was something beautiful in these sentiments, in a land where the ties that bind men depend so little upon association.

Wolcott, among others, had enjoyed much of the domestic society of the President's house. His gentle and graceful wife had been regarded with maternal tenderness by Mrs. Washington and was the friend and correspondent of her eldest daughter. His child had been used to climb, confident of welcome, the knees of the chief, and though so many years his junior, while Wolcott's character and judgment had been held in respect by the President, his personal and social qualities had drawn toward him a warm degree of interest.

On leaving the seat of government, Washington presented, it is believed, to all his chief officers some token of regard. To Wolcott he gave a piece of plate. Mrs. Washington gave to his wife, when visiting her for the last time, a relic still more interesting. Asking her if she did not wish for a memorial of the general, Mrs. Wolcott replied, "Yes," she "should like a lock of his hair." Mrs. Washington, smiling, took Her scissors and cut off for her a lock of her husband's and one of her own. These, with the originals of Washington's letters, Wolcott preserved with careful veneration and divided between his surviving children.

"On the retirement of General Washington," says Wolcott, "being desirous that my personal interests should not embarrass his successor, and supposing that some other person might be preferred to myself, I tendered my resignation to Mr. Adams before his inauguration. The tender was declined and I retained office under my former commission."

On the 1st of March (1797) Washington had addressed a note to the Senate, desiring them to attend in their chamber on Saturday, the 4th, at 10 o'clock, "to receive any communication which the President of the United States might lay before them touching their interests." In conformity with this summons the Senate assembled on that day and commenced their thirteenth session. The oath of office was administered by Mr. Bingham to Mr. Jefferson, who thereupon took the chair. The new Senators were then sworn and the Vice-President delivered a brief address. The Senate then repaired to the chamber of the House of Representatives to attend the administration of the oath of office to the new President. Mr. Adams entered, accompanied by the heads of departments, [1] the marshal of the district and his officers, and took his seat in the speaker's chair. The Vice-President and secretary of the Senate were seated in advance on his right, and the late speaker and clerk on the left; the justices of the Supreme Court sat before the President, the foreign ministers and members of the House in their usual seats. Washington, once more a private citizen, sat in front of the judges. Mr. Adams then rose and delivered his inaugural speech. This address was brief and well suited to the occasion. After adverting to the circumstances which led to the formation of the new constitution, he expressed the unqualified approbation with which, in a foreign land and apart from the scene of controversy, he had first perused it, and the undiminished confidence which, after eight years of experience, he entertained of its fitness. He remarked briefly on the abuses to which it was subject, and against which it became the duty of the people to guard, and having disclosed his opinions of general policy, pledged himself anew to the support of the government. The oath of office was then administered by Chief Justice Ellsworth, the other justices attending, after which he retired. [2]

The citizens of Philadelphia celebrated the day of Adams' inauguration by a testimony of their respect and affection for Washington. They prepared a magnificent entertainment, designed for him as the principal guest, to which were invited the foreign ministers, the members of the Cabinet, officers of the army and navy, and other distinguished persons.

In the rotunda in which it was given, an elegant compliment was prepared for the principal guest, which is thus described in the papers of the day:

"Upon entering the area, the general was conducted to his seat. On a signal given music played Washington's march, and a scene which represented simple objects in the rear of the principal seat was drawn up and discovered emblematical painting.

"The principal was a female figure, large as life, representing America, seated on an elevation composed of sixteen marble steps. At her left side stood the Federal shield and eagle, and at her feet lay the cornucopias, in her right hand she held the Indian calumet of peace supporting the cap of liberty; in the perspective appeared the temple of fame, and on her left hand an altar dedicated to public gratitude, upon which incense was burning. In her left hand she held a scroll inscribed Valedictory, and at the foot of the altar lay a plumed helmet and sword, from which a figure of General Washington, large as life, appeared, retiring down the steps, pointing with his right hand to the emblems of power which he had resigned, and with his left to a beautiful landscape representing Mount Vernon, in front of which oxen were seen harnessed to the plough. Over the general appeared a Genius, placing a wreath of laurels on his head."

After Washington had paid to his successor those respectful compliments which he believed to be equally due to the man and to the office, he hastened to that real felicity which awaited him at Mount Vernon, the enjoyment of which he had long impatiently anticipated.

The same marks of respect and affection for his person which had on all great occasions been manifested by his fellow-citizens, still attended him. His endeavors to render his journey private were unavailing, and the gentlemen of the country through which he passed, were still ambitious of testifying their sentiments for the man who had, from the birth of the Republic been deemed the first of American citizens. Long after his retirement he continued to receive addresses from legislative bodies and various classes of citizens, expressive of the high sense entertained of his services.

"Notwithstanding the extraordinary popularity of the first President of the United States," says Marshall, "scarcely has any important act of his administration escaped the most bitter invective.

"On the real wisdom of the system which he pursued, every reader will decide for himself. Time will, in some measure, dissipate the prejudices and passions of the moment, and enable us to view objects through a medium which represents them truly.

"Without taking a full review of measures which were reprobated by one party and applauded by the other, the reader may be requested to glance his eye at the situation of the United States in 1797, and to contrast it with their condition in 1788.

"At home a sound credit had been created; an immense floating debt had been funded in a manner perfectly satisfactory to the creditors; an ample revenue had been provided; those difficulties which a system of internal taxation, on its first introduction, is doomed to encounter, were completely removed, and the authority of the government was firmly established. Funds for the gradual payment of the debt had been provided; a considerable part of it had been actually discharged, and that system which is now operating its entire extinction had been matured and adopted. The agricultural and commercial wealth of the nation had increased beyond all former example. The numerous tribes of warlike Indians, inhabiting those immense tracts which lie between the then cultivated country of the Mississippi, had been taught, by arms and by justice, to respect the United States and to continue in peace. This desirable object having been accomplished, that humane system was established for civilizing and furnishing them with the conveniences of life, which improves their condition, while it secures their attachment.

"Abroad, the differences with Spain had been accommodated, and the free navigation of the Mississippi had been acquired, with the use of New Orleans as a place of deposit for three years, and afterward, until some other equivalent place should be designated. Those causes of mutual exasperation which had threatened to involve the United States in a war with the greatest maritime and commercial power in the world, had been removed, and the military posts which had been occupied within their territory, from their existence as a nation, had been evacuated. Treaties had been formed with Algiers and with Tripoli, and no captures appear to have been made by Tunis, so that the Mediterranean was opened to American vessels.

"This bright prospect was indeed, in part, shaded by the discontents of France. Those who have attended to the particular points of difference between the two nations will assign the causes to which these discontents are to be ascribed, and will judge whether it was in the power of the President to have avoided them without surrendering the real independence of the nation and the most invaluable of all rights--the right of self-government."

Such was the situation of the United States at the close of Washington's administration. Their circumstances at its commencement will be recollected, and the contrast is too striking not to be observed. That this beneficial change in the affairs of America is to be ascribed exclusively to the wisdom which guided the national councils will not be pretended. That many of the causes which produced it originated with the government, and that their successful operation was facilitated, if not secured, by the system which was adopted, will scarcely be denied. To estimate that system correctly, their real influence must be allowed to those strong prejudices and turbulent passions with which it was assailed.

Accustomed, in the early part of his life, to agricultural pursuits, and possessing a real taste for them, Washington was particularly well qualified to enjoy, in retirement, that tranquil felicity which he had anticipated. Resuming former habits, and returning to ancient and well-known employments, he was familiar with his new situation, and therefore exempt from the danger of that disappointment which is the common lot of those who, in old age, retire from the toils of business, or the cares of office, to the untried pleasures of the country. A large estate, which exhibited many proofs of having been long deprived of the attentions of its proprietor in the management and improvement of which he engaged with ardor, an extensive correspondence, and the society of men and books, gave employment to every hour which was equally innocent and interesting, and furnished ground for the hope that the evening of a life which had been devoted to the public service, would be as serene as its midday had been brilliant.

In his journey from Philadelphia to Mount Vernon Washington was accompanied by Mrs. Washington, Miss Custis, George Washington Lafayette, eldest son of the general, and M. Frestel, young Lafayette's tutor.

Writing to Mr. McHenry, Secretary of War, from Mount Vernon, April 3, 1797, he thus describes His return home and his situation there:

"We got home without accident and found the roads dryer and better than I ever found them at that season of the year. The attentions we met with on our journey were very flattering, and, to some, whose minds are differently formed from mine, would have been highly relished; but I avoided, in every instance, where I had any previous knowledge of the intention, and could by earnest entreaties prevail, all parade and escorts. Mrs. Washington took a violent cold in Philadelphia, which hangs upon her still, but it is not as bad as it has been. [3]

"I find myself in the situation nearly of a new beginner, for, although I have not houses to build (except one, which I must erect for the accommodation and security of my military, civil, and private papers, which are voluminous, and may be interesting), yet I have scarcely anything else about me that does not require considerable repairs. In a word, I am already surrounded by joiners, masons, and painters, and, such is my anxiety to get out of their hands, that I have scarcely a room to put a friend into or to sit in myself without the music of hammers or the odoriferous scent of paint."

To Mr. Wolcott, Secretary of the Treasury, he writes:

"For myself, having turned aside from the broad walks of political into the narrow paths of private life, I shall leave it with those whose duty it is to consider subjects of this sort, and, as every good citizen ought to do, conform to whatsoever the ruling powers shall decide. To make and sell a little flour annually, to repair houses (going fast to ruin), to build one for the security of my papers of a public nature, and to amuse myself in agricultural and rural pursuits, will constitute employment for the few years I have to remain on this terrestrial globe. If, also, I could now and then meet the friends I esteem, it would fill the measure and add zest to my enjoyments; but, if ever this happens, it must be under my own vine and fig-tree, as I do not think it probable that I shall go beyond twenty miles from them."

To another correspondent he repeats the same interesting sentiments, in reference to his retirement and the happiness he found in it:

"Retired from noise myself, and the responsibility attached to public employment, my hours will glide smoothly on. My best wishes, however, for the prosperity of our country will always have the first place in my thoughts; while to repair buildings and to cultivate my farms, which require close attention, will occupy the few years, perhaps days, I may be a sojourner here, as I am now in the sixty-sixth year of my peregrination through life."

In a letter to Mr. McHenry, May 29th, he says: "I begin my diurnal course with the sun; if my hirelings are not in their places at that time, I send them messages of sorrow for their indisposition; having put these wheels in motion, I examine the state of things further. The more they are probed the deeper I find the wounds which my buildings have sustained by an absence and neglect of eight years; by the time I have accomplished these matters, breakfast (a little after 7 o'clock) is ready; this being over, I mount my horse and ride round my farms, which employs me until it is time to dress for dinner, at which I rarely miss seeing strange faces--come, as they say, out of respect for me. Pray, would not the word curiosity answer as well? And how different this from having a few social friends at a cheerful board! The usual time of setting at table, a walk, and tea bring me within the dawn of candle-light, previous to which, if not prevented by company, I resolve that, as soon as the glimmering taper supplies the place of the great luminary, I will retire to my writing table and acknowledge the letters I have received; but, when the lights are brought, I feel tired and disinclined to engage in this work, conceiving that the next night will do as well. The next night comes, and with it, the same causes for postponement, and so on.

"This will account for your letter remaining so long unacknowledged; and, having given you the history of a day, it will serve for a year, and I am persuaded you will not require a second edition of it. But it may strike you, that in this detail no mention is made of any portion of time allotted for reading. The remark would be just, for I have not looked into a book since I came home; nor shall I be able to do it until I have discharged my workmen, probably not before the nights grow longer, when, possibly, I may be looking in Doomsday Book. At present I shall only add, that I am always and affectionately yours."

The celebrated Mr. (afterward Lord) Erskine, having sent Washington a copy of his "View of the Causes and Consequences of the Present War with France," he acknowledged it in a letter, of which the following is a part:

"To have so conducted my steps in the intricate walks of public life, and through a long course, as to meet the approbation of my country and the esteem of good men, is, next to the consciousness of having acted in all things from my best judgment, the highest gratification of which my mind is susceptible, and will, during the remainder of a life which is hastening to an end, and in moments of retirement better adapted to calm reflection than I have hitherto experienced, alleviate the pain and soften any cares, which are yet to be encountered, though hid from me at the present.

"For me to express my sentiments with respect to the administration of the concerns of another government might incur a charge of stepping beyond the line of prudence; but the principles of humanity will justify an avowal of my regret, and I do regret exceedingly, that any causes whatever should have produced and continued until this time, a war, more bloody, more expensive, more calamitous, and more pregnant with events than modern, or perhaps any other times can furnish an example of. And I most sincerely and devoutly wish that your exertions, and those of others having the same object in view, may effect what human nature cries aloud for, a general peace." [4]

His correspondence with the Earl of Radnor shows the estimation in which he was held abroad, and also illustrates his situation and feelings at the time.

"To General Washington.

"SIR.--Though of necessity a stranger to you, I cannot deny myself the satisfaction, among the many who will, probably, even from this country, intrude upon your retirement, of offering to you my congratulations on your withdrawing yourself from the scene of public affairs, with a character which appears to be perfectly unrivalled in history. The voluntary resignation of authority, wielded, as it was, while you thought fit to yield it, for the advantage of your country, in the universal opinion of mankind, confirms the judgment I had presumed to form of your moderation, and completes the glory of your life.

"Permit me, sir, who, enlisted in no political party, have, as a public man, looked up to you with veneration; who have seen the beginning of your career against England with approbation, because I felt England was unjust; who have seen you discontinue your hostility toward England, when, in good faith, she was no longer acting as an enemy to America, by honest counsels endeavoring to be as closely connected with amity, as she is by natural and mutual interests; who have seen you the instrument, in the hand of Providence, of wresting from the British Parliament an influence destructive of the just rights of both countries and of establishing the independence of America, which, I am persuaded, will continually, if your principles and your wisdom shall actuate your successors, be the means of securing them respectively to us both; who have seen you, in adversity and prosperity alike, the good, the firm, the moderate, the disinterested patriot; permit me, I say, as an Englishman and as a man, to rejoice at the completion of such a character, and to offer my unfeigned wishes for a peaceful evening of your life and the realization (as is my sincere belief) of your posthumous fame and your eternal happiness.

"I have the honor to subscribe myself, etc.,

"RADNOR.

"LONGFORD CASTLE, January 19, 1797."

The following is Washington's reply:

"MY LORD.--The sentiments which your lordship has been pleased to express, in your favor of the 19th of January last, relative to my public conduct, do me great honor, and I pray you to accept my grateful acknowledgment of the unequivocal evidence, conveyed in your letter, of the favorable opinion you entertain of the principles by which it was actuated.

"For having performed duties which I conceive every country has a right to require of its citizens, I claim no merit; but no man can feel more sensibly the reward of approbation for such services than I do. Next to the consciousness of having acted faithfully in discharging the several trusts to which I have been called, the thanks of one's country and the esteem of good men are the highest gratification my mind is susceptible of.

"At the age of sixty-five, I am now recommencing my agricultural and rural pursuits, which were always more congenial to my temper and disposition than the noise and bustle of public employments, notwithstanding so small a portion of my life has been engaged in the former.

"I reciprocate, with great cordiality, the good wishes you have been pleased to bestow on me, and pray devoutly that we may both witness, and that shortly, the return of peace; for a more bloody, expensive, and eventful war is not recorded in modern, if to be found in ancient history."

Before leaving the subject of Washington's European reputation it is proper to quote the remarks made by the celebrated orator and statesman, Charles James Fox, in the British Parliament, January 31, 1794. It was in reference to Washington's communications to Congress at the opening of the session, December 3, 1793:

"And here, sir, I cannot help alluding to the President of the United States, General Washington, a character whose conduct has been so different from that which has been pursued by the ministers of this country. How infinitely wiser must appear the spirit and principles manifested in his late address to Congress than the policy of modern European courts! Illustrious man, deriving honor less from the splendor of his situation than from the dignity of his mind; before whom all borrowed greatness sinks into insignificance, and all the potentates of Europe (excepting the members of our own royal family) become little and contemptible. He has had no occasion to have recourse to any tricks of policy or arts of alarm; his authority has been sufficiently supported by the same means by which it was acquired, and his conduct has uniformly been characterized by wisdom, moderation, and firmness. Feeling gratitude to France for the assistance received from her in that great contest which secured the independence of America, he did not choose to give up the system of neutrality. Having once laid down that line of conduct which both gratitude and policy pointed out as most proper to be pursued, not all the insults and provocation of the French minister, Genet, could turn him from his purpose. Entrusted with the welfare of a great people, he did not allow the misconduct of another, with respect to himself, for one moment to withdraw his attention from their interest. He had no fear of the Jacobins; he felt no alarm from their principles, and considered no precaution necessary in order to stop their progress.

"The people over whom he presided he knew to be acquainted with their rights and their duties. He trusted to their own good sense to defeat the effect of those arts which might be employed to inflame or mislead their minds, and was sensible that a government could be in no danger while it retained the attachment and confidence of its subjects--attachment, in this instance, not blindly adopted; confidence not implicitly given, but arising from the conviction of its excellence and the experience of its blessings. I cannot, indeed, help admiring the wisdom and fortune of this great man. By the phrase 'fortune,' I mean not in the smallest degree to derogate from his merit. But notwithstanding his extraordinary talents and exalted integrity, it must be considered as singularly fortunate that he should have experienced a lot which so seldom falls to the portion of humanity, and have passed through such a variety of scenes without stain and without reproach. It must, indeed, create astonishment, that, placed in circumstances so critical, and filling for a series of years, a station so conspicuous, his character should never once have been called in question; that he should in no one instance have been accused either of improper insolence or mean submission in his transactions with foreign nations. For him it has been reserved to run the race of glory, without experiencing the smallest interruption to the brilliancy of his career."

1. Footnote: All the Cabinet officers of Washington were retained by Mr. Adams, viz.: Timothy Pickering, Secretary of State; James McHenry, Secretary of War; Oliver Wolcott, Secretary of the Treasury, and Charles Lee, Attorney-General. The navy department was not organized till 1798. 2. Footnote: Gibbs, "Administrations of Washington and John Adams."

3. Footnote: The following extract is from a Baltimore paper, dated March 13th: "Last evening arrived in this city, on his way to Mount Vernon, the illustrious object of veneration and gratitude, George Washington. His Excellency was accompanied by his lady and Miss Custis, and by the son of the unfortunate Lafayette and his preceptor. At a distance from the city, he was met by a crowd of citizens, on horse and foot, who thronged the road to greet him, and by a detachment from Captain Hollingsworth's troop, who escorted him in through as great a concourse of people as Baltimore ever witnessed. On alighting at the Fountain Inn, the general was saluted with reiterated and thundering huzzas from the spectators. His Excellency, with the companions of his journey, leaves town, we understand, this morning."

4. Footnote: Erskine's opinion of Washington is thus expressed in his letter, dated London, March 15, 1795: "I have taken the liberty," he writes, "to introduce your august and immortal name in a short sentence, which will be found in the book I send you. I have a large acquaintance among the most valuable and exalted classes of men; but you are the only human being for whom I ever felt an awful reverence. I sincerely pray God to grant a long and serene evening to a life so gloriously devoted to the universal happiness of the world.

"T. ERSKINE."

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XII. WASHINGTON APPOINTED LIEUTENANT-GENERAL. 1797-1798

We have mentioned, incidentally, that George Washington Motier de Lafayette, the son of the general, with his tutor, M. Frestel, accompanied Washington on his journey from Philadelphia to Mount Vernon. When the wife and daughters of Lafayette left France to join him in the prison of Olmutz his son came to the United States. He arrived at Boston in the summer of 1795, with his tutor, and had immediately written to Washington to apprise him of his arrival. The letter was received just as he was leaving Philadelphia for Mount Vernon. Washington would have been delighted to receive him immediately into his family, but this was forbidden by political considerations of great weight. He therefore wrote to George Cabot, of Boston, desiring him to assure the young man of his friendship and protection, and recommending that he should be entered as a student at Harvard University, Cambridge, and offering to defray the expenses of his education there. This was declined, however, on account of the different course of study which he was pursuing under the tuition of M. Frestel, and George went to take up his residence with M. Lacolombe, [1] in a country-house near New York. In November, 1795, Washington wrote to young Lafayette and his tutor, assuring the former of his paternal regard and support, and desiring him to repair to Colonel Hamilton in New York. On the 18th of March, 1796, the following resolution, and order were passed by the House of Representatives in Congress:

"Information having been given to this House that a son of General Lafayette is now within the United States;

"Resolved, That a committee be appointed to inquire into the truth of the said information and report thereon, and what measures it would be proper to take, if the same be true, to evince the grateful sense entertained by this country for the services of his father.

"Ordered, That Mr. Livingston, Mr. Sherburne, and Mr. Murray be appointed a committee pursuant to the said resolution."

As chairman of this committee, Mr. Livingston wrote to young Lafayette as follows:

"SIR.--Actuated by motives of gratitude to your father, and eager to seize every opportunity of showing their sense of his important services, the House of Representatives have passed the resolution which I have the pleasure to communicate. The committee being directed to inquire into the fact of your arrival within the United States, permit me to advise your immediate appearance at this place, that the Legislature of America may no longer be in doubt whether the son of Lafayette is under their protection and within the reach of their gratitude.

"I presume to give this advice as an individual personally attached to your father, and very solicitous to be useful to any person in whose happiness he is interested. If I should have that good fortune on this occasion, it will afford me the greatest satisfaction.

"I am, &c.,

"EDWARD LIVINGSTON."

On receiving this letter, young Lafayette wrote to Washington, enclosing the resolution and the letter of Mr. Livingston, and asking his advice relative to the course which he should pursue. The following is Washington's answer:

"Your letter of the 28th instant was received yesterday. The enclosures which accompanied it evidence much discretion, and your conduct therein meets my entire approbation.

"In the early part of this month I put a letter into the hands of Colonel Hamilton, inviting you to this place, and expected, until your letter of the above date was received, to have embraced you under my own roof tomorrow or next day.

"As the period for this seems to be more distant, from the purport of your inquiries, I again repeat my former request, and wish that, without delay, you and M. Frestel would proceed immediately to this city and to my house, where a room is prepared for you and him.

"Under expectation of your doing this, it is as unnecessary as it might be improper to go more into detail until I have the pleasure of seeing you and of rendering every service in my power to the son of my friend, for whom I have always entertained the purest affection, which is too strong not to extend itself to you. Therefore believe me to be, as I really am, sincerely and affectionately yours, &c."

From this time (March, 1796) to April, 1797, when he journeyed with Washington to Mount Vernon, young Lafayette resided with him in Philadelphia. Writing to General Dumas (June 24, 1797) from Mount Vernon, Washington, after expressing an ardent wish for the restoration of General Lafayette to liberty, says: "His son and M. Frestel, who appears to have been his mentor, are, and have been, residents in my family since their arrival in this country, except in the first moments of it; and a modest, sensible, well-disposed youth he is."

In October, 1797, intelligence of the liberation of General Lafayette from his Austrian prison having been received, his son hastened to meet him in France. He sailed with M. Frestel from New York, on the 26th of October, bearing the following letter from Washington to his father: [2]

"This letter, I hope and expect, will be presented to you by your son, who is highly deserving of such parents as you and your amiable lady.

"He can relate much better than I can describe my participation in your sufferings, my solicitude for your relief, the measures I adopted, though ineffectual, to facilitate your liberation from an unjust and cruel imprisonment, and the joy I experienced at the news of its accomplishment. I shall hasten, therefore, to congratulate you, and be assured that no one can do it with more cordiality, with more sincerity, or with greater affection, on the restoration of that liberty which every act of your life entitles you to the enjoyment of; and I hope I may add, to the uninterrupted possession of your estates and the confidence of your country. The repossession of these things, though they cannot compensate for the hardships you have endured, may nevertheless soften the painful remembrance of them.

"From the delicate and responsible situation in which I stood as a public officer, but more especially from a misconception of the manner in which your son had left France, till explained to me in a personal interview with himself, he did not come immediately into my family on his arrival in America, though he was assured in the first moments of it of my protection and support. His conduct, since he first set his feet on American ground, has been exemplary in every point of view, such as has gained him the esteem, affection, and confidence of all who have had the pleasure of his acquaintance. His filial affection and duty and his ardent desire to embrace his parents and sisters, in the first moments of their release, would not allow him to wait the authentic account of this much-desired event; but, at the same time that I suggested the propriety of this, I could not withhold my assent to the gratification of his wishes to fly to the arms of those whom he holds most dear, persuaded as he is, from the information he has received, that he shall find you all in Paris.

"M. Frestel has been a true mentor to George. No parent could have been more attentive to a favorite son, and he richly merits all that can be said of his virtues, of his good sense, and of his prudence. Both your son and he carry with them the vows and regrets of this family and all who know them. And you may be assured that yourself never stood higher in the affections of the people of this country than at the present moment.

"Having bid a final adieu to the walks of public life, and meaning to withdraw myself from politics, I shall refer you to M. Frestel and George, who, at the same time that they have, from prudential considerations, avoided all interference in the politics of the country, cannot have been inattentive observers of what was passing among us, to give you a general view of our situation, and of the party which, in my opinion, has disturbed the peace and tranquility of it. And with sentiments of the highest regard for you, your lady, and daughters, and with assurances that, if inclination or events should induce you or any of them to visit America, no person in it would receive you with more cordiality and affection than Mrs. Washington and myself, both of us being most sincerely and affectionately attached to you, and admirers of them."

Devoted as Washington, in his retirement, was to his favorite pursuit of agriculture, he nevertheless took a lively interest in the political affairs of the country. In the events which were now passing he found cause for considerable anxiety. The conduct of the French Directory still indicated a persistence in their favorite policy of detaching the people of the United States from the support of the executive, and effecting a revolution in the government. Their treatment of General Pinckney, the minister sent to France by Washington, fully disclosed their views and intentions. After inspecting General Pinckney's letter of credence, the Directory announced to him their determination "not to receive another minister plenipotentiary from the United States until after the redress of grievances demanded of the American government, which the French republic had a right to expect from it." This message was succeeded, first by indecorous verbal communications, calculated to force the American minister out of France, and afterward, by a written mandate to quit the territories of the republic.

This act of hostility was accompanied with another, which would explain the motives for this conduct, if previous measures had not rendered all further explanation unnecessary.

On giving to the recalled minister his audience of leave, the President of the Directory addressed a speech to him, in which terms of outrage to the government were mingled with expressions of affection for the people of the United States, and the expectation of ruling the former, by their influence over the latter, was too clearly manifested not to be understood. To complete this system of hostility, American vessels were captured wherever found, and, under the pretext of their wanting a document, with which the treaty of commerce had been uniformly understood to dispense, they were condemned as prize.

This serious state of things demanded a solemn consideration. On receiving from General Pinckney the dispatches which communicated it, President Adams issued his proclamation requiring Congress to meet on the 15th day of May. The speech delivered by him at the commencement of the session showed that the insults of the French Directory were deeply resented. He said: "The speech of the President discloses sentiments more alarming than the refusal of a minister, because more dangerous to our independence and union, and, at the same time, studiously marked with indignities toward the government of the United States. It evinces a disposition to separate the people from their government; to persuade them that they have different affections, principles, and interests from those of their fellow-citizens whom they themselves have chosen to manage their common concerns; and thus to produce divisions fatal to our peace. Such attempts ought to be repelled with a decision which shall convince France, and the world, that we are not a degraded people, humiliated under a colonial spirit of fear and sense of inferiority, fitted to be the miserable instruments of foreign influence, and regardless of national honor, character, and interest. Retaining still the desire which had uniformly been manifested by the American government to preserve peace and friendship with all nations, and believing that neither the honor nor the interest of the United States absolutely forbade the repetition of advances for securing these desirable objects with France, he should," he said, "institute a fresh attempt at negotiation, and should not fail to promote and accelerate an accommodation on terms compatible with the rights, duties, interests, and honor of the nation." But while he should be making these endeavors to adjust all differences with the French republic by amicable negotiation, he earnestly recommended it to Congress to provide effectual measures of defense.

The drawing up an answer to this speech of President Adams occasioned a full fortnight's debate in the House of Representatives, but at length a reply, correspondent to the President's tone and views, was carried by 51 or 52 voices against 48. This showed the balance of parties, proved that Adams still kept the ascendency, however small, that Washington had done, and that the dread of democratic violence prevailed over the suspicions endeavored to be awakened of monarchism and an arbitrary executive. This feeling was, no doubt, strengthened greatly by refugees from St. Domingo, who related the dire effects which democratic acts had produced in that island. France, however, was never more formidable. Tidings of her victories poured in, whilst those of England told of bank payments suspended, a mutiny in the fleet, and the abandonment of her best continental ally.

To carry into effect the pacific dispositions avowed by President Adams in his speech, he appointed three envoys to the French Directory. General Pinckney, who was still residing in Europe, was placed at the head of the mission. Gen. John Marshall, afterward chief justice, a sturdy Federalist, and Elbridge Gerry, an anti-Federalist, but a strong personal friend and favorite of the President, were joined with Pinckney in the mission. They were instructed to endeavor to procure peace and reconciliation by all means compatible with the honor and faith of the United States, but no national engagements were to be impaired, no innovation to be permitted upon those internal regulations for the preservation of peace which had been deliberately and uprightly established, nor were the rights of the government to be surrendered. On their arrival in France the envoys saw M. Talleyrand, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, but were informed that they could not be received by the Directory. They had permission to remain in Paris, however, and the agents of M. de Talleyrand--a female amongst others were employed to negotiate with them. The true difficulty in the way of accommodation, in addition to the impertinent arrogance of the Directory, seemed to be that Merlin and others received a great part of the gains accruing from American prizes made by the French. In order to counteract this gold in one hand by gold in the other, Talleyrand demanded a douceur of £50,000 for himself and chiefs, besides a loan to be afterward made from America to France. To extract these conditions, every argument that meanness could suggest was employed by Talleyrand; he demanded to be fed as a lawyer or bribed as a friend. But the Americans were inexorable, and two of their number, Pinckney and Marshall, returned to announce to their countrymen the terms on which peace was offered. The cupidity of the French government completely turned against it the tide of popular feeling in America. "Millions for defense, not a cent for tribute," was instantly the general cry. The President felt his hands strengthened by the demands of the French. Certainly, never did minister show himself less sagacious than M. de Talleyrand in this affair, or more ignorant of the spirit and manners of a nation amongst whom he had resided.

In Congress (May, 1798), vigorous measures were adopted for placing the country in a state of defense against impending hostilities from one of the most powerful nations of the world. Among these was a regular army. A regiment of artillerists and engineers was added to the permanent establishment, and the President was authorized to raise twelve additional regiments of infantry and one regiment of cavalry to serve during the continuance of the existing differences with the French republic, if not sooner discharged. He was also authorized to appoint officers for a provisional army and to receive and organize volunteer corps who should be exempt from ordinary militia duty, but neither the volunteers nor the officers of the provisional army were to receive pay unless called into actual service.

Addresses to the executive from every part of the United States attested the high spirit of the nation, and the answers of President Adams were well calculated to give it solidity and duration.

No sooner had a war become probable, to the perils of which no man could be insensible, than the eyes of all were directed to Washington, as the person who should command the American army. He alone could be seen at the head of a great military force without exciting jealousy; he alone could draw into public service and arrange properly the best military talents of the nation, and he, more than any other, could induce the utmost exertion of its physical strength. Indignant at the unprovoked injuries which had been heaped upon his country, and convinced that the conflict, should a war be really prosecuted by France with a view to conquest, would be extremely severe and could be supported, on the part of America, only by a persevering exertion of all her force, he could not determine, should such a crisis arrive, to withhold those aids which it might be in his power to afford, should public opinion really attach to his services that importance which would render them essential. His own reflections appear to have resulted in a determination not to refuse once more to take the field, provided he could be permitted to secure efficient aid by naming the chief officers of the army, and to remain at home until his service in the field should be required by actual invasion. [3]

A confidential and interesting letter from Colonel Hamilton of the 19th of May, on political subjects, concludes with saying: "You ought also to be aware, my dear sir, that in the event of an open rupture with France the public voice will again call you to command the armies of your country, and though all who are attached to you will, from attachment as well as public consideration, deplore an occasion which should once more tear you from that repose to which you have so good a right, yet it is the opinion of all those with whom I converse that you will be compelled to make the sacrifice. All your past labors may demand, to give them efficacy, this further, this very great sacrifice."

"You may be assured," said Washington in reply, "that my mind is deeply impressed with the present situation of public affairs and not a little agitated by the outrageous conduct of France toward the United States, and at the inimitable conduct of those partisans who aid and abet her measures. You may believe further, from assurances equally sincere, that if there was anything in my power to be done consistently to avert or lessen the danger of the crisis, it should be rendered with hand and heart."

"But, my dear sir, dark as matters appear at present, and expedient as it is to be prepared for the worst that can happen (and no man is more disposed to this measure than I am), I cannot make up my mind yet for the expectation of open war; or, in other words, for a formidable invasion by France. I cannot believe, although I think her capable of anything, that she will attempt to do more than she has done. When she perceives the spirit and policy of this country rising into resistance, and that she has falsely calculated upon support from a large part of the people to promote her views and influence in it, she will desist ever from those practices, unless unexpected events in Europe or the acquisition of Louisiana and the Floridas should induce her to continue them. And I believe further, that, although the leaders of their party in this country will not change their sentiments, they will be obliged to change their plan or the mode of carrying it on. The effervescence which is appearing in all quarters, and the desertion of their followers, will frown them into silence--at least for a while.

"If I did not view things in this light my mind would be infinitely more disquieted than it is, for, if a crisis should arrive when a sense of duty or a call from my country should become so imperious as to leave me no choice, I should prepare for relinquishment and go with as much reluctance from my present peaceful abode as I should go to the tombs of my ancestors."

The opinion that prudence required preparations for open war and that Washington must once more be placed at the head of the American armies strengthened every day, and on the 22d of June President Adams addressed him a letter in which that subject was thus alluded to.

"In forming an army, whenever I must come to that extremity I am at an immense loss whether to call out the old generals or to appoint a young set. If the French come here we must learn to march with a quick step and to attack, for in that way only they are said to be vulnerable. I must tax you sometimes for advice. We must have your name, if you will in any case permit us to use it. There will be more efficacy in it than in many an army."

A letter from McHenry, the Secretary of War, written four days afterward, concludes with asking: "May we flatter ourselves that, in a crisis so awful and important you will accept the command of all our armies? I hope you will, because you alone can unite all hearts and all hands, if it is possible that they can be united."

These letters reached Washington on the same day. The following extract from his reply to the President will exhibit the course of his reflections relative to his appearance once more at the head of the American armies:

"At the epoch of my retirement an invasion of these States by an European power, or even the probability of such an event in my days, was so far from being contemplated by me that I had no conception either that or any other occurrence would arise in so short a period which could turn my eyes from the shades of Mount Vernon. But this seems to be the age of wonders. And it is reserved for intoxicated and lawless France (for purposes of Providence far beyond the reach of human ken) to slaughter her own citizens and to disturb the repose of all the world besides. From a view of the past--from the prospect of the present--and of that which seems to be expected, it is not easy for me to decide satisfactorily on the part it might best become me to act. In case of actual invasion by a formidable force I certainly should not entrench myself under the cover of age and retirement, if my services should be required by my country to assist in repelling it. And if there be good cause to expect such an event, which certainly must be better known to the government than to private citizens, delay in preparing for it may be dangerous, improper, and not to be justified by prudence. The uncertainty, however, of the latter, in my mind, creates my embarrassment, for I cannot bring it to believe, regardless as the French are of treaties and of the laws of nation, and capable as I conceive them to be of any species of despotism and injustice, that they will attempt to invade this country after such a uniform and unequivocal expression of the determination of the people in all parts to oppose them with their lives and fortunes. That they have been led to believe by their agents and partisans among us that we are a divided people, that the latter are opposed to their own government, and that the show of a small force would occasion a revolt, I have no doubt; and how far these men (grown desperate) will further attempt to deceive, and may succeed in keeping up the deception, is problematical. Without that, the folly of the Directory in such an attempt would, I conceive, be more conspicuous, if possible, than their wickedness."

"Having with candor made this disclosure of the state of my mind, it remains only for me to add that to those who know me best it is best known that, should imperious circumstances induce me to exchange once more the smooth paths of retirement for the thorny ways of public life, at a period too when repose is more congenial to nature, it would be productive of sensations which can be more easily conceived than expressed."

His letter to the Secretary of War was more detailed and more explicit. "It cannot," he said, "be necessary for me to premise to you or to others who know my sentiments; that to quit the tranquility of retirement, and enter the boundless field of responsibility, would be productive of sensations which a better pen than I possess would find it difficult to describe. Nevertheless, the principle by which my conduct has been actuated through life would not suffer me, in any great emergency, to withhold any services I could render when required by my country--especially in a case where its dearest rights are assailed by lawless ambition and intoxicated power, in contempt of every principle of justice, and in violation of a solemn compact and of laws which govern all civilized nations--and this too with the obvious intent to sow thick the seeds of disunion for the purpose of subjugating our government and destroying our independence and happiness.

"Under circumstances like these, accompanied by an actual invasion of our territory, it would be difficult for me, at any time, to remain an idle spectator, under the plea of age or retirement. With sorrow, it is true, I should quit the shades of my peaceful abode, and the ease and happiness I now enjoy, to encounter anew the turmoils of war, to which, possibly, my strength and powers might be found incompetent. These, however, should not be stumbling-blocks in my own way. But there are other things highly important for me to ascertain and settle before I could give a definitive answer to your question:

"1st. The propriety in the opinion of the public, so far as that opinion has been expressed in conversation, of my appearing again on the public theater after declaring the sentiments I did in my valedictory address of September, 1796.

"2dly. A conviction in my own breast, from the best information that can be obtained, that it is the wish of my country that its military force should be committed to my charge; and,

"3dly. That the army now to be formed should be so appointed as to afford a well-grounded hope of its doing honor to the country and credit to him who commands it in the field.

"On each of these heads you must allow me to make observations." Washington then proceeded to detail his sentiments on those points on which his consent to take command of the army must depend.

Some casual circumstances delayed the reception of the letters of the President and Secretary of War for several days, in consequence of which, before the answer of Washington reached the seat of government, the President had nominated him to the chief command of all the armies raised or to be raised in the United States, with the rank of lieutenant-general; and the Senate had unanimously advised and consented to his appointment.

By the Secretary of War, who was directed to wait upon him with his commission, the President addressed to him the following letter:

"Mr. McHenry, the Secretary of War, will have the honor to wait on you in my behalf, to impart to you a step I have ventured to take, which I should have been happy to have communicated in person, had such a journey at this time been in my power."

"My reasons for this measure will be too well known to need any explanation to the public. Every friend and every enemy of America will comprehend them at first blush. To you, sir, I owe all the apology I can make. The urgent necessity I am in of your advice and assistance, indeed of your conduct and direction of the war, is all I can urge; and that is a sufficient justification to myself and to the world. I hope it will be so considered by yourself. Mr. McHenry will have the honor to consult you upon the organization of the army, and upon everything relating to it."

Open instructions, signed by the President, were on the same day delivered to the Secretary of War, of which the following is a copy:

"It is my desire that you embrace the first opportunity to set out on your journey to Mount Vernon and wait on General Washington with the commission of lieutenant-general and commander-in-chief of the armies of the United States, which, by the advice and consent of the Senate, has been signed by me.

"The reasons and motives which prevailed on me to venture on such a step as the nomination of this great and illustrious character, whose voluntary resignation alone occasioned my introduction to the office I now hold, were too numerous to be detailed in this letter, and are too obvious and important to escape the observation of any part of America or Europe. But as it is a movement of great delicacy it will require all your address to communicate the subject in a manner that shall be inoffensive to his feelings and consistent with all the respect that is due from me to him.

"If the general should decline the appointment all the world will be silent and respectfully acquiesce. If he should accept it all the world, except the enemies of his country, will rejoice. If he should come to no decisive determination, but take the subject into consideration, I shall not appoint any other lieutenant-general until his conclusion is known.

"His advice in the formation of a list of officers would be extremely desirable to me. The names of Lincoln, Morgan, Knox, Hamilton, Gates, Pinckney, Lee, Carrington, Hand, Muhlenberg, Dayton, Burr, Brooks, Cobb, Smith, as well as the present commander-in-chief, may be mentioned to him, and any others that occur to you. Particularly, I wish to have his opinion on the men most suitable for inspector-general, adjutant-general, and quartermaster-general.

"His opinion on all subjects would have great weight, and I wish you to obtain from him as much of his reflections upon the times and the service as you can."

The communications between Washington and the Secretary of War appear to have been full and unreserved. The impressions of the former respecting the critical and perilous situation of his country had previously determined him to yield to the general desire and accept the commission offered him, provided he could be permitted to select for the high departments of the army, and especially for the military staff, those in whom he could place the greatest confidence. Being assured that there was every reason to believe his wishes in this respect would not be thwarted, he gave to the secretary the arrangement which he would recommend for the principal stations in the army, and on the 13th of July addressed the following letter to the President:

"I had the honor, on the evening of the 11th instant, to receive from the hands of the Secretary at War your favor of the 7th, announcing that you had, with the advice and consent of the Senate, appointed me lieutenant-general and commander-in-chief of the armies raised or to be raised for the service of the United States."

"I cannot express how greatly affected I am at this new proof of public confidence, and at the highly flattering manner in which you have been pleased to make the communication. At the same time I must not conceal from you my earnest wish that the choice had fallen upon a man less declined in years and better qualified to encounter the usual vicissitudes of war."

"You know, sir, what calculations I had made relative to the probable course of events on my retiring from office and the determination with which I had consoled myself of closing the remnant of my days in my present peaceful abode. You will, therefore, be at no loss to conceive and appreciate the sensations I must have experienced to bring my mind to any conclusion that would pledge me at so late a period of life to leave scenes I sincerely love to enter upon the boundless field of public action, incessant trouble, and high responsibility.

"It was not possible for me to remain ignorant of or indifferent to recent transactions. The conduct of the Directory of France toward our country; their insidious hostility to its government; their various practices to withdraw the affections of the people from it; the evident tendency of their arts, and those of their agents to countenance and invigorate opposition; their disregard of solemn treaties and the laws of nations; their war upon our defenseless commerce; their treatment of our ministers of peace, and their demands, amounting to tribute, could not fail to excite in me sentiments corresponding with those my countrymen have so generally expressed in their affectionate addresses to you.

"Believe me, sir, no man can more cordially approve the wise and prudent measures of your administration. They ought to inspire universal confidence, and will no doubt, combined with the state of things, call from Congress such laws and means as will enable you to meet the full force and extent of the crisis. Satisfied, therefore, that you have sincerely wished and endeavored to avert war, and exhausted to the last drop the cup of reconciliation, we can, with pure hearts, appeal to Heaven for the justice of our cause, and may confidently trust the final result to that kind Providence who has heretofore and then so often signally favored the people of the United States.

"Thinking in this manner and feeling how incumbent it is upon every person of every description to contribute at all times to his country's welfare, and especially in a moment like the present, when everything we hold dear and sacred is so seriously threatened, I have finally determined to accept the commission of commander-in-chief of the armies of the United States, with the reserve only that I shall not be called into the field until the army is in a situation to require my presence or it becomes indispensable by the urgency of circumstances.

"In making this reservation, I beg it to be understood that I do not mean to withhold any assistance to arrange and organize the army, which you may think I can afford. I take the liberty also to mention that I must decline having my acceptance considered as drawing after it any immediate charge upon the public, or that I can receive any emoluments annexed to the appointment before I am in a situation to incur expense."

From this period Washington intermingled the cares and attentions of office with his agricultural pursuits. His solicitude respecting the organization of an army which he might possibly be required to lead against an enemy the most formidable in the world, was too strong to admit of his being inattentive to its arrangements.

Having stipulated, in accepting office, that he should have a concurrent voice in the appointment of the general officers and general staff of the army, he named Alexander Hamilton as inspector-general and second in command, with Charles Cotesworth Pinckney and Henry Knox as major-generals. Adams, who particularly disliked Hamilton, and was very suspicious of his designs and purposes, especially if placed in any position of power and influence, was not at all pleased with this arrangement; but he unwillingly acquiesced. General Knox was dissatisfied with the rank assigned him, and refused to serve; General Pinckney, on the other hand, accepted the post offered him.

During the months of November and December (1798), Washington was at Philadelphia, where he was busily occupied, with Hamilton and Pinckney, in concerting arrangements for raising and organizing the army. From this time to the end of his life a great part of his time was bestowed upon military affairs.

"His correspondence with the Secretary of War, the major-generals, and other officers," as Mr. Sparks states, "was unremitted and very full, entering into details and communicating instructions which derived value from his long experience and perfect knowledge of the subject. His letters during this period, if not the most interesting to many readers, will be regarded as models of their kind, and as affording evidence that the vigor and fertility of his mind had not decreased with declining years.

"He never seriously believed that the French would go to the extremity of invading the United States. But it had always been a maxim with him, that a timely preparation for war afforded the surest means for preserving peace, and on this occasion he acted with as much promptitude and energy as if the invaders had been actually on the coast. His opinion proved to be correct, and his prediction was verified." For the French government, when it was found that the people would support the executive in resisting aggressions, soon manifested a disposition to draw back from their war-like attitude, since war with the United States was the last thing which was really desired.

While Washington was engaged in organizing the army actual hostilities between the United States and France were going on at sea. A navy department was formed by act of Congress in April (1798), and on May 21st Benjamin Stoddert, of Maryland, became the first Secretary of the Navy. The frigates United States, 44, and Constellation, 38, were launched and fitted for sea in the summer and autumn succeeding; and the whole force authorized by a law passed on the 16th of July, consisted of twelve frigates, twelve ships of a force between twenty and twenty-four guns inclusive, and six sloops, besides galleys and revenue cutters, making a total of thirty active cruisers. Numerous privateers were also fitted out. The chief theater of naval operations was the archipelago of the West Indies, where the aggressions on our commerce by French cruisers and privateers had originally commenced. Of the numerous encounters which took place, two remarkable ones afforded a promise of the future glories of the American navy. One of these was a very severe action (February, 1799) between the American frigate Constellation, of thirty-eight guns, commanded by Commodore Truxton, and the French frigate l'Insurgente, of forty guns, which terminated in the capture of the latter. Truxton, in a subsequent engagement, compelled another French frigate, the Vengeance, mounting no less than fifty-two guns, to strike her colors, but she afterward made her escape in the night.

The determined attitude of the United States soon convinced the French Directory that the people were united in support of the administration in its hostile operations, and Talleyrand sent certain intimations to our government, through William Vans Murray, American minister at the Hague, as well as by more private channels, that the Directory were willing and desirous to treat for peace. President Adams determined to avail himself of these friendly dispositions, and, without consulting his Cabinet or the leading members of Congress, on the 18th of February (1799) nominated to the Senate Mr. Murray as minister plenipotentiary to the French republic. Patrick Henry and Chief Justice Oliver Ellsworth were subsequently appointed joint ambassadors, but the latter declining on account of ill health, Gen. William Richardson Davie, Governor of North Carolina, was appointed in his place. Ellsworth and Davie did not leave the country, however, till November. The peace which terminated the quasi war with France was negotiated by these envoys, but it did not take place till the 3d of September, 1800, when Napoleon was at the head of affairs in France, as First Consul, and after the death of Washington.

We have seen that when Washington retired from the office of President, he had promised himself a season of leisure and repose before closing his useful and honorable life. But this the course of events did not permit. His last days were destined to be fully occupied with public affairs.

During the years 1798 and 1799 he was engaged in a most voluminous correspondence with the President, the heads of departments, and the officers of the provisional army, in relation to military affairs, and in addition to this his published letters show that he had to keep up a correspondence with many public men, both in Europe and America, as well as with his own connections and dependants.

This correspondence and the arrangement of his papers added to the writing occasioned by his accounts and the army affairs, made it necessary for him to have assistance, and he accordingly wrote to his old secretary, Mr. Tobias Lear, with a view to engaging him in the same office again (August 2, 1798). An extract from his letter to Mr. Lear shows how his writing labors had increased.

"The little leisure I had," he writes, "before my late appointment (from visits, my necessary rides, and other occurrences), to overhaul, arrange, and separate papers of real from those of little or no value, is now, by that event, so much encroached upon by personal and written applications for offices, and other matters incidental to the commander-in-chief, that, without assistance, I must abandon all idea of accomplishing this necessary work before I embark in new scenes, which will render them more voluminous, and, of course, more difficult; a measure which would be extremely irksome to me to submit to, especially as it respects my accounts, which are yet in confusion; my earnest wish and desire being, when I quit the stage of human action, to leave all matters in such a situation as to give as little trouble as possible to those who will have the management of them hereafter.

"Under this view of my situation, which is far from being an agreeable one, and at times fills me with deep concern when I see so little prospect of complete extrication, I have written to the Secretary of War to be informed whether--as my taking the field is contingent, and no pay or emolument will accrue to myself until then--I am at liberty to appoint my secretary immediately, who shall be allowed his pay and forage from the moment he joins me. If he answers in the affirmative, can you do this on these terms?"

Mr. Lear accepted the appointment of secretary, proceeded immediately to Mount Vernon, and remained with Washington till his decease.

With the aid of Mr. Lear, who was thoroughly conversant with his papers and accustomed to his methods of transacting business, he was enabled to keep up his old habit of riding over the estate, and superintending its culture, during the early hours of the day. "When he returned from his morning ride," which, he remarks in a letter to Mr. McHenry, "usually occupied him till it was time to dress for dinner," he generally found some newly arrived guests, perfect strangers to him, come, as they said, out of respect to him. They were always received courteously, but their number and their constant succession must have made serious inroads on the domestic quiet in which he so much delighted. "How different this," he says in the same letter, "from having a few social friends at a cheerful board."

During the last two years of his life his domestic circle was small. Mrs. Washington, Miss Custis, and some others of his adopted children, and his old friend, Mr. Lear, were at Mount Vernon; and some of his visitors were such as he himself would have chosen. But the greater part of them were comparative strangers.

Distinguished persons sometimes came from Europe to visit him, and these were received with his usual hospitality. When they sought to draw him into conversation about his own actions, he changed the subject and made inquiries about Europe and its affairs. In his own house, although maintaining toward strangers great courtesy and amenity, he always avoided discussing on matters in which he himself had played the most conspicuous part. At home he was the plain, modest country gentleman he had been before the destinies of an army and an empire had been placed in his hands.

1. Footnote: M. de Lacolombe had been adjutant-general under Lafayette, when the latter commanded the National Guard.

2. Footnote: Sparks, "Writings of Washington."

3. Footnote: Marshall.

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XIII. LAST ILLNESS, DEATH, AND CHARACTER OF WASHINGTON. 1799

On Thursday, December 12, 1799, Washington rode out to superintend as usual the affairs of his estate. He left the house at 10 o'clock in the morning and did not return till 3 o'clock in the afternoon. Soon after he went out the weather became very inclement, rain, hail, and snow falling alternately, with a cold wind. When he came in his secretary and superintendent, Mr. Lear, handed him some letters to frank, but he declined sending them to the post-office that evening, remarking that the weather was too bad to send a servant with them. On Mr. Lear's observing that he was afraid he had got wet, he said, No, his great coat had kept him dry. Still his neck was wet and snow was hanging on his hair. But he made light of it, and sat down to dinner without changing his dress. In the evening he appeared as well as usual. [1]

A heavy snowstorm on Friday prevented his riding out on the estate as usual. He had taken cold the day before by his long exposure, and he complained of a sore throat. This, however, did not prevent his going out in the afternoon to mark some trees not far from the house, which were to be cut down. He had now a hoarseness, which increased toward the close of the day. He spent the evening in the parlor with Mrs. Washington and Mr. Lear, perusing the newspapers, occasionally reading an interesting article aloud as well as his hoarseness would permit, and cheerful as usual. On his retiring, Mr. Lear proposed that he should take some remedy for his cold, but he answered "No, you know I never take anything for a cold. Let it go as it came."

Between 2 and 3 o'clock on Saturday morning he had an ague fit, but would not permit the family to be disturbed in their rest till daylight. He breathed with great difficulty and was hardly able to utter a word intelligibly. At his desire he was bled by Mr. Rawlins, one of the overseers. An attempt to take a simple remedy for a cold showed that he could not swallow a drop, but seemed convulsed and almost suffocated in his efforts. Dr. Craik, the family physician, was sent for and arrived about 9 o'clock, who put a blister on his throat, took some more blood from him and ordered a gargle of vinegar and sage tea, and inhalation of the fumes of vinegar and hot water. Two consulting physicians, Dr. Brown and Dr. Dick, were called in, who arrived about 3 o'clock, and after a consultation he was bled a third time. The patient could now swallow a little, and calomel and tartar emetic were administered without any effect.

About half past 4 o'clock he desired Mr. Lear to call Mrs. Washington to his bedside; when he requested her to bring from his desk two wills, and on receiving them, he gave her one, which he observed was useless as being superseded by the other, and desired her to burn it, which she did, and put the other into her closet.

"After this was done," says Mr. Lear, in concluding his touching narrative, "I returned to his bedside and took his hand. He said to me: 'I find I am going. My breath cannot last long. I believed from the first that the disorder would prove fatal. Do you arrange and record all my late military letters and papers. Arrange my accounts and settle my books, as you know more about them than anyone else, and let Mr. Rawlins finish recording my other letters, which he has begun.' I told him this should be done. He then asked if I recollected anything which it was essential for him to do, as he had but a very short time to continue with us. I told him that I could recollect nothing which it was essential for him to do, but that I hoped he was not so near his end. He observed, smiling, that he certainly was, and that, as it was the debt we must all pay, he looked to the event with perfect resignation.

"In the course of the afternoon he appeared to be in great pain and distress, from the difficulty of breathing, and frequently changed his posture in the bed. On these occasions I lay upon the bed and endeavored to raise him and turn him with as much ease as possible. He appeared penetrated with gratitude for my attentions, and often said, 'I am afraid I shall fatigue you too much,' and upon assuring him that I could feel nothing but a wish to give him ease, he replied, 'Well, it is a debt we must pay to each other, and I hope when you want aid of this kind you will find it.'

"About 5 o'clock Dr. Craik came again into the room, and, upon going to the bedside, the general said to him, 'Doctor, I die hard, but I am not afraid to go. I believed, from my first attack, that I should not survive it. My breath cannot last long.' The doctor pressed his hand, but could not utter a word. He retired from the bedside and sat by the fire, absorbed in grief.

"Between 5 and 6 o'clock Dr. Craik, Dr. Dick, and Dr. Brown came again into the room, and with Dr. Craik went to the bed, when Dr. Craik asked him if he could sit up in the bed. He held out his hand and I raised him up. He then said to the physicians, 'I feel myself going; I thank you for your attentions, but I pray you to take no more trouble about me. Let me go off quietly. I cannot last long.' They found that all which had been done was without effect. He lay down again, and all retired except Dr. Craik. He continued in the same situation, uneasy and restless, but without complaining, frequently asking what hour it was. When I helped him to move at this time he did not speak, but looked at me with strong expressions of gratitude.

"About 8 o'clock the physicians came again into the room and applied blisters and cataplasms of wheat bran to his legs and feet, after which they went out, except Dr. Craik, without a ray of hope. I went out about this time and wrote a line to Mr. Law and Mr. Peter, requesting them to come with their wives (Mrs. Washington's granddaughters) as soon as possible to Mount Vernon.

"About 10 o'clock he made several attempts to speak to me before he could effect it. At length he said, 'I am just going. Have me decently buried, and do not let my body be put into the vault in less than three days after I am dead.' I bowed assent, for I could not speak. He then looked at me again and said, 'Do you understand me?' I replied, 'Yes.' 'Tis well,' said he.

"About ten minutes before he expired (which was between 10 and 11 o'clock) his breathing became easier. He lay quietly; he withdrew his hand from mine and felt his own pulse. I saw his countenance change. I spoke to Dr. Craik, who sat by the fire. He came to the bedside. The general's hand fell from his wrist. I took it in mine and pressed it to my bosom. Dr. Craik put his hands over his eyes, and he expired without a struggle or a sigh (December 14, 1799).

"While we were fixed in silent grief, Mrs. Washington, who was sitting at the foot of the bed, asked, with a firm and collected voice, 'Is he gone?' I could not speak, but held up my hand as a signal that he was no more. 'Tis well,' said she, in the same voice, 'all is over now. I shall soon follow him. I have no more trials to pass through.'

"During his whole illness," adds Mr. Lear, "he spoke but seldom, and with great difficulty and distress, and in so low and broken a voice as at times hardly to be understood. His patience, fortitude, and resignation never forsook him for a moment. In all his distress he uttered not a sigh nor a complaint, always endeavoring, from a sense of duty, as it appeared, to take what was offered him and to do as he was desired by the physicians."

By this simple and touching record of the last moments of Washington, it will be perceived that his conduct, in the last trying scene, was in all respects consistent with his whole life and character. His habitual serenity and self-command, and the ever-present sense of duty, are apparent through the whole. He died as he had lived, a hero in the highest sense of the word and a true Christian.

The deep and wide-spreading grief occasioned by this melancholy event assembled a great concourse of people for the purpose of paying the last tribute of respect to the first of Americans, and on Wednesday, the 18th of December, his body, attended by military honors, and with religious and Masonic ceremonies, was deposited in the family vault on his estate.

In December, 1837, the remains of the great father of our nation, after a slumber of thirty-eight years, were again exposed by the circumstance of placing his body once and forever within the marble sarcophagus made by Mr. Struthers, of Philadelphia. The body, as Mr. Struthers related, was still in a wonderful state of preservation, the high pale brow wore a calm and serene expression, and the lips, pressed together, had a grave and solemn smile.

When intelligence reached Congress of the death of Washington, they instantly adjourned until the next day, when John Marshall, then a member of the House of Representatives and afterward chief justice of the United States and biographer of Washington, addressed the speaker in the following words:

"The melancholy event which was yesterday announced with doubt has been rendered but too certain. Our Washington is no more. The hero, the patriot, and the sage of America; the man on whom, in times of danger, every eye was turned, and all hopes were placed, lives now only in his own great actions and in the hearts of an affectionate and afflicted people.

"If, sir, it had even not been usual openly to testify respect for the memory of those whom Heaven has selected as its instruments for dispensing good to man, yet such has been the uncommon worth and such the extraordinary incidents which have marked the life of him whose loss we all deplore, that the whole American nation, impelled by the same feelings, would call with one voice for a public manifestation of that sorrow, which is so deep and so universal.

"More than any other individual, and as much as to any one individual was possible, has he contributed to found this, our wide-spreading empire, and to give to the western world independence and freedom.

"Having effected the great object for which he was placed at the head of our armies, we have seen him convert the sword into the ploughshare and sink the soldier into the citizen.

"When the debility of our Federal system had become manifest, and the bonds which connected this vast continent were dissolving, we have seen him the chief of those patriots who formed for us a constitution, which, by preserving the Union, will, I trust, substantiate and perpetuate those blessings which our Revolution had promised to bestow.

"In obedience to the general voice of his country, calling him to preside over a great people, we have seen him once more quit the retirement he loved, and, in a season more stormy and tempestuous than war itself, with calm and wise determination, pursue the true interests of the nation and contribute more than any other could contribute to the establishment of that system of policy which will, I trust, yet preserve our peace, our honor, and our independence. Having been twice unanimously chosen the chief magistrate of a free people, we have seen him, at a time when his re-election with universal suffrage could not be doubted, afford to the world a rare instance of moderation, by withdrawing from his high station to the peaceful walks of private life. However the public confidence may change, and the public affections fluctuate with respect to others, with respect to him they have, in war and in peace, in public and in private life, been as steady as his own firm mind and as constant as his own exalted virtues. Let us then, Mr. Speaker, pay the last tribute of respect and affection to our departed friend. Let the grand council of the nation display those sentiments which the nation feels. For this purpose I hold in my hand some resolutions which I take the liberty of offering to the House.

"Resolved, That this House will wait on the President in condolence of this mournful event.

"Resolved, That the speaker's chair be shrouded with black, and that the members and officers of the House wear black during the session.

"Resolved, That a committee, in conjunction with one from the Senate, be appointed to consider on the most suitable manner of paying honor to the memory of the man first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his fellow-citizens."

The Senate, on this melancholy occasion, addressed to the President the following letter:

"The Senate of the United States respectfully take leave, sir, to express to you their deep regret for the loss their country sustains in the death of Gen. George Washington.

"This event, so distressing to all our fellow-citizens, must be peculiarly heavy to you, who have long been associated with him in deeds of patriotism. Permit us, sir, to mingle our tears with yours. On this occasion it is manly to weep. To lose such a man at such a crisis is no common calamity to the world. Our country mourns a father. The Almighty Disposer of human events has taken from us our greatest benefactor and ornament. It becomes us to submit with reverence to Him 'who maketh darkness His pavilion.'

"With patriotic pride we review the life of our Washington and compare its events with those of other countries who have been preeminent in fame. Ancient and modern times are diminished before him. Greatness and guilt have too often been allied, but his fame is whiter than it is brilliant. The destroyers of nations stood abashed at the majesty of his virtues. It reproved the intemperance of their ambition and darkened the splendor of victory. The scene is closed, and we are no longer anxious lest misfortune should sully his glory; he has traveled on to the end of his journey and carried with him an increasing weight of honor; he has deposited it safely where misfortune cannot tarnish it, where malice cannot blast it. Favored of Heaven, he departed without exhibiting the weakness of humanity. Magnanimous in death, the darkness of the grave could not obscure his brightness.

"Such was the man whom we deplore. Thanks to God, his glory is consummated. Washington yet lives on earth in his spotless example; his spirit is in Heaven. Let his countrymen consecrate the memory of the heroic general, the patriotic statesman, and the virtuous sage. Let them teach their children never to forget that the fruits of his labors and his example are their inheritance."

To this address the President returned the following answer:

"I receive with the most respectful and affectionate sentiments, in this impressive address, the obliging expressions of your regret for the loss our country has sustained in the death of her most esteemed, beloved, and admired citizen.

"In the multitude of my thoughts and recollections on this melancholy event, you will permit me to say that I have seen him in the days of adversity, in some of the scenes of his deepest distress and most trying perplexities. I have also attended him in the highest elevation and most prosperous felicity, with uniform admiration of his wisdom, moderation, and constancy.

"Among all our original associates in that memorable league of this continent in 1774, which first expressed the sovereign will of a free nation in America, he was the only one remaining in the general government. Although with a constitution more enfeebled than his, at an age when he thought it necessary to prepare for retirement, I feel myself alone bereaved of my last brother; yet I derive a strong consolation from the unanimous disposition which appears in all ages and classes to mingle their sorrows with mine on this common calamity to the world.

"The life of our Washington cannot suffer by a comparison with those of other countries, who have been most celebrated and exalted by fame. The attributes and decorations of royalty could only have served to eclipse the majesty of those virtues which made him, from being a modest citizen, a more resplendent luminary. Misfortune, had he lived, could hereafter have sullied his glory only with those superficial minds, who, believing that character and actions are marked by success alone, rarely deserve to enjoy it. Malice could never blast his honor, and envy made him a singular exception to her universal rule. For himself, he had lived long enough to life and to glory; for his fellow-citizens, if their prayers could have been answered, he would have been immortal; for me, his departure is at a most unfortunate moment. Trusting, however, in the wise and righteous dominion of Providence over the passions of men and the results of their actions, as well as over their lives, nothing remains for me but humble resignation.

"His example is now complete, and it will teach wisdom and virtue to magistrates, citizens, and men, not only in the present age, but in future generations, as long as our history shall be read."

The committee of both Houses appointed to devise the mode by which the nation should express its grief reported the following resolutions, which were unanimously adopted:

"That a marble monument be erected by the United States at the capitol of the city of Washington, and that the family of General Washington be requested to permit his body to be deposited under it, and that the monument be so designed as to commemorate the great events of his military and political life.

"That there be a funeral from Congress Hall to the German Lutheran Church, in memory of Gen. George Washington, on Thursday, the 26th instant, and that an oration be prepared at the request of Congress, to be delivered before both Houses that day; and that the president of the Senate and speaker of the House of Representatives be desired to request one of the members of Congress to prepare and deliver the same.

"That the President of the United States be requested to direct a copy of these resolutions to be transmitted to Mrs. Washington, assuring her of the profound respect Congress will ever bear to her person and character, of their condolence on the late affecting dispensation of Providence, and entreating her assent to the interment of the remains of General Washington in the manner expressed in the first resolution.

"That the President be requested to issue his proclamation, notifying the people throughout the United States the recommendation contained in the third resolution."

These resolutions passed both Houses unanimously, and those which would admit of immediate execution were carried into effect. The whole nation appeared in mourning. The funeral procession was grand and solemn, and the eloquent oration, which was delivered on the occasion by General Lee, was heard with profound attention and with deep interest.

Throughout the United States similar marks of affliction were exhibited. In every part of the continent funeral orations were delivered, and the best talents of the nation were devoted to an expression of the nation's grief.

To the letter of the President which transmitted to Mrs. Washington the resolutions of Congress, and of which his secretary was the bearer, that lady answered:

"Taught by the great example which I have so long had before me, never to oppose my private wishes to the public will, I must consent to the request made by Congress which you have had the goodness to transmit to me; and in doing this I need not, I cannot, say what a sacrifice of individual feeling I make to a sense of public duty."

On receiving intelligence of the death of Washington, Napoleon, then First Consul of France, issued the following order of the day to the army:

"Washington is dead. This great man fought against tyranny; he established the liberty of his country. His memory will always be dear to the French people, as it will be to all freemen of the two worlds; and especially to French soldiers, who, like him and the American soldiers, have combated for liberty and equality."

Napoleon ordered that during ten days black crape should be suspended from all the standards and flags throughout the republic. On the 9th of February, 1800, a splendid funeral solemnity took place in the Champ de Mars; and a funeral oration in honor of Washington was pronounced by M. de la Fontaines, in the Hotel des Invalides, at which the First Consul and the civil and military authorities were present. [2]

The British admiral in command of the fleet lying at Torbay, on receiving the news of Washington's death, honored his memory by lowering his flag to half-mast; and his example was followed by the whole fleet. [3]

Judge Marshall, who had enjoyed the advantage of an intimate personal acquaintance with Washington, who was one of his most steadfast political supporters, and whose able biography shows a thorough appreciation of his extraordinary abilities and virtues, gives the following summary view of his character:

"General Washington was rather above the common size, his frame was robust, and his constitution vigorous--capable of enduring great fatigue and requiring a considerable degree of exercise for the preservation of his health. His exterior created in the beholder the idea of strength, united with manly gracefulness.

"His manners were rather reserved than free, though they partook nothing of that dryness and sternness which accompany reserve when carried to an extreme, and on all proper occasions he could relax sufficiently to show how highly he was gratified by the charms of conversation and the pleasures of society. His person and whole deportment exhibited an unaffected and indescribable dignity, unmingled with haughtiness, of which all who approached him were sensible; and the attachment of those who possessed his friendship and enjoyed his intimacy was ardent, but always respectful.

"His temper was humane, benevolent, and conciliatory, but there was a quickness in his sensibility to anything apparently offensive which experience had taught him to watch, and to correct.

"In the management of his private affairs he exhibited an exact yet liberal economy. His funds were not prodigally wasted on capricious and ill-examined schemes, nor refused to beneficial though costly improvements. They remained, therefore, competent to that expensive establishment which his reputation, added to a hospitable temper, had, in some measure, imposed upon him, and to those donations which real distress has a right to claim from opulence.

"He made no pretensions to that vivacity which fascinates, or to that wit which dazzles and frequently imposes on the understanding. More solid than brilliant, judgment rather than genius, constituted the most prominent feature of his character.

"Without making ostentatious professions of religion, he was a sincere believer in the Christian faith and a truly devout man.

"As a military man, he was brave, enterprising, and cautious. That malignity which has sought to strip him of all the higher qualities of a general, has conceded to him personal courage and a firmness of resolution which neither dangers nor difficulties could shake. But candor will allow him other great and valuable endowments. If his military course does not abound with splendid achievements, it exhibits a series of judicious measures adopted to circumstances, which probably saved his country.

"Placed, without having studied the theory or been taught in the school of experience the practice of war, at the head of an undisciplined, ill-organized multitude, which was impatient of the restraints and unacquainted with the ordinary duties of a camp, without the aid of officers possessing those lights which the Commander-in-Chief was yet to acquire, it would have been a miracle indeed had his conduct been absolutely faultless. But, possessing an energetic and distinguishing mind, on which the lessons of experience were never lost, his errors, if he committed any, were quickly repaired, and those measures which the state of things rendered most advisable were seldom, if ever, neglected. Inferior to his adversary in the numbers, in the equipment, and in the discipline of his troops, it is evidence of real merit that no great and decisive advantages were ever obtained over him, and that the opportunity to strike an important blow never passed away unused. He has been termed the American Fabius, but those who compare his actions with his means will perceive at least as much of Marcellus as of Fabius in his character. He could not have been more enterprising without endangering the cause he defended, nor have put more to hazard without incurring justly the imputation of rashness. Not relying upon those chances which sometimes give a favorable issue to attempts apparently desperate, his conduct was regulated by calculations made upon the capacities of his army and the real situation of his country. When called a second time to command the armies of the United States a change of circumstances had taken place, and he meditated a corresponding change of conduct. In modeling the army of 1798 he sought for men distinguished for their boldness of execution, not less than for their prudence in council, and contemplated a system of continued attack. 'The enemy,' said the general in his private letters, 'must never be permitted to gain foothold on our shores.'

"In his civil administration, as in his military career, ample and repeated proofs were exhibited of that practical good sense, of that sound judgment, which is perhaps the most rare and is certainly the most valuable quality of the human mind. Devoting himself to the duties of his station, and pursuing no object distinct from the public good, he was accustomed to contemplate at a distance those critical situations in which the United States might probably be placed, and to digest, before the occasion required action, the line of conduct which it would be proper to observe.

"Taught to distrust first impressions, he sought to acquire all the information which was attainable, and to hear, without prejudice, all the reasons which could be urged for or against a particular measure. His own judgment was suspended until it became necessary to determine, and his decisions, thus maturely made, were seldom if ever to be shaken. His conduct, therefore, was systematic, and the great objects of his administration were steadily pursued.

"Respecting, as the first magistrate in a free government must ever do, the real and deliberate sentiments of the people, their gusts of passion passed over, without ruffling the smooth surface of his mind. Trusting to the reflecting good sense of the nation for approbation and support, he had the magnanimity to pursue its real interests, in opposition to its temporary prejudices; and, though far from being regardless of popular favor, he could never stoop to retain, by deserving to lose it. In more instances than one we find him committing his whole popularity to hazard, and pursuing steadily, in opposition to a torrent which would have overwhelmed a man of ordinary firmness, that course which had been dictated by a sense of duty.

"In speculation he was a real republican, devoted to the constitution of his country and to that system of equal political rights on which it is founded. But between a balanced republic and a democracy the difference is like that between order and chaos. Real liberty, he thought, was to be preserved only by preserving the authority of the laws and maintaining the energy of government. Scarcely did society present two characters which, in his opinion, less resembled each other than a patriot and a demagogue.

"No man has ever appeared upon the theater of public action whose integrity was more incorruptible, or whose principles were more perfectly free from the contamination of those selfish and unworthy passions which find their nourishment in the conflicts of party. Having no views which required concealment, his real and avowed motives were the same; and his whole correspondence does not furnish a single case from which even an enemy would infer that he was capable, under any circumstances, of stooping to the employment of duplicity. No truth can be uttered with more confidence than that his ends were always upright and his means always pure. He exhibits the rare example of a politician to whom wiles were absolutely unknown, and whose professions to foreign governments and to his own countrymen were always sincere. In him was fully exemplified the real distinction which forever exists between wisdom and cunning, and the importance as well as truth of the maxim, that 'honesty is the best policy.'

"If Washington possessed ambition that passion was, in his bosom, so regulated by principles or controlled by circumstances that it was neither vicious nor turbulent. Intrigue was never employed as the means of its gratification, nor was personal aggrandizement its object. The various high and important stations to which he was called by the public voice were unsought by himself; and, in consenting to fill them, he seems rather to have yielded to a general conviction that the interests of his country would be thereby promoted, than to an avidity for power.

"Neither the extraordinary partiality of the American people, the extravagant praises which were bestowed upon him, nor the inveterate opposition and malignant calumnies which he encountered, had any visible influence upon his conduct. The cause is to be looked for in the texture of his mind.

"In him, that innate and unassuming modesty which adulation would have offended, which the voluntary plaudits of millions could not betray into indiscretion, and which never obtruded upon others his claims to superior consideration, was happily blended with a high and correct sense of personal dignity, and with a just consciousness of that respect which is due to station. Without exertion he could maintain the happy medium between that arrogance which wounds and that facility which allows the office to be degraded in the person who fills it.

"It is impossible to contemplate the great events which have occurred in the United States under the auspices of Washington without ascribing them, in some measure, to him. If we ask the causes of the prosperous issue of a war, against the successful termination of which there were so many probabilities; of the good which was produced, and the ill which was avoided, during an administration fated to contend with the strongest prejudices that a combination of circumstances and of passions could produce; of the constant favor of the great mass of his fellow-citizens, and of the confidence which, to the last moment of his life, they reposed in him, the answer, so far as these causes may be found in his character, will furnish a lesson well meriting the attention of those who are candidates for political fame.

"Endowed by nature with a sound judgment, and an accurate discriminating mind, he feared not that laborious attention which made him perfectly master of those subjects, in all their relations, on which he was to decide; and this essential quality was guided by an unvarying sense of moral right, which would tolerate the employment only of those means that would bear the most rigid examination, by a fairness of intention which neither sought nor required disguise, and by a purity of virtue which was not only untainted but unsuspected." The eulogies of Washington, at the time of his death, were almost as numerous as the towns and cities of the republic; for everywhere funeral honors were paid to his memory. The following, by the celebrated orator, Fisher Ames, pronounced before the Legislature of Massachusetts, is as remarkable for its conciseness as for its just and comprehensive estimate of Washington's character.

"It is not impossible," he said, "that some will affect to consider the honors paid to this great patriot by the nation as excessive, idolatrous, and degrading to freemen who are all equal. I answer, that refusing to virtue its legitimate honors would not prevent their being lavished in future on any worthless and ambitious favorite. If this day's example should have its natural effect, it will be salutary. Let such honors be so conferred only when, in future, they shall be so merited; then the public sentiment will not be misled nor the principles of a just equality corrupted. The best evidence of reputation is a man's whole life. We have now, alas, all of Washington's before us. There has scarcely appeared a really great man whose character has been more admired in his lifetime or less correctly understood by his admirers. When it is comprehended it is no easy task to delineate its excellencies in such a manner as to give the portrait both interest and resemblance, for it requires thought and study to understand the true ground of the superiority of his character over many others, whom he resembled in the principles of action and even in the manner of acting. But, perhaps, he excels all the great men that ever lived, in the steadiness of his adherence to his maxims of life and in the uniformity of all his conduct to those maxims. Those maxims, though wise, were yet not so remarkable for their wisdom as for their authority over his life, for if there were any errors in his judgment--and he displayed as few as any man--we know of no blemishes in his virtue. He was the patriot without reproach; he loved his country well enough to hold success in serving it an ample recompense. Thus far, self-love and love of country coincided, but when his country needed sacrifices that no other man could, or perhaps would be willing to make, he did not even hesitate. This was virtue in its most exalted character. More than once he put his fame at hazard, when he had reason to think it would be sacrificed, at least in this age. Two instances cannot be denied: when the army was disbanded, and again when he stood, like Leonidas at the pass of Thermopylae, to defend our independence against France.

"It is indeed almost as difficult to draw his character as to draw the portrait of virtue. The reasons are similar; our ideas of moral excellence are obscure, because they are complex, and we are obliged to resort to illustrations. Washington's example is the happiest to show what virtue is, and to delineate his character, we naturally expatiate on the beauty of virtue; much must be felt and much imagined. His pre-eminence is not so much to be seen in the display of any one virtue, as in the possession of them all and in the practice of the most difficult. Hereafter, therefore, his character must be studied before it will be striking, and then it will be admitted as a model--a precious one to a free republic.

"It is no less difficult to speak of his talents. They were adapted to lead, without dazzling mankind, and to draw forth and employ the talents of others without being misled by them. In this he was certainly superior, that he neither mistook nor misapplied his own. His great modesty and reserve would have concealed them if great occasions had not called them forth, and then, as he never spoke from the affectation to shine nor acted from any sinister motives, it is from their effects only that we are to judge of their greatness and extent. In public trusts, where men, acting conspicuously, are cautious, and in those private concerns where few conceal or resist their weakness, Washington was uniformly great, pursuing right conduct from right maxims. His talents were such as to assist a sound judgment and ripen with it. His prudence was consummate and seemed to take the direction of his powers and passions; for, as a soldier, he was more solicitous to avoid mistakes that might be fatal than to perform exploits that are brilliant; and, as a statesman, to adhere to just principles, however old, than to pursue novelties; and, therefore, in both characters, his qualities were singularly adapted to the interest and were tried in the greatest perils of the country. His habits of inquiry were so far remarkable that he was never satisfied with investigating, nor desisted from it, so long as he had less than all the light that he could obtain upon a subject, and then he made his decision without bias.

"This command over the partialities that so generally stop men short or turn them aside in their pursuit of truth, is one of the chief causes of his unvaried course of right conduct in so many difficult scenes, where every human action must be presumed to err. If he had strong passions he had learned to subdue them, and to be moderate and mild. If he had weaknesses, he concealed them, which is rare, and excluded them from the government of his temper and conduct, which is still more rare. If he loved fame, he never made improper compliances for what is called popularity. The fame he enjoyed is of the kind that will last forever, yet it was rather the effect than the motive of his conduct. Some future Plutarch will search for a parallel to his character. Epaminondas is, perhaps, the brightest name of all antiquity. Our Washington resembled him in the purity and ardor of his patriotism, and, like him, he first exalted the glory of his country. There, it is to be hoped, the parallel ends, for Thebes fell with Epamanondas. But such comparisons cannot be pursued far without departing from the similitude. For we shall find it as difficult to compare great men as great rivers; some we admire for the length and rapidity of their currents and the grandeur of their cataracts; others for the majestic silence and fullness of their streams; we cannot bring them together, to measure the difference of their waters. The unambitious life of Washington, declining fame yet courted by it, seemed, like the Ohio, to choose its long way through solitudes, diffusing fertility, or like his own Potomac, widening and deepening its channel as it approaches the sea, and displaying most the usefulness and serenity of its greatness toward the end of its course. Such a citizen would do honor to any country. The constant veneration and affection of his country will show that it was worthy of such a citizen.

"However his military fame may excite the wonder of mankind, it is chiefly by his civil magistracy that his example will instruct them. Great generals have arisen in all ages of the world, and perhaps most of them in despotism and darkness. In times of violence and convulsion they rise, by the force of the whirlwind, high enough to ride in it and direct the storm. Like meteors, they glare on the black clouds with a splendor that, while it dazzles and terrifies, makes nothing visible but the darkness. The fame of heroes is indeed growing vulgar; they multiply in every long war; they stand in history and thicken in their ranks almost as undistinguished as their own soldiers.

"But such a chief magistrate as Washington appears like the pole-star in a clear sky to direct the skilful statesman. His presidency will form an epoch and be distinguished as the age of Washington. Already it assumes its high place in the political region. Like the milky-way, it whitens along its allotted portion of the hemisphere. The latest generations of men will survey, through the telescope of history, the space where so many virtues blend their rays, and delight to separate them into groups and distinct virtues. As the best illustration of them, the living monument, to which the first of patriots would have chosen to consign his fame, it is my earnest prayer to Heaven that our country may subsist even to that late day in the plenitude of its liberty and happiness, and mingle its mild glory with Washington's."

1. Footnote: Our authority for the details of Washington's last illness and death is a statement carefully prepared by Mr. Lear at the time, and published from the original in Sparks' "Life of Washington." It is the most exact and reliable authority extant.

2. Footnote: Sparks, "Life of Washington."

3. Footnote: Sparks, "Life of Washington."

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