The Eastern Mail brought your letter of the 23d: this morning.1 The business part of it stands thus. Dr: Woodhouse has been in the habit of putting up chemical equipage at various prices, and when our friend Quincy wrote for one, last year I communicated the order to the Dr: Professor himself, who promised to attend to it. This promise no doubt escaped his memory, as he has since been twice across 238 the Atlantic and lately arrived. As my proud spirit will not suffer me to make another man’s business my own, where he alone is to be benefited, I will make no more applications to the Dr: Professor, himself, but have already engaged a brother Chemist to apply for the apparatus, who being a sort of Chemical experimentalist, will see that things are as they should be.2 The expence, which Quincy authorised me to encounter upon his order, was, I think, from 30 to 50 Dls: so that your few shillings is but a scanty bid and will not command the article. If I incur expence in this transaction, I shall look to some of you philosophers for repayment, since the articles would be of no manner of use to one who is not a philosopher & never will be, any more than he will be, a free-mason. I have a mortal antipathy to the term, since it has been perverted to the strange use of modern times, when it means any thing but a lover of wisdom. My father disclaims one species or sect of philosophers, in his answer to the birth day addressers;3 but I think the drift of his meaning in that disclaimer has not been discovered, except at the seat of government, by the Sophist of Thetford.

The Ode was copied by me and headed with an extract;4 then enclosed to the temporary some-time editor of the Port Folio, who, you will be surprised to hear, is a small, sly Deist, a disguised, but determined jacobin; a sort of Sammy Harison Smith, “in shape and make the same”; his name is Brown, & he criticised your translation of Gentz in the New York magazine called American Review, whereof he is a coadjutor.5 Well, this fellow suppressed the ode for four or five weeks, and until I made a noise about it, there was no chance of its coming out. I thought like you, that I had “lost an Ode of charming praise”;6 I had never any real intention of sending it to Richmond, but the truth was, that I knew this Browne so well as to foresee what would be the fate of the piece, if it came to him. I took the Editor-ship of the paper upon myself, and by this mail you will see the fruits of it. The two last numbers are revised, by me, and I shall continue my superintendance until Dennie returns to the City, which I think will be in a few days.7 I have passed the Summer and part of the Autumn, in his society; by my advice and recommendation he took up his abode at & about the yellow-springs, and if the first breaking out of the yellow-fever had not dispersed the subordinate workmen, the PF. would have been regularly printed, though possibly not so punctually transmitted. The great fault of the establishment and a principal cause of its slender support, is irregularity. Dennie has never had a man of business, either as a partner or a 239 subordinate; the detail of the concern has consequently been neglected, shamefully and many think unpardonably. His contracts have been loosely made & as negligently performed. Notwithstanding all this, his patrons have been numerous, and though many have fallen off, many are daily added to the list of his subscribers. After the backward numbers are brought up, which there is some expectation they will be, at the end of the year, I have engaged to take upon myself the detail, or, if you will, the drudgery of the establishment, and in order to facilitate this connection, (which is entirely of a private nature, and as such made known only to you, as a friend & powerful patron,) Mr: Dennie is to dwell under the same roof & have a chamber contiguous to mine. You know some of my qualifications for the detail of business, and I know very well, that the mechanical employment appurtenant to the punctual transmission &ca: of the Port Folio, is not, by odds, so great as fell to my lot, while in your employ as a Secretary. Whether I shall have your approbation in this scheme, I know not, but I feel anxious to obtain it, for I think it will owe much of its success to your generous contribution; not in funds, but in the means of raising them. I feel no complacency in avowing that this measure is the dictate rather of necessity than choice; the law will not support me here alone, and if I can do any thing, in concert with the profession, which will enable me to turn to account, the little cultivation of intellect, I ought to be supposed to possess; I shall feel that I have less reason than I have had to repine at my lot in life. Complaints against fortune are as common with those, who have thrown off her embrace or madly frowned her away when she smiled with bewitching fondness, as they are with those that never saw her face; and it is hard for disinterested spectators & auditors, to discriminate between the murmur that is just, and the complaint that is groundless. In general, however, they are alike disregarded. If I repine at my fate, it is because I see no prosperity attendant on those pursuits which education has familiarized to me, and which if I am compelled to abandon, I shall be thrown upon an ocean of unexplored and therefore dangerous navigation. The dread too of abandoning, in disgrace the profession, which one has chosen is a powerful draw-back upon the facility of change, which is never scarcely reputable, unless when made to avoid greater evils. These and other considerations, too much my own to be imparted, have induced me to try my luck as a Co-adjutor in the management of a public print. I have pledged myself, according to my means, to commence profit & loss, with the new year, and though prospects are 240 less brilliant than could be wished, they are not so dark as some may conjecture. The only contribution I ask or wish from you towards this undertaking, is your pen-service, to which myself & co-associate have long paid & will continue to pay homage. Another favor will be to furnish such selections or an index to them, as you deem worthy of perpetuity. Lastly to keep my secret, without which I shall be more less benefited than injured.

Mr: Dobson has furnished the missing sheet and a second volume of Supplement, which shall be sent by the first opportunity.8

Please inform my mother, that two barrils of flour have already been Shipped and two more ordered on her account.

Can you procure for me the first number of Dumas précis des evènements militaires. My first was sent to Quincy and I never got it, but it is now wanted to be bound up.9 You have many of my books among yours—when shall I see them again?

You threaten to dream, “odes, sonnets or legendary tales,” and I cannot but hope you many a vision. Such stuff is rare & in demand. Tell me what you think of “another imitation,” of our Ode. It was dream’t here; by a worthy wight whose Ancestors were Welsh. He may plead prescription for his Bard-ship. Look to your Terence. Adelphi Act 3. Scen 4 and mark the passage, which begins—“Sed quis illic est quem video procul? Estne Hegio— Tribulis noster? Si satis cerno, hercle’is est. Homo amicus nobis”— Such is our Cadwalader; the very Hegis of our school.10

Vale.

I have had your favour of the 30th: ulto: several days; and have taken time to deliberate upon its contents— And first as to the chemical apparatus—If you have not already procured one, we shall spare 242 you any further trouble about it, as we have succeeded in obtaining a large one here, which will quite supersede the want of Dr: Woodhouse’s oeconomical preparations— If however you have already engaged what I wrote for, send it forward, and charge me with the expence— As to 30 or 50 Dollars, I have only to say that Dr: Woodhouse’s complete apparatus is advertised for a few shillings in a printed book (Henry’s Epitome of Chemistry) and therefore if he asks more, we shall expect something more than complete—1

You are a little out of humour with Philosophy, because her name has been shamefully abused— You might as well renounce Religion or Liberty, if that were a sufficient Reason— But the sound argument is from the abuse of a good thing to its utility—to its excellence—Not to its uselessness— Liberty, Religion and Philosophy are and must ever remain the blessings and ornaments of life, however they may sometimes get ill-sorted

As for your project, I shall be happy that you have undertaken it, if you have thoroughly reflected upon it in all its points of view— Thus I presume you have not engaged yourself so far, as to make your property responsible, for the loose contracts, and negligent performances of another man— Let me recommend to you particularly to consider very deliberately, how far you may implicate your property, by a share in the concern—for I am sure if you consider it thoroughly, you will use all due precaution for your own security.

If you do engage your property in it, let me next entreat you, to secure, if not an entire superintendency over the accompts, and contracts, at least an ample controul over them— And do not fail to exert that controul with unceasing vigilance and circumspection.

Make up your account, for more, mechanical, and especially for more uninterrupted toil and drudgery, than you ever had while with me— Let it be an inflexible resolution, totally to remove that complaint of irregularity, which as you observe has been the great objection hitherto— And which has been so excessive that I am astonished, it has not totally destroyed the establishment— There is not another paper on this Continent which would not long since have expired under one half the offences it has committed in this particular—

At the close of this year great numbers of the Subscribers will infallibly fall off— You must determine to repair the losses, by extraordinary Industry and Care— Have nothing to do with it untill the six weeks in arrear shall be completely made up— Start fair— But speak for an heart of iron and for nerves of Adamant to carry you through— 243 Your greatest danger is of thinking too lightly of what you undertake, before you begin.

I could not help laughing, when you so strongly urged me to keep your secret.— You may depend upon me— But you may lay it down as an axiom of universal application, that no secret can ever be kept, which you must communicate to more than one person— Now your’s must be known already, at least to two— Therefore you must consider it as known already to all the world, and form your expectations accordingly— You may keep your secret as long as you can— But place no reliance upon it whatsoever.

Do not think I say this to deter you from the enterprize—far from it— If you conclude to go on, you shall have all the assistance in my power, and I pledge my self to my best exertions to support you, in the way you mention— I will furnish you, with as much matter, original or selected, as the proportion I have supplied from the commencement of the paper, and you shall be sure of my good-will for ten times as much as it will ever be in my power to contribute.

But do not if you once engage, let your work be so neglected, as to make one ashamed of having any concern in it— Keep yourself steady, and make your fellow labourer more so, by gentle insinuation, and by all-conquering example— Have no apologies to make to the public, and then you will not have occasion to brazen it out with the Public, and tell them that your plan does not require regularity.

Your motives for thus engaging are fair and honourable, and I most cordially wish you success— Nor have I any doubt but that you will obtain it if you will but labour for it. Please to take notice, that N. 41. of the Port Folio, the proper date of which is Octr: 16. 1802 I have not yet received— Nor do I believe it has been at-all received in Boston— All the preceding numbers I have, and also N: 42. dated Octr: 23. so that the number 41. must have miscarried in the conveyance— Take care to send me one, for I want it to complete my set here— At the same time I must observe that more than one of the subscribers here have intimated to me the design of dropping the paper, because of its irregularity— I presume that the Ode of Hegio is in that same number 41. for I have not found it in any of my numbers yet received— But pray had you any particular object in referring me to the passage in Terence—Or was it merely to let me know how highly and how justly you value your Hegio?2

I shall endeavour, the next time I go to Quincy, to procure you the first number of Dumas’s précis des evenemens militaires, if it is 244 there to be found— When you will get your books I know not— With most of mine they are still pack’d up in a garret— And I cannot unpack, because I have no where to stow them— The res angusta domi,3 is a sad restraint upon learning as well as upon virtue.

You will find enclosed a thorough-paced Jacobin dream, quite in the sans-culotte costume, but I have not time to copy it again— It will take you some, and no small pains to read it accurately, but you will find it worth the trouble— If you do not find it contain more wit, than to Jacobin belongs, burn it, and let it be a profound secret— For the Jacobin from whom I had it, told me, that although he considered it in point of argument as an unanswerable defence of his favourite Statesman, yet it would not do for the weak brethren, and therefore it must be a secret.— Now I do not say that it is unanswerable— But I do say, that it is in point of argument the very strongest defence of the great man, which has yet appeared in print, against that charge—4

Let me hear again from you soon— If you persevere in your plan I shall have an additional spur to Industry, and shall send you some more letters copied from the volumes whence that of old Franklin was taken.

Your’s truly.