Within the course of the last week, I have had the pleasure to receive your favors of the 20th: 27th: & 30th: of December, number’s 19–20–21. of the series, which wants only No 18 to be complete.1 The interest, which your letters never fail to excite, has been abundantly testified by the eagerness, with which subscriptions to the Port folio have been sent forward, from every part of the Country, & the chief inducement to which, in many instances, to my knowledge, has been a desire to possess a copy of your journalized tour, through Silesia. It had escaped my memory, that I had intimated to you, so early as the 25th: of October, my wish that these letters should appear in print, but I am glad to have the sanction of your consent, altho’ I ventured to anticipate it.2 You will ere long receive the first numbers of the Port folio and I have little doubt of your being satisfied with the style in which you are exhibited to the public. How you will be pleased with the general execution of the paper, is not in my power to say, though I am free to declare my own opinion of it, to be very favorable. The Editor is precisely the same Jo: Dennie, that I knew at Harvard, & that you were better acquainted with, in Boston, when he exercised a calling similar to the present.3 It would therefore be superfluous to tell you, that he is more addicted to laughter than gravity; more disposed to quaff the generous bowl, with a friend, at a midnight hour, than to covet a character for regular & exemplary habits. His friends, who are familiar with his history, sometimes express a doubt of his perseverance & stability, but with encouragement, such as he has experienced, in his present undertaking, there is a stimulus to industry, which he has never known, on any former occasion. I have strong hopes of him therefore, knowing the wide difference between the patronized efforts of genius, & those that are neglected.

The caution, which your last letter enjoins upon me, with respect to the management of your affairs, has I hope been observed, as far as was consistent with my own opinion of the surest & safest method of promoting your interest.4 I was, for a considerable time, under the same impression of doubt, distrust & anxiety as to the result of the 48 great struggle between the different parties, during the last Autumn, as you appear to have been, but from being more in the way to mark & watch the progress of it, I was better able to calculate the consequences, and though at one moment I should have been happy to be free from any risk of a pecuniary nature, thinking that a very great fluctuation of the funds would ensue a change of administration, I never felt alarmed for the capital under my care, & of course did not think fit to dispose of it, when it would have commanded the highest price— Since the new organization has been completed & we may indulge a hope, that we know the worst, I have not repented my tenacity though by speculating upon these events, money might have been made.

The Country is now in a more tranquil state, both within & without than I have ever known it to be, & the merit of this condition is no less ascribable to the magnanimity of the federalists, since their defeat, than to their successful & prosperous measures, while at the head of our public affairs. They will be robb’d, most unjustly, of all this honor, for should the public exigencies diminish and taxation, of course, be lessened—the Republican democrats, will be eager enough to claim the praise & the sovereign will not have discrimination enough to withhold it.

In consequence of the ratification of the Convention with France, our Navy will be reduced to a peace establishment, and all the vessels, of inferior magnitude, will be sold. Our difficulties with England, will be at least suffered to sleep, during the pressure of the nothern confederacy, in which we Shall probably have no concern and the Commerce of our Country, unmolested by either of the rival powers, may be expected to florish beyond former example.

The changes hitherto operated under the new system, you will be officially apprized of. Some removals from office have taken place, without adequate cause & for the sake of, what has been called, the principle. Under the new law, which has extended the judiciary system, many of the Officers, such as District Attorneys & Marshalls, who hold during will & pleasure, have been dissmissed, and in some instances, men of bad fame, have been substituted for valuable officers. The higher departments are, in general, well filled. Madison, Secretary of State; but the duties of that office have hitherto been discharged by the Attorney General, Mr: Lincoln. General Dearborn, of Massachusetts, Secretary of War. Mr: Dexter still continues at the head of the treasury, and the Navy department continues vacant.5 49 During the recess of Congress, we shall hear little of Cabinet concerns.

Our family have safely arrived at home, and a cordial reception has been given them by the people of our native State, whose representatives presented an affectionate address to your father, which I enclose to you, with his answer.6 The anxiety you express for their comfort in retirement, & the filial affection, which dictated the instructions you gave me, in one of your letters, will be gratefully acknowledged by them. I hope & believe, that their circumstances are not embarrassed, though certainly far from being affluent; the produce of their farm will afford food, at least, and their other resources will probably be adequate to their wants. I was highly gratified by the last acts of a public nature, which were performed by the late President; they were marked by the same firmness, consistency & dignity, which characterized all his other measures; the same collected, temperate & energetic conduct, which so few men in public stations are capable of practising, & which, from the rarity of such examples, fewer still know how to appretiate or comprehend. Your opinions, though formed from imperfect information, are generally very accurate, on the subject of our domestic affairs, and my habitual respect for them has induced me to take liberties, for the public benefit, as often as I have had opportunities.

I have little to say on the subject of your private affairs, having so recently transmitted my annual account, wherein a full exposition of them was contained.7 I have consulted with Dr: Tufts relative to the purchase of an house, and he advises a postponement, for a few months, at least, because your money will be more productive in the funds than by being converted into real estate. I have not been able to obtain the last year’s interest upon Mr: J. B Smith’s note of hand, though I saw him, about two months ago, at New-York. He wanted me to take some of his lands, to the amount of the debt, but this I did not feel myself authorized to do. When you return, you can consent to the proposition for yourself, if you think fit.8

I am, with my best love to Louisa / Your Brother

I received a few days ago your kind letter of 29 January. After having been so many months without a line from you, it gave me sincere pleasure to see your hand-writing again, though I could not but sympathise with the afflictions under the immediate burden of which it was written— I have cordially and deeply lamented my poor brother, and will obey your injunction respecting his child1

I learn with extreme satisfaction that under all these circumstances my father has retained his health and spirits— I have ever been fully convinced of his vigour and energy of mind, and was persuaded that it would bear him up on these occasions, as it had done in many former instances, of difficulty, danger and disappointment— I knew he was aware that in contributing to found a great republic, he was not preparing a School for public gratitude; that bad passions and bad practices would produce the same effects there, that they have in all other ages and climates with similar governments; and that he himself would in all probability be one of the most signal instances of patriotism sacrificed to intrigue and envy.

Mr: Hamilton’s pamphlet I have not seen, and have heard but very obscurely and imperfectly of the Essex junto and their manoeuvres—2 But I could not avoid the conclusion when once the fact was established of such a division in the friends to the Government, that the administration would certainly change hands— The usual details of 51 party manoeuvering, intrigues, calumnies, perfidies, frauds, baseness and brutality of every kind, I have known very little of and have no desire to know more— That they would be, there was no reason to doubt, and that they have been can therefore give no surprize— The alledged motives of a public nature upon which Mr: Hamilton and his party separated from the government, are in themselves not merely a justification, they are the best eulogium of my father’s administration.— I regret very much not having received your letter from Quincy, not only as it contained explanations upon this subject, which I am very desirous to possess, but because it would have made known the reasons to me, for which you think it would be advisable for me to return home immediately.—3 I am the more anxious for this, because two motives which to my own mind are of peculiar weight and importance have led me to a different determination— The first is the present situation of the North of Europe, which seems more than at any other period, to render expedient the presence of a person in a public character from the United States— And the second is that being under a confident expectation of a recall from the new Administration, I do not think proper to have the appearance of anticipating it, by asking it myself— If for public reasons or from private motives, the President judges fit to remove me from this place, I shall submit, and go home, not to publish a libel against him, by betraying the documents of my mission, when they are no longer mine; not to insult him by blubbering to the house of Representatives an insolent complaint against him for recalling me— Not to treasure up in my heart wrath for the day of wrath,4 and ransack the United States for every private confidential letter he ever wrote, to make it a tool of malice and revenge against himself— High and illustrious as these precedents of patriotism are, I will sooner turn scavenger and earn my living by clearing away the filth of the streets, than plunge into this bottomless filth of faction that with the ordure with which I shall cover my self I may stink him out of office. I certainly never will ask him for any place— Nor will I complain if he removes me from that which I already hold— But in following my own feelings of delicacy, I think that the removal ought to be entirely an act of his own, and that it would be unbecoming in me to ask, or by any thing on my part provoke it.

That my brother’s conduct is in every respect such as to give you satisfaction, I rejoyce to hear, though I should have been certain it could not be otherwise, even had you not so written— I fully know his worth and have in him an unlimited confidence— It must be to him 52 a source of equal pleasure to know that he has your approbation— The most exquisite enjoyment which can delight a filial heart, is the certainty of giving joy to that of a parent. I should have wished that he had changed his determination, and settled in our native State. Without feeling any thing of local prejudice I cannot consider either the physical, the moral or the political climate of Pennsylvania, as so healthy as that of Massachusetts— It is not inconsistent with religious ideas, and is much less so than shallow thinkers persuade themselves, with the lessons of natural and experimental philosophy, to suppose that the pestilence of the mind, which rages with such violence in that State under the name of party-Spirit, is intimately connected with that physical pestilence which sweeps away so many thousands of its people.

“The first magistrates of a republic (says Cicero) should always observe two precepts of Plato— The one, to sacrifice their own ease to the benefit of the people, and refer to that end all their actions— The other, to apply their cares to the whole body of the Republic, and not abandon one part for the sake of protecting another— For, (adds he,) they who consult the interests only of a part of the citizens, and neglect the rest, introduce into the city, those most pernicious evils, discord and sedition; from which some become partizans of the populace, and others, of the better sort—very few, of the whole— Hence arose cruel dissensions in Athens, and in our republic not only seditions but these pestiferous civil wars— A firm and honest citizen, worthy of being placed at the head of his nation, will shun, will abhor such conduct, and give himself up entirely to the Republic.”—5 It is the misfortune of Pennsylvania to be governed by persons who care very little for the precepts of Plato, and perhaps know as little of those of Cicero— Pennsylvania has taken great and very laudable pains to reform her criminal code, and I hope the day will come when she will be no longer liable to the reproach of having been more solicitous to mitigate punishments than to diminish crimes.6 It is not from petty larcenies, and paltry frauds that the danger of our country proceeds— It is from political vices, widening into moral depravity of the worst kind— Against these Pennsylvania has provided no school of correction—no work-shop gaol; no solitary dungeon; though she needs them much more than for offences against her common or statute Laws.— All the States of our union suffer by the same evil; but Pennsylvania is more afflicted with it than any of the rest.

The Gazettes which I have begun to address to my father will 53 abridge all I can say to you upon the politics of Europe— My greatest concern with regard to this plan is, that before the several numbers come to hand, all the news will be old— It was from this consideration that I dropp’d the purpose I had form’d when I first came to Europe, of sending something similar to the Secretary of State— I now venture upon the trial, especially as I feel a greater latitude of liberty in delivering my opinions upon facts, to my father, than to the official department.

The death of the Emperor of Russia, and the English expedition against Copenhagen are the most important recent incidents in the North of Europe— When I wrote my letter to my father of March 24th: I little thought that Paul the first was no more— That on that very day he had perished, probably by an eruption of the volcano upon which he was doom’d to live— It is yet very doubtful whether the changes which I then anticipated as the probable consequence of such a contingency will actually take place. At least it is certain that the new Emperor has sent a Commission to the former Russian Minister in England, and that Count Panin is to be Vice-Chancellor again7

Since Nelson’s first attack upon the line of defence before Copenhagen, and the armistice which succeeded upon its issue, there is nothing certain from that place— Whatever may happen there will be sooner known in England than here; and of course will reach you sooner by the newspapers than from me.

The day before yesterday, at half-past three o’clock afternoon, my dear Louisa gave me a Son—8 She has had a very severe time, through the winter, and is now so ill that I dare not write to her mother, to give her notice of this event— I will humbly hope that in a few days, I may be relieved from my anxiety on her account, and enabled to announce to her mother, only news of joy.— The child is well.

Ever affectionately your’s