[French] people were ground to powder; when we pass in review *** the riches, iuxury, indolence and immorality of the clergy.—AUTOBIOGRAPHY. i, 86. FORD ED., i, 118. (1821.)

5272. MINISTERS (Religious), Hostility to Jefferson. The delusion into which the X. Y. Z. plot shows it possible to push the people; the successful experiment made under the prevalence of that delusion on the clause of the Constitution, which, while it secured the freedom of the press, covered also the freedom of religion, had given to the clergy a very favorite hope of obtaining an establishment of a particular form of Christianity through the United States; and as every sect believes its own form the true one, every one, perhaps hoped for his own, but especially the Episcopalians and Congregationalists. The returning good sense of our country threatens abortion to their hopes, and they believe that any portion of power confided to me, will be exercised in opposition to their schemes. And they believe rightly; for I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man. But this is all they have to fear from me; and enough, too, in their opinion. And this is the cause of their printing lying pamphlets against me, forging conversations for me with Mazzei, Bishop Madison, &c., which are absolute falsehoods without a circumstance of truth to rest on; falsehoods, too, of which I acquiet Mazzei

and Bishop Madison for they are men of truth. But enough of this. It is more than I have before committed to paper on the subject of all the lies that have been preached and printed against me.-TO DR. BENJAMIN RUSH. iv, 336. FORD ED., vii, 460. (M., Sep. 1800.)

5273. MINISTERS (Religious), Liberty and. In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own. To HORATIO G. SPAFFORD. vi, 334. (M., 1814.)

5274. MINISTERS (Religious), New England. The sway of the clergy in New England is indeed formidable. No mind beyond mediocrity dares there to develop itself. If it does, they excite against it the public opinion which they command, and by little, but incessant and tearing persecutions, drive it from among them. Their present emigrations to the Western country are real flights from persecution, religious and political, but the abandonment of the country by those who wish to enjoy freedom of opinion leaves the despotism over the residue more intense, more oppressive.-TO HORATIO GATES SPAFFORD. FORD ED., X, 13. (M., 1816.)

5275. The advocate of religious freedom is to expect neither peace nor forgiveness from the New England clergy.-To LEVI LINCOLN. iv, 427. FORD ED., viii, 129. (1802.) See CHURCH, CHURCH AND STATE, CLERGY, and RELIGION.

5276. MINORITY, Censorship by.-A respectable minority [in Congress] is useful as censors. The present one is not respectable, being the bitterest remains of the cup of federalism, rendered desperate and furious by despair.-To JOEL BARLOW. iv, 437. FORD ED., viii, 149. (W., May 1802.)

5277. MINORITY, Equal rights of.Bear in mind this sacred principle that ** * the minority possess their equal rights, which

equal laws must protect, and to violate which would be oppression.-FIRST INAUGURAL ADDRESS. viii, 2. FORD ED., viii, 2. (1801.)

5278. MINORITY, Sacrifices to.-The minorities [against the new Constitution] in most of the accepting States have been very respectable; so much so as to render it prudent, were it not otherwise reasonable, to make some sacrifice to them.-To GENERAL WASHINGTON. ii, 533. FORD ED., V, 56. (P., 1788.)

Το

5280. MINT, Establishment of.-The propositions* under consideration [by Congress] suppose that the coinage is to be carried on in a foreign country, and that the implements are to reinain the property of the undertaker; which conditions, in the opinion [of the Secretary of State] render them inadmissible, for these reasons: Coinage is peculiarly an attribute of sovereignty. transfer its exercise into another country, is to submit it to another sovereign. Its transportation across the ocean, besides the ordinary dangers of the sea, would expose it to acts of piracy, by the crews to whom it would be confided, as well as by others apprized of its passage. In time of war, it would offer to the enterprises of an enemy what have been emphatically called the sinews of war. If the war were with the nation within whose territory the coinage is, the first act of war, or reprisal, might be to arrest this operation, with the implements and materials coined and uncoined, to be used at their discretion. The reputation and principles of the present undertaker are safeguards against the abuses of a coinage, carried on in a foreign country, where no checks could be provided by the proper sovereign, no regulations established, no police, no guard exercised; in short, none of the numerous cautions hitherto thought essential at every mint; but in hands less entitled to confidence, these will become dangers. We may be secured, indeed, by proper experiments as to the purity of the coin delivered us according to contract, but we cannot be secured against that which, though less pure, shall be struck in the general die, and protected against the vigilance of Government, till it shall have entered into circulation. We lose the opportunity of calling in and recoining the clipped money in circulation, or we double our risk by a double transportation. We lose, in like manner, the resource of coining up our household plate in the instant of great distress. We lose the means of forming artists to continue the works, when the common accidents of mortality shall have deprived us of those who began them. In fine, the carrying on a coin

The question was referred to Jefferson by the House of Representatives.-EDITOR.

age in a foreign country, as far as the Secretary knows, is without example; and general example is weighty authority. He is, therefore, of opinion, on the whole, that a mint, whenever established, should be established at home.-COINAGE REPORT. vii, 463. (April 1790.)

5281. MIRAGE AT MONTICELLO.The elevation and particular situat on at Monticello afford an opportunity of seeing a phenomenon which is rare at land, though frequent at sea. The seamen call it looming. Philosophy is as yet in the rear of the seamen, for so far from having accounted for it, she has not given it a name. Its principal effect is to make distant objects appear larger, in opposition to the general law of vision, by which they are diminished. I know an instance, at Yorktown, from whence the water prospect eastwardly is without termination, wherein a canoe with three men, at a great distance was taken for a ship with its three masts. I am little acquainted with the phenomenon as it shows itself at sea; but at Monticello it is familiar. There is a solitary mountain about forty miles off in the South, whose natural shape, as presented to view there, is a regular cone; but by the effect of looming. it sometimes subsides almost totally in the horizon: sometimes it rises more acute

and more elevated; sometimes it is hemispherical; and sometimes its sides are perpendicular, its top flat, and as broad as its base. In short, it assumes at times the most whimsical shapes, and all these perhaps successively in the same morning. The Blue Ridge of mountains comes into view, in the north-east, at about one hundred miles distance, and approaching in a direct line, passes by within twenty miles, and goes off to the south-west. This phenomenon begins to show itself on these mountains at about fifty miles distance, and continues beyond that as far as they are seen. I remark no particular state, either in the weight, moisture, or heat of the atmosphere, necessary to produce this. The only constant circumstances are its appearance in the morning only, and on objects at least forty or fifty miles distant. In this latter circumstance, if not in both, it differs from the looming on the water. Refraction will not account for the metamorphosis. That only changes the proportions of length and breadth, base and altitude, preserving the general outlines. Thus it may make a circle appear elliptical, raise or depress a cone, but by none of its laws, as yet developed, will it make a circle appear a square, or a cone a sphere.-NOTES ON VIRGINIA. viii, 327. FORD ED., iii, 186. (1782.)

5282. MIRANDA EXPEDITION, Jefferson's knowledge of.-That the expedit'on of Miranda was countenanced by me, is an absolute falsehood, let it have gone from whom it might; and I am satisfied it is equally so as to Mr. Madison. To know as much of it as we could was our duty, but not to encourage it. To WILLIAM DUANE. iv, 592. viii, 433. (W., 1806.)

FORD ED.,

5283. Your predecessor, soured on a question of etiquette against the administration of this country, wished to impute wrong to them in all their actions, even where he did not believe it himself. In this spirit, he wished it to be believed that we were in unjustifiable cooperation in Miranda's expedition. I solemnly, and on my personal truth and honor, declare to you. that this was entirely without foundation, and that there was neither cooneration, nor connivance on our part. He informed

us he was about to attempt the liberation of his native country from bondage, and intimated a hope of our aid, or connivance at least. He was at once informed, that although we had great cause of complaint against Spain, and even of war, yet whenever we should think proper to act as her enemy, should be openly and above board, and that our hostility should never be exercised by such petty means. We had no suspicion that he expected to engage men here, but merely to purchase military stores. Against this there was no law, nor consequently any On authority for us to interpose obstacles. the other hand, we deemed it improper to betray his voluntary communication to the agents of Spain. Although his measures were many days in preparation at New York, we never had the least intimation or suspicion of his engaging men in his enterprise, until he was gone; and. I presume, the secrecy of his proceeding kept them equally unknown to the Marquis Yrujo at Fhiladelphia, and the Spanish consul at New York, since neither of them gave us any information of the enlistment of men, until it was too late for any measures taken at Washington to prevent their departure. The officer in the customs, who participated in the transaction with Miranda, we immediately removed, and should have had him and others further punished, had it not been for the protection given them by private citizens at New York, in opposition to the government, who, by their impudent falsehoods and calumnies, were able to overbear the minds of the jurors.-To DoN VALENTINE DE FORONDA. v, 474. FORD ED., ix, 250. (M., Oct. 1809.)

5284. MIRANDA EXPEDITION, Prosecutions. On the prosecution of Ogden and Smith for participation in Miranda's expedition, the defendants and their friends have contrived to make it a government question, in which they mean to have the Administration and the judge tried as the culprits instead of themselves. Swartwout, the marshal to whom, in his duel with Clinton, Smith was second. and his bosom friend, summoned a panel of jurors, the greater part of which were of the bitterest federalists. His letter, too, covering

to a friend a copy of Aristides,* and affirming that every fact in it was true as Holy Writ [was considered in Cabinet]. Determined unanimously that he be removed.-THE ANAS. FORD ED., i, 316. (May 1806.)

5285. MISFORTUNE, Pleasure and.Pleasure is always before us; but misfortune is at our side; while running after that, this arrests us.-To MRS. COSWAY. ii, 37. FORD ED., iv, 317. (P., 1786.)

5286. MISFORTUNE, Solace in.-I most cordially sympathize in your losses. It is a situation in which a man needs the aid of all his wisdom and philosophy. But as it is better to turn from the contemplat on of our misfortunes to the resources we possess of extricating ourselves, you will, of course, have found solace in your vigor of mind, health of body. talents, habits of business, in the consideration that you have time yet to retr eve everything, and a knowledge that the very activity necessary for this, is a state of greater happiness than the unoccupied one to which you had a thought of retiring.-To DR. CURRIE. ii, 218. (P., 1787.)

5287. MISSIONARIES, Foreign.-I do not know that it is a duty to disturb by missionaries the religion and peace of other

*W. P. Van Ness, who wrote a pamphlet in favor of Burr.-EDITOR.

The

5290. MISSISSIPPI RIVER NAVIGATION, Congress and.-The affair of the Mississippi, by showing that Congress is capable of hesitating on a question, which proposes a clear sacrifice of the western to the maritime States, will with difficulty be obliterated. proposition of my going to Madrid to try to recover there the ground which has been lost at New York, by the concession of the vote of seven States, I should think desperate.-To JAMES MADISON. ii, 153. FORD ED., iv, 392. (P., 1787.)

5291.

I was pleased to see the vote of Congress, of September the 16th, on the subject of the Mississippi, as I had before seen, with great uneasiness, the pursuits of other principles, which I could never reconcile to my own ideas of probity or wisdom, and from which, and my knowledge of the character of our western settlers, I saw that the loss of that country was a necessary consequence. I wish this return to true policy may be in time to prevent evil.-To JAMES MADISON. ii, 563. FORD ED., V, 63. (P., 1789.)

5292. MISSISSIPPI RIVER NAVIGATION, Law of nature and.-But our right is built on ground still broader and more unquestionable, to wit: On the law of nature and nations. If we appeal to this, as we feel it written in the heart of man, what sentiment is written in deeper characters than that the ocean is free to all men, and their rivers to all their inhabitants? Is there a man, savage or civilized, unbiased by habit, who does not feel and attest this truth? Accordingly, in all tracts of country united under the same political society, we find this natural right universally acknowledged and protected by laying the navigable rivers open to all their inhabitants. When their rivers enter the limits of another society, if the right of the upper inhabitants to descend the stream is in any case obstructed, it is an act of force by a stronger society against a weaker. condemned by the judgment of mankind. The late case of Antwerp and the Scheldt was a striking proof of a general union of sentiment on this point; as it is believed that Amsterdam had scarcely an advocate out of Holland, and even there its pretensions were advocated on the ground of treaties, and not of natural right. *** The Commissioners will be able perhaps to find, either in the practice or the pretensions of Spain as to the Douro, Tagus, and Guadiana, some acknowledgments of this principle on the part of that nation. This sentiment of right in favor of the upper inhabitants must become stronger in the pro portion which their extent of country bears to the lower. The United States hold 600,000

But

square miles of habitable territory on the Mississippi and its branches, and this river and its branches afford many thousands of miles of navigable waters penetrating this territory in all its parts. The inhabitable grounds of Spain river, which alone can pretend any fear of being below our boundary, and bordering on the incommoded by our use of the river, are not the thousandth part of that extent. This vast portion of the territory of the United States has no other outlet for its productions, and these productions are of the bulkiest kind. And only be innocent as to the Spanish subjects on in truth, their passage down the river may not the river, but cannot fail to enrich them far beyond their present condition. The real interests then of all the inhabitants, upper and lower, concur in fact with their rights. If we appeal to the law of nature and nations, as expressed by writers on the subject, it is agreed by them, that, were the river, where it passes between Florida and Louisiana, the exclusive right of Spain, still an innocent passage along it is a natural right in those inhabiting its borders above. It would indeed be what those writers call an imperfect right, because the modification of its exercise depends in a considerable degree on the conveniency of the nation through which they are to pass. it is still a right as real as any other right. however well-defined; and were it to be refused, or to be so shackled by regulations, not necessary for the peace or safety of its inhabitants, as to render its use impracticable to us, it would then be an injury, of which we should be entitled to demand redress. The right of the upper inhabitants to use this navigation is the counterpart to that of those possessing the shore below, and founded in the same natural relations with the soil and water. And the line at which their rights meet is to be advanced or withdrawn, so as to equalize the inconve niences resulting to each party from the exercise of the right by the other. This estimate is to be fairly made, with a mutual disposition to make equal sacrifices, and the numbers on each side are to have their due weight in the estimate. Spain holds so very small a tract of habitable land on either side below our boundary, that it may in fact be considered as a strait of the sea; for though it is eighty leagues from our boundary to the mouth of the river, yet it is only here and there, in spots and slips, that the land rises above the level of the water in times of inundation. There are, then, and ever must be, so few inhabitants on her part of the river, that the freest use of its naviga tion may be admitted to us without their annoyance.-MISSISSIPPI RIVER INSTRUCTIONS. FORD ED., V, 467. (1792.)

vii, 577.

5293. MISSISSIPPI RIVER NAVIGATION, Sectional opposition. It is true, there were characters whose stations entitled them to credit, and who, from geographical prejudices, did not themselves wish the navigation of the Mississippi to be restored to us, and who believe, perhaps, as is common with mankind, that their opinion was the general opinion. But the sentiments of the great mass of the Union were decidedly otherwise then, and the very persons to whom M. Gardoqui alluded, have now come over to the opinion heartily. that the navigation of the Mississippi, in full and unrestrained freedom, is indispensably necessary, and must be obtained by any means it may call for.-To WILLIAM CARMICHAEL. iii, 246. (Pa., 1791.)

5294. MISSISSIPPI RIVER NAVIGATION, Spain and.-In the course of the

Revolutionary War, in which the thirteen colonies, Spain and France, were opposed to Great Britain, Spain took possess on of several posts held by the British in Florida. It is unnecessary to inquire whether the possession of half a dozen posts scattered through a country of seven or eight hundred miles extent, could be considered as the possession and conquest of that country. If it was, it gave still but an inchoate right, as was before explained, which could not be perfected but by the relinquishment of the former possession at the close of the war; but certainly it could not be cons dered as a conquest of the river, even against Great Britain, since the possession of the shores, to wit, of the island of New Orleans on the one side, and Louisiana on the other, having undergone no change, the right in the water would remain the same, if considered in its relation to them; and if considered as a distinct right, independent of the shores, then no naval victories obtained by Spain over Great Britain, in the course of the war, gave her the color of conquest over any water which the British fleet could enter. Still less can she be considered as having conquered the river, as against the United States, with whom she was not at war. We had a common right of navigation in the part of the river between Florida, the island of New Orleans, and the western bank, and nothing which passed between Spain and Great Britain, either during the war or at its conclusion, could lessen that right. Accordingly, at the treaty of November, 1782, Great Britain confirmed the rights of the United States to the navigation of the river, from its source to its mouth, and in January, 1783, completed the right of Spain to the territory of Florida, by an absolute relinquishment of all her rights in it. This relinquishment could not include the navigation held by the United States in their own right, because this right existed in themselves only, and was not in Great Britain. If it added anything to the rights of Spain respecting the river between the eastern and western banks, it could only be that portion of right which Great Britain had retained to herself in the treaty with the United States, held seven weeks before, to wit, a right of using it in common with the United States. So that as by the treaty of 1763, the United States had obtained a common right of navigating the whole river from its source to its mouth, so by the treaty of 1782, that common right was confirmed to them by the only power who could pretend claims against them, founded on the state of war; nor has that common right been transferred to Spain by either conquest or cession. MISSISSIPPI RIVER INSTRUCTIONS. vii, 576. FORD ED.. v, 466. (1792.)

5295. MISSISSIPPI RIVER NAVIGATION, Treaty of Paris and.-The war of 1755-1763, was carried on jointly by Great Britain and the Thirteen Colonies, now the United States of America, against France and Spain. At the peace which was negotiated by our common magistrate, a right was secured to the subjects of Great Britain (the common designation of all those under his government) to navigate the Mississippi in its whole breadth and length, from its source to the sea, and expressly that part which is between the Island of New Orleans and the right bank of the river, as well as the passage both in and out of its mouth; and that the vessels should not be stopped, visited, or subjected to the payment of any duty whatsoever. These are the words of the treaty, article VII. Florida was at the same time ceded by Spain, and its extent westwardly

was fixed to the Lakes Pontchartrain and Maurepas, and the River Mississippi; and Spain received soon after from France a cession of the island of New Orleans, and all the country she held westward of the Mississippi, subject. of course, to our right of navigating between that country and the island previously granted to us by France. This right was not parcelled out to us in severalty, that is to say, to each the exclusive navigation of so much of the river as was adjacent to our several shores, in which way it would have been useless to all; but it was placed on that footing, on which alone it could be worth anything, to wit: as a right to all to navigate the whole length of the river in common. The import of the terms, and the reason of the thing, prove it was a right of common in the whole, and not a several right to each of a particular part. To which may be added the evidence of the stipulation itself, that we should navigate between New Orleans and the western bank, which, being adjacent to none of our States, could be held by us only as a right of common. Such was the nature of our right to navigate the Mississippi, as far as established by the Treaty of Paris.-MISSISSIPPI RIVER INSTRUCTIONS. vii, 575. FORD ED., V. 466. (1792.)

5296. MISSISSIPPI RIVER NAVIGATION, Western people and.-The difficulty on which the negotiation with Spain hangs is a sine qua non with us. It would be to deceive them and ourselves, to suppose that an amity can be preserved while this right is withheld. Such a supposition would argue not only an ignorance of the people to whom this is most interesting, but an ignorance of the nature of man, or an inattention to it. Those who see but half way into our true interest will think that that concurs with the views of the other party. But those who see it in all its extent, will be sensible that our true interest will be best promoted, by making all the just claims of our fellow citizens, wherever situated, our own, by urging and enforcing them with the weight of our whole influence, and by exercising in this, as in every other instance, a just government in their concerns, and making common cause even where our separate interest would seem opposed to theirs. No other conduct can attach us together; and on this attachment depends our happiness.-To JAMES MONROE. i, 605. FORD ED., iv, 262. (P., 1786.)

5297.

If they declare themselves a separate people, we are incapable of a single effort to retain them. Our citizens can never be induced, either as militia or as soldiers, to go there to cut the throats of their own brothers and sons, or rather, to be themselves the subjects, instead of the perpetrators of the parricide. Nor would that country requite the cost of being retained against the will of its inhabitants, could it be done. But it cannot be done. They are able already to rescue the navigation of the Mississippi out of the hands of Spain. and to add New Orleans to their own territory. They will be joined by the inhabitants of Louisiana. This will bring on a war between them and Spain; and that will produce the question with us, whether it will not be worth our while to become parties with them in the war, in order to reunite them with us, and thus correct our error? And were I to permit my forebodings to go one step further. I should predict that the inhabitants of the United States would force their rulers to take the affirmative of that question. To JAMES MADISON. ii, 106. FORD ED., iv, 363. (P., 1787.)