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that brevity which the labor of writing constrains me to use.

On the fourth particular articles of inquiry in your letter, respecting your grandfather, the venerable Samuel Adams, neither memory nor memorandums enable me to give any information. I can say that he was truly a great man, wise in council, fertile in resources, immovable in his purposes, and had, I think, a greater share than any other member, in advising and directing our measures, in the northern war especially. As a speaker he could not be compared with his living colleague and namesake, whose deep conceptions, nervous style, and undaunted firmness, made him truly our bulwark in debate. But Mr. Samuel Adams, although not of fluent elocution, was so rigorously logical, so clear in his views, abundant in good sense, and master always of his subject, that he commanded the most profound attention whenever he rose in an assembly by which the froth of declamation was heard with the most sovereign contempt. I sincerely rejoice that the record of his worth is to be undertaken by one so much disposed as you will be to hand him down. fairly to that posterity for whose liberty and happiness he was so zealous a laborer.

With sentiments of sincere veneration for his memory, accept yourself this tribute to it with the assurances of my great respect.

P. S. August 6th, 1822, since the date of this letter, to wit, this day, August 6th, '22, I received the new publication of the secret Journals of Congress, wherein is stated a resolution, July 19th, 1776,

that the declaration passed on the 4th be fairly engrossed on parchment, and when engrossed, be signed by every member; and another of August 2d, that being engrossed and compared at the table, was signed by the members. That is to say the copy engrossed on parchment (for durability) was signed by the members after being compared at the table with the original one, signed on paper as before stated. I add this P. S. to the copy of my letter to Mr. Wells, to prevent confounding the signature of the original with that of the copy engrossed on parchment.'

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MONTICELLO, June 22. 19.

DEAR SIR,-Your favor of Mar. 1. has been duly received, and requires my thanks for the kind offer I Jefferson further wrote to Wells:

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"MONTICELLO, June 23. 19.

'DEAR SIR,-Your favor of the 2d inst. has been duly received, & I answer your request to make use of the information given in mine of May 12 by a free permission, to employ it for any purpose you may think useful. You suppose that the fact that six colonies were not yet matured for a separation from the parent stock could not have been known unless a vote had been taken. Yet nothing easier. For the opinion of every individual was known to every one who had anxiety enough on the subject to scrutinize and calculate. There was neither concealment nor reserve on the subject on either side; and how the vote of each colony would be, if then pushed to a vote was exactly ascertainable. Nor does the appointment of a Committee to prepare an instrument of confederation offer ground of doubt, for that was but a proposition to save time provisionally, and subject to the ultimate negative of the minority. It was moreover a necessary measure in the opinion of all whether permanent, or limited to the duration of the controversy. I certainly will not, on the authority of memory alone affirm facts in opposition to Mr. Galloway, Judge McKean, or any one else. But what I wrote on the paper from which

of your services in London. Books are indeed with me a necessary of life; and since I ceded my library to Congress, I have been annually importing from Paris. Not but that I need some from London also, but that they have risen there to such enormous prices as cannot be looked at. England must lose her foreign commerce in books, unless the taxes on it's materials are reduced. Paris now prints the most popular of the English books, and sells them far below the English price. I send there therefore for such of them as I want. We too reprint now I sent extracts to you, was written on the spot, in the moment, and is true; and all that remains is to reconcile to that the contradictions of others by enquiring whether they may not have confounded different subjects, or whether after such a lapse of time their memory has not been more liable to err than the litera scripta. Galloway can be no better authority than the common herd of passengers in the streets. He knew nothing but the rumors of hearsay; for he had quitted us long before. And Mr. McKean was very old, and his memory much decayed when he gave his statement.

"The painting lately executed by Colo. Trumbull, I have never seen, but as far back as the days of Horace at least we are told that pictoribus atque poetis; Quidlibet audendi semper fuit aequa potestas. He has exercised this licentia pictoris in like manner in the surrender of York, where he has placed Ld. Cornwallis at the head of the surrender altho' it is well known that he was excused by General Washington from appearing.

"Of the return of Massachusetts to sound principles I never had a doubt. The body of her citizens has never been otherwise than republican. Her would-be dukes and lords, indeed, have been itching for coronets; her lawyers for robes of ermin, her priests for lawn sleeves, and for a religious establishment which might give them wealth, power, and independence of personal merit. But her citizens who were to supply with the sweat of their brow the treasures on which these drones were to riot, could never have seen any thing to long for in the oppressions and pauperism of England. After the shackles of Aristocracy of the bar & priesthood have been burst by Connecticut, we cannot doubt the return of Massachusetts to the bosom of the republican family.

"I repeat with pleasure the assurance of my great respect & esteem."

such of the new English works as have merit, much cheaper than is done in England, but dearer than they ought to be. But we are now under the operation of the remedy for that. The enormous abuses of the banking system are not only prostrating our commerce, but producing revolution of property, which without more wisdom than we possess, will be much greater than were produced by the revolutionary paper. That too had the merit of purchasing our liberties, while the present trash has only furnished aliment to usurers and swindlers. The banks themselves were doing business on capitals, three fourths of which were fictitious: and, to extend their profit they furnished fictitious capital to every man, who having nothing and disliking the labours of the plough, chose rather to call himself a merchant to set up a house of 5000. D. a year expence, to dash into every species of mercantile gambling, and if that ended as gambling generally does, a fraudulent bankruptcy was an ultimate resource of retirement and competence. This fictitious capital probably of 100. millions of Dollars, is now to be lost, & to fall on some body; it must take on those who have property to meet it, & probably on the less cautious part, who, not aware of the impending catastrophe have suffered themselves to contract, or to be in debt, and must now sacrifice their property of a value many times the amount of their debt. We have been truly sowing the wind, and are now reaping the whirlwind. If the present crisis should end in the annihilation of these pennyless & ephemeral interlopers only, and reduce our commerce to the measure of our own

wants and surplus productions, it will be a benefit in the end. But how to effect this, and give time to real capital, and the holders of real property, to back out of their entanglements by degrees requires more knolege of Political economy than we possess. I believe it might be done, but I despair of it's being done. The eyes of our citizens are not yet sufficiently open to the true cause of our distresses. They ascribe them to every thing but their true cause, the banking system; a system, which, if it could do good in any form, is yet so certain of leading to abuse, as to be utterly incompatible with the public safety and prosperity. At present all is confusion, uncertainty and panic.

I avail myself of your kindness to put under the protection of your cover a letter to St. John Philippart, who requested it might be sent through your channel, and I salute you with affectionate esteem and respect.

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DEAR SIR,-My letters of Jan. 5 and Nov. 10. of the last year had informed you generally that Genl. Kosciuzko had left a considerable sum of money in the hands of the US. and had, by a will deposited in my hands, disposed of it to a charitable purpose: & I asked the favor of your opinion in what court the will should be proved. According to that opinion, expressed in your favor of Dec. 28 I proved the will in our district court, renouncing the executorship.

VOL. XII.-9.

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