At five in the morning I shall start for Philadelphia. The object of this journey has been intimated in a former letter. One motive, however, lays down at the bottom of my heart, and has scarcely, as yet, been avowed to myself. You will conjecture, and rightly, that I mean Celeste. That matter shall receive its final decision. Now, to confess the truth, which, however, I have but just discovered, but for this matter the journey would not have been taken. How little is this truth suspected by the hundreds who are at this moment ascribing to the movement motives of profound political importance.
I enclose you a pamphlet written with views the most friendly to A.B.
So greatly do I differ from the author, that I have desired a friend
to buy them up and burn them. I shall return to this city on the 29th.
Adieu.
A. BURR.
TO THEODOSIA.
Washington, January 28, 1805.
Your letter of the 1st of January found me at Philadelphia, and at the moment of leaving it. Your kind wishes came so warm from the heart, that, in a journey of eight hundred miles, at this inclement season, they had not yet cooled.
You treat with too much gravity the New-Jersey affair. It should be considered as a farce, and you will yet see it terminated so as to leave only ridicule and contempt to its abettors. The affair of Celeste is for ever closed, so there is one trouble off hand.
After you get through the book you are now reading, which I think is Anacharsis, or is it Gibbon? you better suspend history till you have gone through B. You do wrong to read so slow the first reading of B. I had rather you went through it like a novel, to get fixed in your mind a kind of map of the whole; after which, when you come to read scientifically, you would better see the relations and bearings of one part to another. In all journeys, whether on foot or on horseback, it is a relief to know not only where you start from, but where you are going to, and all the intermediate stages. I beg that in every letter you will give me one line about B., and ask me questions if you please.