Dear Sir—
I thank you for the pamphlets (Letters) you were so kind as to send me. You will know what I thought of them by my having before sent a dozen sets to Virginia, to distribute among my friends; yet I thank you not the less for these, which I value the more as they came from yourself.
The papers of Political Arithmetic, both in yours and Mr. Cooper's pamphlets, are the most precious gifts that can be made to us; for we are running navigation-mad, and commerce-mad, and Navy-mad, which is worst of all. How desirable it is that you should pursue that subject for us. From the porcupines of our country you will receive no thanks, but the great mass of our nation will edify, and thank you.
How deeply have I been chagrined and mortified at the persecutions which fanaticism and monarchy have excited against you, even here! At first, I believed it was merely a continuance of the English persecution; but I observe that, on the demise
of Porcupine, and the division of his inheritance between Fenno and Brown, the latter (though succeeding only to the Federal portion of Porcupinism, not the Anglican, which is Fenno's part) serves up for the palate of his sect dishes of abuse against you as high-seasoned as Porcupine's were. You have sinned against Church and King, and therefore can never be forgiven. How sincerely I have regretted that your friend, before he fixed a choice of position, did not visit the valleys on each side of the blue range in Virginia, as Mr. Madison and myself so much wished. You would have found there equal soil, the finest climate, and the most healthy air on the earth, the homage of universal reverence and love, and the power of the country spread over you as a shield; but, since you would not make it your Country by adoption, you must now do it by your good offices.
Mr. Livingston, the Chancellor of New York, so approved the "Letters" that he got a new edition of them printed at Albany.
The following letter to this same gentleman, although upon another subject than the "Letters"
is not devoid of interest. It has come into the writer's hands through the kind offices of Dr. Thomas L. Montgomery, State Librarian of Pennsylvania:
Sir,
I think myself much honoured by your letter, and should have thought myself singularly happy if my situation had been near to such a person as you. Persons engaged in scientific pursuits are few in this country. Indeed, they are not very numerous anywhere. In other respects I think myself very happy where I am.