Sir,
I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letters to March 4th inclusive. I am sorry to find by them, that the ferment occasioned by the causes you explain, continues to work. How far it may be necessary to purge off the impurities, which your government has contracted by long inaction, I will not pretend to say. It is certain, however, that the want of harmony in its different branches has had the most melancholy effects upon your operations the last war; and deprived you of important advantages in the conclusion of it. Though I sincerely wish that the struggles of your patriots may be attended with the same happy consequences with ours, yet I take the liberty to remind you, that your public character puts you in a delicate situation with respect to them, that as a foreign nation, whatever we may wish, we have no right to express those wishes, or in any way to interfere in the internal disputes of our allies, that our conduct should show, that we were the enemy of no party, except so far as their measures were inimical to us. You will not, Sir, consider this as a reproof, for I have not the smallest reason to believe, that you have not made these reflections yourself, and acted conformably thereto. On the contrary, I rather conclude, that you have, from the long habit in which you have been of conducting public affairs which require prudence and delicacy. I only mention it, therefore, as a caution which will not probably, but may possibly be necessary to one who is animated by the spirit of freedom, and may as a patriot be hurried beyond the limits we should prescribe to our Ministers.
You will be pleased to discontinue in future all the Dutch papers, and send us only the Leyden Gazette, the Courrier du Bas Rhin, and the Courrier de l'Europe, together with such publications on political subjects, written in French, as may be worth our attention. I commit the enclosed letters to Mr Dana to your care.
Nothing has yet been done in your affairs, though they lay before Congress; a variety of important matters have pressed of late for their consideration, and you are too well acquainted with popular assemblies to be surprised at the slowness of their proceedings.
We have returned the prisoners on both sides, and Congress have made a considerable reduction in the army, by permitting those who are enlisted for the war to return home on furlough. We cannot yet learn with certainty from General Carleton, when he means to evacuate New York. I sincerely rejoice at M. Van Berckel's appointment, and wish you had informed me when we might expect him here, where the patriotic character of his family cannot but ensure him an agreeable reception.
I am, Sir, &c.
ROBERT R. LIVINGSTON.
TO ROBERT R. LIVINGSTON.
The Hague, May 8th, 1783.
Sir,