[311]. “His manners were civil and engaging, to such a degree, that he seldom passed an hour, even in a public house in travelling through our country, without being followed by the good wishes of all who attended upon him.” Rush’s Eulogium on Ritt.
[312]. Dr. Rittenhouse’s brother Benjamin, in a written communication made to the writer of these memoirs in the year 1796, observes, that the Doctor, “when in health, was cheerful; and his passions, unless they were excited by the abuses and knavery of men, either in public or private life, were moderate: but where he conceived that the interest or liberties of his country were endangered, he would, on those occasions, express himself with great warmth and asperity.”
[313]. See his Oration.
[314]. It was publicly declared by the same acrimonious writer who charged Dr. Rittenhouse with being an atheist, (namely, Mr. William Cobbett,) and with an equal disregard of truth, as has been already shewn, that the Doctor signed “the inflammatory Resolutions” of the Democratic Society against the Excise-law, which, as he alleged, produced the Western Insurrection in Pennsylvania, in the year 1794. Dr. Rittenhouse, it is well known, did not even attend the meetings of that society. This is admitted by Mr. Cobbett himself, in the following invidious paragraph, extracted from a pamphlet written and published by the late William L. Smith, Esq. of South-Carolina, and republished by Cobbett in his own works: it is in these words—“Rittenhouse was a great philosopher; but the only proof we have had of his political talents, was, his suffering himself to be wheedled into the presidency of the democratic society of Philadelphia; a society with which he was even ashamed to associate, though cajoled and flattered into the loan of his name.”
[315]. The memorialist cannot deprive himself of the gratification of introducing, on the present occasion, a little anecdote communicated to him by his friend, Francis Johnston, Esq. characteristic of our philosopher’s amiable simplicity and benevolent disposition. Circumstances as unimportant in themselves, as the one here related, sometimes make us acquainted with the true character of individuals.
Colonel Johnston, who was bred a scholar, and held with reputation the rank of a colonel in the American service in the war of the revolution, was, at an early period of his life, a zealous admirer of the character of Rittenhouse. But long afterwards, and while the Doctor officiated as state-treasurer, that gentleman held the next great office in the financial department of the state. The connexion of those offices occasioned almost daily visits from the colonel to the state-treasury, and intercourse with the treasurer himself; and this produced a reciprocal friendship between the two gentlemen. “For a time,” says Col. Johnston, “Dr. Rittenhouse managed the business of his office with the utmost attention and assiduity: but his all-capacious mind could no longer be restrained from its native pursuits; his money and his counter, therefore, he resigned into the hands of his beloved wife, who, although possessed of all the feminine virtues, performed the arduous duties of the office with a masculine understanding, with accuracy and unwearied attention.”
“My intimacy with Dr. Rittenhouse,” continues the colonel, “introduced between us a concern in some property, in the western part of the city, which often induced us to walk out together, to visit it. That part of the property which laid on the main street, belonged to me; and being more exposed to the depredations of the disorderly people who then inhabited that neighbourhood, was consequently often injured in the fences or board-inclosures. More than once, I have seen this philosopher, who never thought it any degradation of philosophy, to bow at the shrine of friendship, marching along my line of fence, and most industriously, and in a most masterly manner, with his own hammer and nails, mending or repairing the same.”
“This anecdote I mention thus particularly,” adds the worthy colonel, “with a view of shewing, that in addition to Dr. Rittenhouse’s other virtues, humanity and friendship were leading traits in his excellent character.”
[316]. In expressing his admiration of “that dispositions of lands and seas, which affords a communication between distant regions, and a mutual exchange of benefits,” Dr. Rittenhouse unquestionably had in view a commercial, as well as social, intercourse between the inhabitants of different climes: he was too enlightened a man, not to have been aware of its “benefits.” “A civilized nation, without commerce,” (as the writer of these memoirs had occasion to observe in a former publication,[[316a]]) “is a solecism in politics. It is in the rudest state of mankind, only, that a people can exist, without any communication with other societies or commercial intercourse among themselves, every one supporting himself by his own labour. Indeed, so absolute a state of nature can only be conceived; but has scarcely existed in reality. The wants, the fears, the weakness, nay the very nature of man, constitute him a social animal: and, in the very origin of society, their mutual necessities, with the various talents, means, and opportunities of individuals for supporting them, must have produced a reciprocity of services, and an occasional interchange with one another of that property, which each had acquired by his own exertions.”
[316a]. The true interest of the United States, and particularly of Pennsylvania, considered: published in 1786.