thing of no consequence, since the money was a gratuity, and nobody was held answerable for it. When Gouverneur Morris was minister in France from the United States several years afterwards, he procured a copy of the receipt from the public office, which showed the money to have been paid to Beaumarchais, and this is the remnant of the celebrated claim of that individual and his heirs, which has been before Congress in one shape or another for more than half a century. We do not profess to give a history of this transaction, but merely to state such results as prove with what extreme injustice any injurious reflections were cast upon Dr Franklin respecting it.

Lastly, it has been often said, and is sometimes repeated at this day, that Dr Franklin never settled his public accounts. In its spirit and purport this assertion is essentially false. Some months before Dr Franklin left France, Mr Barclay, the American Consul to that country, arrived there, with full power and authority from Congress to liquidate and settle the accounts of all persons in Europe, who had been intrusted with the expenditure of the public money of the United States. Under this authority he examined methodically the entire mass of Dr Franklin's accounts. The difference between the result of his investigation and the statement of Dr Franklin was seven sols, or about six cents, which by mistake the Doctor had overcharged. Mr Barclay was ready to close and finally settle the accounts, but, at Dr Franklin's request, they were kept open for the inspection of Congress, because he believed there were other charges, which Congress ought rightfully to pay, but which Mr Barclay did not feel authorized to allow. Soon after his return, he sent his accounts to Congress, with a request that they might be examined, and the separate charges considered. Congress delayed the examination, and a few months before his death, Franklin wrote to Congress on the subject, as follows; Reports have for some time past been circulated here, and propagated in the newspapers, that I am greatly indebted to the United States for large sums that had been put into my hands, and that I avoid a settlement. This, together with the little time one of my age may expect to live, makes it necessary for me to request earnestly, which I hereby do, that the Congress would be pleased, without further delay, to examine those accounts, and if they find therein any article or articles which they do not understand or approve, that they would cause me to be acquainted with the same, that I may

6

have an opportunity of offering such explanations or reasons in support of them as may be in my power, and then that the accounts may be finally closed.' Nothing more needs be added, we believe, to vindicate Dr Franklin from censure or suspicion in regard to this subject.

We might pursue these inquiries through all their ramifications, and we are confident that the result would in every instance contribute to exalt the character and brighten the fame of Franklin. Prejudice has done him a wrong, which time and truth will adjust. He was an early, a true, a steady, an enlightened friend to his country, and for half a century a most able and faithful defender of her liberties. The more his political principles, designs, and acts are scrutinized, the more they will be found to demand the admiration, the respect, and the gratitude of his countrymen.

A. Ritchie

ART. IX.-Memoir, Correspondence, and Miscellanies, from the Papers of THOMAS JEFFERSON. Edited by Thomas Jefferson Randolph. 4 vols. 8vo. Charlottesville. F. Carr & Co. 1829.

THE publication of this work has excited an uncommon degree of interest. Mr Jefferson was an active leader of public opinion, from his first appearance as a politician until the close of his political career, a period of forty years; and he continued to influence by his advice the course of public measures, long after he had withdrawn himself within the shade of private life. He has stood before two generations. The same political doctrines which he first espoused, he advocated with persevering consistency long after most of those who were his original adherents or opponents had disappeared from the world. He survived to review the judgment which had been passed upon him by one age, and these posthumous documents will establish the rank which he is to hold in the estimation of the present age and of posterity.

There are no subjects so attractive to our curiosity or our sympathy, as the fortunes and trials, the reflections and purposes of eminent men. We love to watch their movements, as they appear conspicuously on the public stage, whether at

the head of armies, or uttering in the senate the public voice. We take an equal pleasure in following them into the retreat of the tent or the cabinet; to overhear secret debates and resolves, which are to determine the course of great events and decide the destiny of a nation. But it is a luxury of curiosity to be able to accompany a great man in the relaxation of his private hours; to be admitted under his roof, when he is relieved from the cares of office; to see him in the intercourse of domestic relations; to notice the character of his mind, when released from the restraints of public exhibition; to hear his soliloquies when he is off his guard; or gather from his confidence the maxims and lessons which are the result of his experience and reflection. The world is not willing to lose sight of a conspicuous man, as soon as he is retired from office. After the season of activity is past, there frequently remains the most valuable and interesting portion of life; when passion having subsided, the mind can survey the past with unclouded view; can connect causes with their effects; can follow virtue through trials and obstructions to its reward; can discover wherefore prudence has failed and folly has triumphed; and reconcile with the natural order of providence those events which have been called caprices of fortune. Had the Emperor Napoleon won the battle of Waterloo, he might have continued to hold his power, till the last pageant had conducted him to the vaults of St Dénis. The world would have lost that part of his story which now, forms its moral; the shade which now gives relief and effect to the picture. The cruel state of security, in which the fears or the vengeance of his conquerors placed him, afforded to the last years of his life a leisure for calm retrospection, which successful ambition would not have allowed. He employed it in commentaries on his various fortune; in divulging his secret designs; unveiling the motives of his policy; the origin of his errors; in a word, in explaining the wonders of his reign. By becoming his own historian, he has made the last scene, the most useful of his life. Had his seclusion been voluntary retirement, he would have acquired by his merit that interest, which the sympathy of the world has generally accorded to his misfortune.

The eminent men, who have been willing to record the events of the times in which they were actors, and ingenuously to describe the part they took in them, have seldom resorted to a most natural expedient; one which anticipates and supersedes

the task of historical composition. It consists merely in the arrangement of a series of their own epistolary correspondence. And yet letters have a natural charm which cannot well be transfused into methodical history; for we may aflirm, that while it is a most difficult task of literature to give spirit to a long narration of events foreign to the writer, there are few letters written under the excitement of the occasion, which fail of that success. Such writers seize the interest before it evaporates. Events, as soon as they have gone by and satisfied our curiosity, lose some lines of their first impression. Hopes or apprehensions, which once brought them near to us, gradually subside, and at length what first enlisted the feelings becomes, by lapse of time, a matter of speculation. So that it is a vain effort, which the historian makes, to impart to remote transactions the animation they once possessed. colors have faded and cannot be perfectly revived. The botanist who describes flowers from the rich herbarium of Linnæus, may accurately show their distinctive characters, but their tints and forms, and all that delighted the eye, are lost. It is this curiosity to view the thought exactly as it springs up and unfolds itself in the mind, that is the source of the pleasure peculiar to epistolary writing. The effusions of friendship, the impulses of passion, common occurrences, and domestic incidents are attractive, when related without affectation of elegance or feeling. It is on this principle, that so many of the familiar letters of Cicero, not intended to last beyond the occasions on which they were written, have been handed down to posterity, while all his historical works have been suffered to disappear and be irrecoverably lost.

The correspondence of Mr Jefferson, contained in these volumes, commenced in the year 1775, and continued almost without interruption till June, 1826. He secured the advantage of perpetuating the part which he held in it, by the uniform practice of retaining copies of his own letters. As they were written mostly on political topics which occupied the public attention at their several dates; and the writer was, during a long life, intimately conversant with two eventful revolutions, the American and French; deeply interested in the fate of our country during its subsequent difficulties and divisions; and oneof the principal organs of administration under the constitution of the United States, the consummation and reward of so much effort; these letters, addressed to the most distinguished men

of the age, must furnish very important and interesting materials for history. But political subjects never excluded from the mind of Mr Jefferson those which were still more congenial to it; the researches of philosophy, the developement of the mind, the discussion of morals, and whatever he thought would contribute to the benefit of mankind. The most impressive of his letters are those dictated by the kind and paternal feelings that distinguished his character; in which, without pretension or disguise, he gives his advice on the subject of education and conduct to those who regarded him as their friend and Mentor. He makes the following remarks in a letter to one of them on the subject of travel.

This makes men wiser, but less happy. When men of sober age travel, they gather knowledge, which they may apply usefully for their country; but they are subject ever after to recollections mixed with regret; their affections are weakened by being extended over more objects; and they learn new habits which cannot be gratified when they return home. Young men who travel are exposed to all these inconveniences in a higher degree, to others still more serious, and do not acquire that wisdom for which a previous foundation is requisite, by repeated and just observations at home. The glare of pomp and pleasure is analogous to the motion of the blood; it absorbs all their affection and attention; they are torn from it as from the only good in this world, and return to their home as to a place of exile and condemnation. Their eyes are for ever turned back to the object they have lost, and its recollection poisons the residue of their lives. Their first and most delicate passions are hackneyed on unworthy objects here, and they carry home the dregs, insufficient to make themselves or any body else happy. Add to this, that a habit of idleness, an inability to apply themselves to business is acquired, and renders them useless to themselves and their country. These observations are founded in experience. There is no place where your pursuit of knowledge will be so little obstructed by foreign objects, as in your own country, nor any, wherein the virtues of the heart will be less exposed to be weakened. Be good, be learned, and be industrious, and you will not want the aid of travelling to render you precious to your country, dear to your friends, happy within yourself. I repeat my advice, to take a great deal of exercise, and on foot. Health is the first requisite after morality.' Vol 11. pp. 218, 219.

To expose in one view the state of the thoughts, opinions, and motives, during a whole life, would be to most men an unwilling and hazardous undertaking. Yet the faithful exhibition