The interest in his administration centred in the foreign relations of the government.  It need not be added that he sympathized with Burke’s “Reflections on the French Revolution,”—­that immortal document which for rhetoric and passion has never been surpassed, and also for the brilliancy with which reverence for established institutions is upheld, and the disgust, hatred, and scorn uttered for the excesses which marked the godless revolutionists of the age.  It is singular that so fair-minded a biographer as Parton could see nothing but rant and nonsense in the most philosophical political essay ever penned by man.  It only shows that a partisan cannot be an historian any more than can a laborious collector of details, like Freeman, accurate as he may be.  Adams, like Burke, abhorred the violence of those political demagogues who massacred their king and turned their country into a vile shambles of blood and crime; he equally detested the military despotism which succeeded under Napoleon Bonaparte; and the Federalists generally agreed with him,—­even the farmers of New England, whose religious instincts and love of rational liberty were equally shocked.

Affairs between France and the United States became then matters of paramount importance.  Adams, as minister to Paris, had perceived the selfish designs of the Count de Vergennes, and saw that his object in rendering aid to the new republic had been but to cripple England.  And the hollowness of French generosity was further seen when the government of Napoleon looked with utter contempt on the United States, whose poverty and feebleness provoked to spoliations as hard to bear as those restrictions which England imposed on American commerce.  It was the object of Adams, in whose hands, as the highest executive officer, the work of negotiation was placed, to remove the sources of national grievances, and at the same time to maintain friendly relations with the offending parties.  And here he showed a degree of vigor and wisdom which cannot be too highly commended.

The President was patient, reasonable, and patriotic.  He curbed his hot temper, and moderated his just wrath.  He averted a war, and gained all the diplomatic advantages that were possible.  He selected for envoys both Federalists and Democrats,—­the ablest men of the nation.  When Hamilton and Jefferson declined diplomatic missions in order to further their ambitious ends at home, who of the statesmen remaining were superior to Marshall, Pinckney, and Gerry?  How noble their disdain and lofty their independence when Talleyrand sought from them a bribe of millions to secure his influence with the First Consul!  “Millions for defence, not a cent for tribute,” are immortal words.  And when negotiations failed, and there seemed to be no alternative but war,—­and that with the incarnate genius of war, Napoleon,—­Adams, pacific as was his policy, set about most promptly to meet the exigency, and recommended the construction