I do not believe with the Rochefoucaults and Montaignes, that fourteen out of fifteen men are rogues:  I believe a great abatement from that proportion may be made in favor of general honesty.  But I have always found that rogues would be uppermost, and I do not know that the proportion is, too strong for the higher orders, and for those who, rising above the swinish multitude, always contrive to nestle themselves into the places of power and profit.  These rogues set out with stealing the peoples’ good opinion, and then steal from them the right of withdrawing it, by contriving laws and associations against the power of the people themselves.  Our part of the country is in considerable fermentation on what they suspect to be a recent roguery of this kind.  They say that while all hands were below deck mending sails, splicing ropes, and every one at his own business, and the captain in his cabin attending to his log-book and chart, a rogue of a pilot has run them into an enemy’s port.  But metaphor apart, there is much dissatisfaction with Mr. Jay and his treaty.  For my part, I consider myself now but as a passenger, leaving the world and its government to those who are likely to live longer in it.  That you may be among the longest of these, is my sincere prayer.  After begging you to be the bearer of my compliments and apologies to Mr. Ogilvie, I bid you an affectionate farewell, always wishing to hear from you.

LETTER CLXXXVI.—­TO JAMES MADISON

THOMAS JEFFERSON TO JAMES MADISON.

Monticello, September 21,1795.

I received, about three weeks ago, a box containing six dozen volumes, of two hundred and eighty-three pages, 12mo. with a letter from Lambert, Beckley’s clerk, that they came from Mr. Beckley, and were to be divided between yourself, J. Walker, and myself.  I have sent two dozen to J. Walker, and shall be glad of a conveyance for yours.  In the mean time, I send you by post, the title-page, table of contents, and one of the pieces, Curtius, lest it should not have come to you otherwise.  It is evidently written by Hamilton, giving a first and general view of the subject, that the public mind might be kept a little in check, till he could resume the subject more at large from the beginning, under his second signature of Camillas.  The piece called ’The Features of the Treaty,’ I do not send, because you have seen it in the newspapers.  It is said to be written by Coxe, but I should rather suspect by Beckley.  The antidote is certainly not strong enough for the poison of Curtius.  If I had not been informed the present came from Beckley, I should have suspected it from Jay or Hamilton.  I gave a copy or two, by way of experiment, to honest, sound-hearted men of common understanding, and they were not able to parry the sophistry of Curtius.  I have ceased, therefore, to give them.  Hamilton is really a colossus to the anti-republican party.  Without