So important were Mr. Adams’ services deemed in the Committee on Manufactures, that, on proposing to resign his post as Chairman, to fulfil other duties which claimed his attention, he was besought by all parties to relinquish his purpose.  Mr. Cambreleng, of N. Y., a political opponent of Mr. Adams, said, “It was not a pleasant duty to oppose the request of any member of the House, particularly one of his character.  He did so with infinite regret in the present instance; and he certainly would not take such a course, but for the important consequences that might result from assenting to the wishes of the distinguished gentleman from Massachusetts.  He had reached the conclusion, not without infinite pain and reluctance, that the harmony, if not the existence of our Confederacy, depends, at this crisis, upon the arduous, prompt, and patriotic efforts of a few eminent men.  He believed that much might be done by the gentleman from Massachusetts.”

In the same tone of high compliment, Mr. Barbour, of Virginia, said, “that to refuse anything that could be asked by the gentleman from Massachusetts gave him pain, great pain.  He said it was with unaffected sincerity he declared, that the member from Massachusetts (with whom he was associated in the committee) had not only fulfilled all his duties with eminent ability, in the committee, but in a spirit and temper that commanded his grateful acknowledgments, and excited his highest admiration.  Were it permitted him to make a personal appeal to the gentleman, he would have done so in advance of this motion.  He would have appealed to him as a patriot, as a statesman, as a philanthropist, and above all as an American, feeling the full force of all his duties, and touched by all their incentives to lofty action—­to forbear this request.”

These complimentary appeals were well deserved by Mr. Adams, and show most emphatically the high position he occupied in the esteem and confidence of the entire House of Representatives, on becoming a member thereof.  But, with the modesty of true greatness, it was painful to him to hear these encomiums uttered in his own presence.  He arose, and begged the House, in whatever further action it might take upon the subject, to refrain from pursuing this strain.  “I have been most deeply affected,” he said, “by what has already passed.  I have felt, in the strongest manner, the impropriety of my being in the House while such remarks were made; being very conscious that sentiments of an opposite kind might have been uttered with far more propriety, and have probably been withheld in consequence of my presence.”