country, and earnestly exhorted them to a continuance of those sacrifices and exertions which he still deemed essential to the happy termination of the war.  The dissensions in congress; the removal of individuals of the highest influence and character from the councils of the nation to offices in the respective states; the depreciation of the currency; the destructive spirit of speculation which the imaginary gain produced by this depreciation had diffused throughout the Union; a general laxity of principles; and an unwillingness to encounter personal inconvenience for the attainment of the great object, in pursuit of which so much blood and treasure had been expended; were the rocks on which, he apprehended, the state vessel might yet split, and to which he endeavoured, incessantly, to point the attention of those whose weight of political character enable them to guide the helm.

[Sidenote:  Letters from General Washington on the state of public affairs.]

“I am particularly desirous of a free communication of sentiments with you at this time,” says the General in a letter written to a gentleman of splendid political talents, “because I view things very differently, I fear, from what people in general do, who seem to think the contest at an end, and that to make money, and get places, are the only things now remaining to be done.  I have seen without despondency, even for a moment, the hours which America has styled her gloomy ones; but I have beheld no day since the commencement of hostilities, when I have thought her liberties in such imminent danger as at present.  Friends and foes seem now to combine to pull down the goodly fabric we have hitherto been raising at the expense of so much time, blood, and treasure.”

After censuring with some freedom the prevailing opinions of the day, he added, “To me it appears no unjust simile to compare the affairs of this great continent to the mechanism of a clock, each state representing some one or other of the smaller parts of it, which they are endeavouring to put in fine order, without considering how useless and unavailing their labour is, unless the great wheel, or spring, which is to set the whole in motion, is also well attended to, and kept in good order.  I allude to no particular state, nor do I mean to cast reflections upon any one of them, nor ought I, it may be said, to do so on their representatives; but, as it is a fact too notorious to be concealed, that congress is rent by party; that much business of a trifling nature and personal concernment, withdraws their attention from matters of great national moment at this critical period; when it is also known that idleness and dissipation take place of close attention and application, no man who wishes well to the liberties of this country, and desires to see its rights established, can avoid crying out—­where are our men of abilities?  Why do they not come forth to save their country?  Let this voice, my dear sir, call upon you, Jefferson,