hort, that I was no party man myself, and that the first wish of my
heart was, if parties did exist, to reconcile them.

[Footnote 43: In the same letter Mr. Jefferson had stated
his total abstraction from party questions.]

"To this I may add, and very truly, that until the last year or two, I
had no conception that parties would, or even could go the lengths I
have been witness to; nor did I believe, until lately, that it was
within the bounds of probability--hardly within those of
possibility--that while I was using my utmost exertions to establish a
national character of our own, independent as far as our obligations
and justice would permit, of every nation of the earth; and wished by
steering a steady course to preserve this country from the horrors of
a desolating war, I should be accused of being the enemy of one nation
and subject to the influence of another; and to prove it, that every
act of my administration would be tortured, and the grossest and most
insidious misrepresentations of them be made, by giving one side only
of a subject, and that too in such exaggerated and indecent terms as
could scarcely be applied to a Nero--to a notorious defaulter--or even
to a common pick-pocket.

"But enough of this--I have already gone further in the expression of
my feelings than I intended."

Of the numerous misrepresentations and fabrications which, with
unwearied industry, were pressed upon the public in order to withdraw
the confidence of the nation from its chief, no one marked more
strongly the depravity of that principle which justifies the means by
the end, than the republication of certain forged letters, purporting
to have been written by General Washington in the year 1776.

These letters had been originally published in the year 1777, and in
them were interspersed, with domestic occurrences which might give
them the semblance of verity, certain political sentiments favourable
to Britain in the then existing contest.

But the original fabricator of these papers missed his aim. It was
necessary to assign the manner in which the possession of them was
acquired; and in executing this part of his task, circumstances were
stated so notoriously untrue, that, at the time, the meditated
imposition deceived no person.

In the indefatigable research for testimony which might countenance
the charge that the executive was unfriendly to France, and under the
influence of Britain, these letters were draw