nswer a useful purpose also, could I receive a communication of that
answer ten days earlier than they. The same stagnation attending our
passage from the old to the new form of government, which stops the
feeble channel of money hitherto flowing towards our treasury, has
suspended also what foreign credit we had. So that, at this moment, we
may consider the progress of our loan as stopped. Though much an
enemy to the system of borrowing, yet I feel strongly the necessity of
preserving the power to borrow. Without this, we might be overwhelmed by
another nation, merely by the force of its credit. However, you can best
judge whether the payment of a single year's interest on Stanitski's
certificates, in Europe, instead of America, may be more injurious to
us than the shock of our credit in Amsterdam, which may be produced by a
failure to pay our interest.

I have only to offer any services which I can render in this business,
either here or by going to Holland, at a moment's warning, if that
should be necessary.

I have the honor to be, with sentiments of the most perfect esteem and
respect, Gentlemen, your most obedient and most humble servant,

Th: Jefferson.

LETTER CXXV.--TO DOCTOR PRICE, February 7, 1788

TO DOCTOR PRICE.

Paris, February 7, 1788.

Dear Sir,

It is rendering mutual service to men of virtue and understanding,
to make them acquainted with one another. I need no other apology for
presenting to your notice the bearer hereof, Mr. Barlow. I know you
were among the first who read the "Vision of Columbus," while yet in
manuscript: and think the sentiments I heard you express of that poem,
will induce you to be pleased with the acquaintance of their author. He
comes to pass a few days only at London, merely to know something of it.
As I have little acquaintance there, I cannot do better for him than to
ask you to be so good as to make him known to such persons, as his turn
and his time might render desirable to him.

I thank you for the volume you were so kind as to send me some time
ago. Every thing you write is precious, and this volume is on the most
precious of all our concerns. We may well admit morality to be the child
of the understanding rather than of the senses, when we observe that
it becomes dearer to us as the latter weaken, and as the former grows
stronger by time and experience, till the hour arrives in which all
other objects lose all their value. That that hour may be dist