ou. The only question is its practicability. The best information I
could get as to this was from General Hand, who described the country as
champain, and these waters as heading in lagoons, which would be easily
united. Maryland and Pennsylvania are both interested to concur with us
in this work. The institutions you propose to establish by the shares
in the Potomac and James river companies, given you by the Assembly, and
the particular objects of those institutions, are most worthy. It occurs
to me, however, that if the bill 'for the more general diffusion
of knowledge,' which is in the revisal, should be passed, it would
supersede the use and obscure the existence of the charity schools you
have thought of. I suppose in fact, that that bill or some other like it
will be passed. I never saw one received with more enthusiasm than that
was in the year 1778, by the House of Delegates, who ordered it to be
printed. And it seemed afterwards, that nothing but the extreme distress
of our resources prevented its being carried into execution even during
the war. It is an axiom in my mind, that our liberty can never be safe
but in the hands of the people themselves, and that too of the people
with a certain degree of instruction. This it is the business of the
State to effect, and on a general plan. Should you see a probability
of this, however, you can never be at a loss for worthy objects of this
donation. Even the remitting that proportion of the toll on all articles
transported, would present itself under many favorable considerations,
and it would in effect be to make the State do in a certain proportion
what they ought to have done wholly: for I think they should clear
all the rivers, and lay them open and free to all. However, you are
infinitely the best judge, how the most good may be effected with these
shares.
All is quiet here. There are indeed two specks in the horizon: the
exchange of Bavaria, and the demarcation between the Emperor and Turks.
We may add as a third, the interference by the King of Prussia in the
domestic disputes of the Dutch. Great Britain, it is said, begins to
look towards us with a little more good humor. But how true this may
be, I cannot say with certainty. We are trying to render her commerce
as little necessary to us as possible, by finding other markets for our
produce. A most favorable reduction of duties on whale-oil has taken
place here, which will give us a vent for that article, payi
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