med country, and lead the minds of the
people to acquiescence under those events, which they see no human power
prepared to ward off. We are too far removed from the other scenes of
war to say, whether the main force of the enemy be within this state.
But I suppose they cannot any where spare so great an army for the
operations of the field. Were it possible for this circumstance to
justify in your Excellency a determination to lend us your personal
aid, it is evident from the universal voice, that the presence of
their beloved countryman, whose talents have so long been successfully
employed in establishing the freedom of kindred States, to whose person
they have still flattered themselves they retained some right, and have
ever looked up, as their dernier resort in distress, would restore full
confidence of salvation to our citizens, and would render them equal to
whatever is not impossible. I cannot undertake to foresee and obviate
the difficulties which lie in the way of such a resolution. The whole
subject is before you, of which I see only detached parts: and your
judgment will be formed on a view of the whole. Should the danger of
this State, and its consequence to the Union, be such, as to render
it best for the whole that you should repair to its assistance, the
difficulty would then be, how to keep men out of the field. I have
undertaken to hint this matter to your Excellency, not only on my own
sense of its importance to us, but at the solicitations of many members
of weight in our legislature, which has not yet assembled to speak their
own desires.

A few days will bring to me that relief which the constitution has
prepared for those oppressed with the labors of my office, and a long
declared resolution of relinquishing it to abler hands, has prepared
my way for retirement to a private station: still, as an individual, I
should feel the comfortable effects of your presence, and have (what I
thought could not have been) an additional motive for that gratitude,
esteem, and respect, with which

I have the honor to be,

your Excellency's most obedient, humble servant,

Th: Jefferson.

[An interval of near three years here occurs in the
Author's correspondence, during which he preserved only
memoranda of the contents of the letters written by him.]

*****

LETTER, LVIII.--TO GENERAL WASHINGTON, April 16, 1784

TO GENERAL WASHINGTON.

Annapolis, April 16, 1784.

Dear Sir,