reap the reward in the thankfulness of Nations is my sincere prayer.
Accept assurances of my high esteem and affectionate attachment.

Thomas Jefferson.

This, Citizens of the United States, is the Letter about which the
leaders and tools of the Federal faction, without knowing its contents
or the occasion of writing it, have wasted so many malignant falsehoods.
It is a Letter which, on account of its wise economy and peaceable
principles, and its forbearance to reproach, will be read by every good
Man and every good Citizen with pleasure; and the faction, mortified at
its appearance, will have to regret they forced it into publication. The
least atonement they can now offer is to make the Letter as public as
they have made their own infamy, and learn to lie no more.

The same injustice they shewed to Mr. Jefferson they shewed to me. I
had employed myself in Europe, and at my own expense, in forming and
promoting a plan that would, in its operation, have benefited the
Commerce of America; and the faction here invented and circulated an
account in the papers they employ, that I had given a plan to the French
for burning all the towns on the Coast from Savannah to Baltimore. Were
I to prosecute them for this (and I do not promise that I will not, for
the Liberty of the Press is not the liberty of lying,) there is not a
federal judge, not even one of Midnight appointment, but must, from the
nature of the case, be obliged to condemn them. The faction, however,
cannot complain they have been restrained in any thing. They have had
their full swing of lying uncontradicted; they have availed themselves,
unopposed, of all the arts Hypocrisy could devise; and the event has
been, what in all such cases it ever will and ought to be, _the ruin of
themselves_.

The Characters of the late and of the present Administrations are now
sufficiently marked, and the adherents of each keep up the distinction.
The former Administration rendered itself notorious by outrage,
coxcombical parade, false alarms, a continued increase of taxes, and an
unceasing clamor for War; and as every vice has a virtue opposed to
it, the present Administration moves on the direct contrary line.
The question, therefore, at elections is not properly a question upon
Persons, but upon principles. Those who are for Peace, moderate taxes,
and mild Government, will vote for the Administration that conducts
itself by those principles, in whatever hands that Adminis