e mansions of rest. Relying on its kindness in this as
in other things, and actuated by that fervent love towards it,
which is so natural to a man, who views in it the native soil of
himself and his progenitors for several generations; I anticipate
with pleasing expectation that retreat, in which I promise myself
to realize, without alloy, the sweet enjoyment of partaking, in the
midst of my fellow-citizens, the benign influence of good laws
under a free government, the ever favorite object of my heart, and
the happy reward, as I trust, of our mutual cares, labors, and
dangers.

"GEORGE WASHINGTON.
"UNITED STATES,
"_September 17, 1796_."

There has been some discussion, within a few years past, concerning the
authorship of Washington's Farewell Address, it having been claimed for
General Hamilton, because a draught of it, varying but little in form
and substance from the document under that title which we have given in
the preceding pages, was found, in Hamilton's handwriting, among his
papers, soon after his death in 1804.

The subject has been thoroughly examined by Horace Binney, Esq., of
Philadelphia, in a volume of two hundred and fifty pages, published in
the autumn of 1859. After a most searching analysis of every fact
bearing upon the subject to be found in the writings of Washington,
Madison, Hamilton, and others, he arrives at an inevitable conclusion,
which he gives in the following words:--

"Washington was, undoubtedly, the original designer of the Farewell
Address; and not merely by general or indefinite intimations, but
by the suggestion of perfectly definite subjects, of an end or
object, and of a general outline, the same which the paper now
exhibits. His outline did not appear so distinctly in his own plan,
because the subjects were not so arranged in it as to show that
they were all comprehended within a regular and proportional
figure; but when they came to be so arranged in the present
Address, the scope of the whole design is seen to be contained
within the limits he intended, and to fill them. The subjects were
traced by him with adequate precision, though without due
connection, with little expansion, and with little declared bearing
of the parts upon each other, or toward a common centre; but they
may now be followed with ease in their proper relations and bearin