e government. At that time, the
president was becoming painfully aware that the differences in his
cabinet were systematic, instead of incidental as at first.

With Madison, Washington held frequent conversations upon the subject of
his retirement, but nothing definite was determined when they left
Philadelphia at the close of the session. The president went so far,
however, as to ask Madison to revolve this subject in his mind, and
advise him as to the proper time and the best mode of announcing his
intention to the people. But Madison always urged him to relinquish the
idea for the public good, and Jefferson desired him to remain in office
for the same reason.

Congress having adjourned on Tuesday, the eighth of May, on the tenth
Washington set out alone for Mount Vernon, leaving his family in
Philadelphia. He carried with him several copies of Paine's _Rights of
Man_, already alluded to, fifty of which he received from the author a
day or two before he left Philadelphia.[36] With peculiar delight he sat
down amid the cool shadows and quiet retreats of his loved home on the
Potomac, at the season of flowers; and the desire to leave the turmoils
of public life appears to have taken hold of him with a strength which
he had never felt before. He resolved to be governed by his
inclinations; and on the twentieth he wrote to Madison, announcing his
intention in unequivocal terms, and repeating the request for advice
which he had made before leaving Philadelphia.

"I have not been unmindful," he said, "of the sentiments expressed by
you in the conversations just alluded to. On the contrary, I have again
and again revolved them with thoughtful anxiety, but without being able
to dispose my mind to a longer continuation in the office I have now the
honor to hold.... Nothing but a conviction that my declining the chair
of government, if it should be the desire of the people to continue me
in it, would involve the country in serious disputes respecting the
chief magistrate, and the disagreeable consequences which might result
therefrom in the floating and divided opinions which seem to prevail at
present, could in any wise induce me to relinquish the determination I
have formed.... Under these impressions, then, permit me to reiterate
the request I made to you at our last meeting, namely, to think of the
proper time and the best mode of announcing the intention, and that you
would prepare the latter. In revolving this subject m