y, but
ended in establishing it free. I have returned, with infinite appetite,
to the enjoyment of my farm, my family, and my books, and had determined
to meddle in nothing beyond their limits. Your proposition, however, for
transplanting the college of Geneva to my own country, was too analogous
to all my attachments to science, and freedom, the first-born daughter
of science, not to excite a lively interest in my mind, and the essays
which were necessary to try its practicability. This depended altogether
on the opinions and dispositions of our State legislature, which was
then in session. I immediately communicated your papers to a member of
the legislature, whose abilities and zeal pointed him out as proper
for it, urging him to sound as many of the leading members of the
legislature as he could, and if he found their opinions favorable, to
bring forward the proposition; but if he should find it desperate, not
to hazard it: because I thought it best not to commit the honor either
of our State or of your college, by an useless act of eclat. It was not
till within these three days that I have had an interview with him, and
an account of his proceedings. He communicated the papers to a great
number of the members, and discussed them maturely, but privately, with
them. They were generally well disposed to the proposition, and some
of them warmly: however, there was no difference of opinion in the
conclusion, that it could not be effected. The reasons which they
thought would with certainty prevail against it, were, 1. that our
youth, not familiarized but with their mother tongue, were not prepared
to receive instructions in any other; 2. that the expense of the
institution would excite uneasiness in their constituents, and endanger
its permanence; and 3. that its extent was disproportioned to the
narrow state of the population with us. Whatever might be urged on these
several subjects, yet as the decision rested with others, there remained
to us only to regret that circumstances were such, or were thought to be
such, as to disappoint your and our wishes.

I should have seen with peculiar satisfaction the establishment of such
a mass of science in my country, and should probably have been tempted
to approach myself to it, by procuring a residence in its neighborhood,
at those seasons of the year at least when the operations of agriculture
are less active and interesting. I sincerely lament the circumstances
which have su