TO GEORGE WHATLEY.

Tract on the Principles of Trade. - Foundling Hospital.-Double Spectacles.

MY DEAR OLD FRIEND,

Passy, 21 August, 1784.

I received your kind letter of May 3d, 1783. I am ashamed that it has been so long unanswered. The indolence of old age, frequent indisposition, and too much business are my only excuses. I had great

pleasure in reading it, as it informed me of your welfare.

Your excellent little work, The Principles of Trade, is too little known.* I wish you would send me a copy of it by the return of my grandson and secretary, whom I beg leave to recommend to your civilities. I would get it translated and printed here. And if your bookseller has any quantity of them left, I should be glad he would send them to America. The ideas of our people there, though rather better than those that prevail in Europe, are not so good as they should be; and that piece might be of service among them.

Since and soon after the date of your letter, we lost unaccountably, as well as unfortunately, that worthy, valuable young man you mention, your namesake, Maddison. He was infinitely regretted by all that knew him.

I am sorry your favorite charity † does not go on as you could wish it. It is shrunk indeed by your admitting only sixty children a year. What you have told your brethren respecting America is true. If you find it difficult to dispose of your children in Eng

*See Vol. II. p. 383.

The Foundling Hospital, of which Mr. Whatley was the Treasurer.

land, it looks as if you had too many people. And yet you are afraid of emigration. A subscription is lately set on foot here to encourage and assist mothers in nursing their infants themselves at home; the practice of sending them to the Enfants trouvés having risen here to a monstrous excess, as, by the annual bill, it appears they amount to near one third of the children born in Paris! The subscription is likely to succeed, and may do a great deal of good, though it cannot answer all the purposes of a foundling hospital.

Your eyes must continue very good, since you can write so small a hand without spectacles. I cannot distinguish a letter even of large print; but am happy in the invention of double spectacles, which, serving for distant objects as well as near ones, make my eyes as useful to me as ever they were. If all the other defects and infirmities were as easily and cheaply remedied, it would be worth while for friends to live a good deal longer, but I look upon death to be as necessary to our constitution as sleep. We shall rise refreshed in the morning. Adieu, and believe me ever yours most affectionately,

B. FRANKLIN.

TO A FRIEND IN ENGLAND.*

General Melvill.-Profession of Faith. The Old

DEAR SIR,

Testament.

Passy, 21 August, 1784.

Understanding that my letter intended for you by General Melvill, was lost at the Hôtel d'Espagne, I

* Supposed to be Dr. Priestley.

take this opportunity by my grandson to give you the purport of it, as well as I can recollect. I thanked you for the pleasure you had procured me of the General's conversation, whom I found a judicious, sensible, and amiable man. I was glad to hear that you possessed a comfortable retirement, and more so that you had thoughts of removing to Philadelphia, for that it would make me very happy to have you there. Your companions would be very acceptable to the Library, but I hoped you would long live to enjoy their company yourself. I agreed with you in sentiments concerning the Old Testament, and thought the clause in our constitution, which required the members of Assembly to declare their belief, that the whole of it was given by divine inspiration, had better have been omitted. That I had opposed the clause; but, being overpowered by numbers, and fearing more might in future times be grafted on it, I prevailed to have the additional clause, "that no further or more extended profession of faith should ever be exacted." I observed to you too, that the evil of it was the less, as no inhabitant, nor any officer of government, except the members of Assembly, was obliged to make that declaration.

So much for that letter; to which I may now add, that there are several things in the Old Testament, impossible to be given by divine inspiration; such as the approbation ascribed to the angel of the Lord, of that abominably wicked and detestable action of Jael, the wife of Heber, the Kenite.* If the rest of the book were like that, I should rather suppose it given by inspiration from another quarter, and renounce the whole.

* Judges, chap. iv.

By the way, how goes on the Unitarian church in Essex Street? And the honest minister of it,* is he comfortably supported? Your old colleague, Mr. Radcliff, is he living? And what became of Mr. Denham ?

My grandson, who will have the honor of delivering this to you, may bring me a line from you; and I hope will bring me an account of your continuing well and happy.

I jog on still, with as much health, and as few of the infirmities of old age, as I have any reason to expect. But, notwithstanding the decay of my constitution, my regard for my old friends remains firm and entire. You will always have a good share of it, for I am ever with great and sincere esteem, dear Sir, &c. B. FRANKLIN.

FROM JAMES MCHENRY TO B. FRANKLIN.t

The Marquis de Lafayette. The Adjournment of Congress, and Dissolution of the Committee of the

States.

Baltimore, 24 August, 1784.

SIR, As it may be a satisfaction to the friends of the Marquis de Lafayette to learn, that his visit to this country has been extremely flattering to its citizens, and that his reception has been marked by every circumstance expressive of gratitude and respect, I thought it would give pleasure to you, of whom I have often heard him express the liveliest regard, to have it in

Theophilus Lindsey.

Mr. McHenry was at this time a delegate in Congress from Maryland. He afterwards served for several years as Secretary of War, during the administrations of Washington and Adams.

your power to convey to them this information. He is now with our late general at Mount Vernon, and is expected in this town about the first of next month.*

I imagine your official information from this country must be very imperfect, and may continue so for some time, unless Mr. Jay, who has arrived, accepts the Department of Foreign Affairs. You know, I suppose, that Congress left a committee of the States; but this committee is, in effect, at an end, without the form of an adjournment. I went down to Annapolis on the 20th instant, to relieve Mr. Chase (a delegate from this State), but I might as well have remained at home, for Mr. Dana and Mr. Blanchard had the day before signified their intention to return to their States. There being only nine members present, a motion was made by General Hand to fix the dissolution on those gentlemen, which would have been entered on the journals, had not Mr. Blanchard withdrawn just as the yeas and nays were about to be called. This put an end to the committee, as he did not choose to return.

Owing to this circumstance, we shall have no visible federal sovereignty before the meeting of Congress at Trenton. I dare say our enemies in Europe will construe this event into a proof of a spirit of disorder and disunion among the States, not distinguishing between the States and their fluctuating representatives, who cannot be always wise, always moderate men. The truth is, the eastern delegates did not think a committee of the States necessary, and went into it merely because, that, without one, they could not have obtained the adjournment to Trenton. The passions and sentiments of Congress descending to the com

* The Marquis de Lafayette had been making a tour through various parts of the United States, and was now about to return to Europe. See Sparks's edition of Washington's Writings, Vol. IX. pp. 55, 74, 77.