ancient and modern republics have not found, that majority, in the exercise of their incontestable right of suffrage, have chosen for chief magistrate a citizen who brings into that high trust no qualification other than military triumphs. That citizen has done much injusticewanton, unprovoked, and unatoned injustice. It was inflicted, as I must ever believe, for the double purpose of gratifying private resentment and promoting personal ambition. When, during the late canvass, he came forward in the public prints under his proper name, with his charge against me, and summoned before the public tribunal his friend and his only witness to establish it, the anxious attention of the whole American people was directed to the testimony which that witness might render. He promptly obeyed the call and testified to what he knew. He could say nothing, and he said nothing which cast the slightest shade upon my honor or integrity. What he did say was the reverse of any implication of me. Then all just and impartial men, and all who had faith in the magnanimity of my accuser, believed that he would voluntarily make a public acknowledgment of his error. How far this reasonable expectation has been fulfilled, let his persevering and stubborn silence attest. But my relations to that citizen by a recent event are now changed. He is the chief magistrate of my country, invested with large and extensive powers, the administration of which may conduce to its prosperity or occasion its adversity. Patriotism enjoins as a duty, that whilst he is in that exalted station, he should be treated with decorum, and his official acts be judged of in a spirit of candor. Suppressing, as far as I can, a sense of my personal wrong-willing even to forgive him, if his own conscience and our common God can acquit him-and entertaining for the majority which has elected him, and for the office which he fills, all the deference which is due from a private citizen, I most anxiously hope that under his guidance the great interests of our country, foreign and domestic, may be upheld, our free institutions be unimpaired, and the happiness of the nation be continued and increased. While I am prompted by an ardent devotion to the welfare of my country sincerely to express this hope, I make no pledges, no promises, no threats, and I must add, I have no confidence. My public life, I trust, furnishes the best guarantee for my faithful adherence to those great principles of external and internal policy to which it has been hitherto zealously dedicated. Whether I shall ever hereafter take any part in the public councils or not depends upon circumstances beyond my control. Holding the principle that a citizen, as long as a single pulsation remains, is under an obligation to exert his utmost energies in the service of his country, if necessary, whether in private or public station, my friends here and everywhere may rest assured that, in either condition, I shall stand erect, with a spirit unconquered, whilst life endures, ready to second their exertions in the cause of liberty, union, and the national prosperity. the Before I sit down I avail myself with pleasure of this opportunity to make my grateful acknowledgments for the courtesies and friendly attentions which I have uniformly experienced from the inhabitants of this city. A free and social intercourse with them, during a period of more than twenty years, is about to terminate, without any recollection on my part of a single painful collision, and without leaving behind me, as far as I know, a solitary personal enemy. If, in the sentiment with which I am about to conclude, I do not give a particular expression to the feelings inspired by the interchange of civilities and friendly offices, I hope the citizens of Washington will be assured that their individual happiness and the growth and prosperity of this city will ever be objects of my fervent wishes. In the sentiment which I shall presently offer, they are indeed comprehended. For the welfare of this city is indissolubly associated with that |