"I beheld," said the noble man who now rests at Ashland, on a memorable occasion,-"I beheld a torch about being applied to a favorite edifice, and I would save it, if possible, before it was wrapt in flames."* Just so, Mr. Adams, who was in England, came to the rescue of his "favorite edifice." He rapidly wrote A Defence, in three volumes, founded mainly on the passage from M. Turgot which we have quoted. He had, indeed, other motives. At this juncture, his native State was agitated by the disorders which, as we have remarked, resulted under Shays in military opposition to the government; and the project of revising the Confederation, or of initiating a more efficient system, was seriously discussed. The first volume of the Defence was published in London, in 1787, at once transmitted to America, reprinted, and circulated, in time to exert an influence in the crisis of affairs; and that it was of essential service cannot be doubted. The work,† as completed, "comprehended an analysis of the various free governments of ancient and modern times, with occasional summaries of their history to illustrate the nature of the evils under which they suffered and ultimately perished." The briefest digest would require an entire article. Some good men thought, and the party hounds yelped out, that it favored the restoration of monarchy; but what was mistake or malignity then needs no refutation now. The true and serious objections are, that it is far too elaborate, and yet that it wants method, harmony, proportion, and distinct aim. It was Mr. Adams's nature to write and to speak with so much spirit as to be vehement, and to go as directly to his point ast the bullet speeds to its mark; but in this instance, so wide is his departure from his wonted method, that we almost fancy he essayed to show his countrymen how very unlike himself he could be. Yet the evidences of profound learning are abundant; there are many pages of great power; and the discussion of principles is often masterly. Were it divested of the material which, as it seems to us, confuses rather than *Mr. Clay's Speech in defence of the American System, and on the Tariff Compromise Bill, February, 1833. "Defence of the Constitutions of the United States of America against the Attack of M. Turgot." aids the principal argument, and reduced by skilful abridgment to a single volume, it would be a valuable manual to such of our public men as venture to think that the past has some lessons worthy of remembrance, or that government is still to be treated as a science. Next in order are the "Discourses on Davila," originally published in a newspaper in Philadelphia, in 1790, when Mr. Adams was Vice-President, as a sequel to the Defence. As before, he was charged with being an advocate for monarchy, and with laboring to make the office of President of the United States hereditary; and he expressed the opinion that these essays did much to destroy his popularity. As his assailants actually caused a suspension of these papers, his design was never fully completed. Davila himself was an Italian writer of European fame, and his work relates to the political convulsions in France, in the sixteenth century. Mr. Adams aimed simply to show, more clearly than he had yet done, "the dangers from powerful factions in ill-balanced forms of government." To furnish the American mind with a repo lican or democratic antidote to this work, Paine's Rights of Man was reprinted in Philadelphia, under high sanction. We confess that'we like these Discourses much. In our view, they contain a great deal of sound philosophy of human nature, and therefore of human history; and they please us none the less, because they courageously resisted the tendencies of the French Revolution, which well-nigh perilled our own national existence. The remaining papers on the subject of government we must pass without notice. In closing the topic, it is of interest to observe that the letter to Mr. Lee, which filled but a single sheet, was the cause, ultimately, and as occasions arose, of the writing and printing of some fourteen hundred octavo pages, occupying a large part of the fourth, and the whole of the fifth and sixth volumes. And we may add, that, had Mr. Adams stood entirely aloof, he would have been spared many lasting disquietudes and misrepresentations. But a calm looker-on he never was. Personal ease he always sacrificed when he felt that he could serve his country. "Discourses on Davila: a Series of Papers on Political History." We come now to a selection from his official papers in the various public stations which he filled in Europe and at home, arranged in chronological order. The seventh volume embraces the period between his appointment to succeed Silas Deane, as commissioner to France, in November, 1777, and the welcome tidings, in the same month, 1782, that the struggle was about to end, the mother having consented to treat with her rebellious children on the basis of independence. In the eighth volume we have his correspondence and other documents which relate to our affairs abroad generally, to his residence in England as our first minister, to his vice-presidency, and to a large part of his service as successor to Washington. The ninth volume completes the epistolary and documentary matter for the remainder of his public career, and, of course, includes his inaugural and annual speeches, special messages to Congress, proclamations, and answers to various public bodies, the whole accurately drawn from the copy books, as we are assured by the editor, except such revisions were necessary "to correct obvious errors of haste, or marked imperfections of language." Following this selection are "two separate extracts, complete in themselves,"* but not specially worthy of publication at first, or of perpetuation now; and the general correspondence, which occupies a part of the ninth, and the whole of the tenth volume, and closes with a letter declining an invitation to celebrate the Fourth of July, 1826, at New York, on which anniversary, it will be remembered, Mr. Adams passed for ever away. No American can read the most considerate of the papers written in Europe without deep emotion, recalling, as they. do, the forlorn condition of their author, and what, under every aspect of affairs, he steadily strove to achieve. His letters to his colleagues in the foreign missions, to the Count de Vergennes, and to M. Dumas; his care to keep Congress advised as to our interests abroad; his well-timed efforts to disabuse the European mind of prejudices, and to refute the slanders which were circulated against us and our cause; his * One from the letters originally published in the Boston Patriot, in 1809, caused by Hamilton's famous pamphlet, "The Public Conduct and Character of John Adams, Esq., President of the United States." endeavors to pacify some restless, jealous spirits, who were in command, or quarrelling for the command, of public ships; his suggestions as to our future relations with the nations of the Old World; his defence of the plan to sink two hundred millions of the "continental stuff" to five millions in silver, or to redeem it, one dollar in specie for forty dollars in paper (which defence, unsatisfactory in some things, as every such plan must have been, since the loss to holders did not fall equally, like a tax, is yet the best argued paper on the subject we have ever seen); his twenty-six letters to that Dutch "giant of the law," Calkoen, respecting the Revolution, which contain more information than can be found elsewhere, in the same compass; his persistence in maintaining his official dignity and standing, when official bills of exchange officially drawn were actually dishonored, or likely to be so, and when the means of paying his personal expenses were alarmingly uncertain; the intrepidity of his course in Holland, his loan, and his treaty of alliance with the Dutch government, which he always regarded as the greatest success of his life; the part he took in the negotiations of the treaty of peace, his bold, unflinching demand for liberal boundaries, and for the right" of his countrymen to the fisheries in the colonial seas, the value of which, as yet appreciated by few, events will one day make manifest to all; his unwearied exertions, amid sneers, insults, and opposition, to extend our commerce, and to insure its stability and growth by treaty stipulations; the suggestions to countervail foreign policy against our navigation, by reserving our coasting trade for vessels under our . own flag, all these things evince the knowledge and the ability which John Adams could bring to the discussion of great questions of public concern. His papers show what is far better. There is evidence on every page of his thorough, incorruptible integrity of heart. - When reminded of the often-quoted sentiment, - attributed to Talleyrand, but original, we think, with Goldsmith, — that the use of speech is to conceal, rather than to express, one's thoughts, we have felt that its best refutation is found in the European diplomacy of Franklin, Jay, and Adams, in which there was neither guile nor hypocrisy. The latter, indeed, was so sincere, as to neglect at times established and harmless forms, and to speak out the honest truth, bluntly, aud even uncourteously. So, too, as we have mused upon Mr. Adams's course individually, we have recalled the pleasant story told of a maiden, who, after repeatedly rejecting a suitor for her hand, finally married him, she said, "to get rid of him"; for in Holland the pipe-smoking, moneyloving Mynheers, and at Paris the every-thing-by-rule sort of gentlemen sent over from the "Circumlocution Office" in England, all unused to dealing with a man so pertinacious, so importunate, and so impossible to be put off, appear to have yielded much in the same mood. Considered as a revolutionist, he was in truth a rare man. In Congress, the "Colossus," the "pillar," the "ablest advocate and champion" of independence, member of no less than ninety committees, and chairman of twenty-five, we find him opposed for the boldness of his measures, but triumphant. Among foreign statesmen he was always equal to the maintenance of the interests intrusted to him, and successful in his endeavors. If, as Hutchinson said of him, "his ambition was without bounds," we care little; since, were we to admit the accusation in the sense intended, we do not know that his countrymen, or the Anglo-Saxon race anywhere, are serious losers by his personal advancement, and by the expulsion of the "old families" that claimed of right and by inheritance to rule America, to the utter exclusion of such an "upstart" planter as the owner * * This is the gentlest word used by the descendants of the Loyalists who lost official places, and whose estates were confiscated. We have heard those occupying high positions in the British Colonies denounce the prominent Whigs in unmeasured terms. Washington is the special object of vituperation; the epithets of "rascal," "traitor," with expletives which we shall not repeat, are used not sparingly. The love of political distinction in the "old families" was a marked trait; and it descended to their children, who, until the recent change in the policy of governing British America, monopolized the offices there. A few years ago, the son of a Boston Loyalist complained to us, that he was a neglected man." As every one else was dissatisfied because he filled all the places in his county, and was one of her Majesty's Council besides, we had the curiosity to ascertain that he held eighteen commissions, all, as the rule then was, for life. At the same time, in the Colony in which this gentleman lives, a single village of some two thousand people only, furnished one fourth of the members of the Legislative Council, which body answers to a Sen. ate with us. Imagine a single country town sending one fourth of the Senators of Massachusetts for twenty, thirty, or forty years, without a change in the persons |