7364. REPUBLICANS, Divisions among.—[further continued] .
The duty of an upright
Administration is to pursue its course steadily,
to know nothing of these family dissensions,
and to cherish the good principles of both parties.
The war ad internecionem which we have
waged against federalism, has filled our later
times with strife and unhappiness. We have
met it, with pain indeed, but with firmness,
because we believed it the last convulsive effort
of that hydra, which in earlier times we
had conquered in the field. But if any degeneracy
of principle should ever render it necessary
to give ascendancy to one of the rising
sections over the other, I thank my God it will
fall to some other to perform that operation.
The only cordial I wish to carry into my retirement,
is the undivided good will of all those
with whom I have acted.—
To Dr. George Logan. Washington ed. iv, 575.
Ford ed., viii, 353.
(W.
May. 1805)
