University of Virginia Library

ARTICLE LXVIII.

The Religious Character of Washington.

An interesting question in relation to Washington will now be
considered,—viz.: What are the proofs of his personal piety? This
work is already done to my hands by the Rev. E. C. McGuire, of
Fredericksburg, from whose careful and faithful volume on the
"Religious Opinions and Character of Washington" I select the
following particulars. He was the child of pious parents and
ancestors, was baptized in his second month,—Mr. Beverley Whiting
and Captain Christopher Brooks godfathers, and Mrs. Mildred
Gregory godmother,—at a time when care was taken to instruct the
children in our holy religion, according to the Scriptures as set
forth in the standards of the Episcopal Church. Until he had
passed his eleventh year he enjoyed the superintending care of
both parents, and after that of his mother and uncle. It is also
believed that, besides the instructions of the parish sexton and Mr.
Williams, he also sat under the ministry of the Rev. Archibald
Campbell, and perhaps was for a time at his school in Washington
parish, Westmoreland county. While with his mother in Fredericksburg,
there can be no doubt of his receiving pious instruction from
her and her minister, the Rev. Mr. Marye. While at school, he
was remarkable for his abhorrence of the practice of fighting among
the boys, and, if unable to prevent a contest, would inform the
teacher of the design. When about thirteen years of age he drew
up a number of resolutions, taken from books, or the result of his
own reflections. Among them is the following:—"When you speak
of God or his attributes, let it be seriously, in reverence." "Labour
to keep alive in your breast that little spark of celestial fire called
conscience." At the age of fifteen his filial piety was remarkably
displayed in relinquishing an earnest desire to enter the navy, just
when about to embark, out of a tender regard to his mother's wishes.
The religious sentiments of his mother and of himself were drawn
from the Bible and, Prayer-Book, and next to them, from the "Contemplations,
Moral and Divine, of Sir Matthew Hale," judging from
the great use which seems to have been made of this book by both
of them; and in no uninspired book do we find a purer and more

elevated Christianity.[43] Should it be said that, notwithstanding his
early religious education and some indications of youthful piety, he
may have fallen into the irreligion and skepticism of the age, and
should proofs of his sincere belief of Christianity, as a divine revelation,
be asked for, we will proceed to furnish them. At a time
when so many of the chief men in France and America, and even
some in England, were renouncing the Christian faith, and when
he was tempted to be silent at least on the subject, in his public
addresses, he seems to have taken special pains to let his sentiments
be known, and to impress them upon the nation, in opposition to
the skepticism of the age,—a skepticism which was sought by some
leading men to be propagated with great zeal among the youth of
Virginia.

In his address to the Governors of the States, dated at Head-Quarters,
June, 1783, when about to surrender up his military command,
speaking of the many blessings of the land, he says, "And,
above all, the pure and benign light of revelation." He also speaks
of "that humility and pacific temper of mind which were the characteristics
of the divine Author of our blessed religion."

In his farewell address to the people of the United States, on
leaving the Presidential chair, he again introduces the same subject:—"Of
all the dispositions and habits which lead to political
prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. A
volume could not trace all their connections with private and public
felicity." He warns against the attempt to separate them, and to
think that "national morality can prevail to the exclusion of religious
principles."

No candid man can read these and other expressions, in the public
addresses of Washington, without acknowledging that, as though
he were the great high-priest of the nation, availing himself of his
position and of the confidence reposed in him, he was raising his
warning voice against that infidelity which was desolating France
and threatening our own land. That Washington was regarded
throughout America, both among our military and political men, as
a sincere believer in Christianity, as then received among us, and
a devout man, is as clear as any fact in our history. Judge Marshall,
the personal friend, the military and political associate, of
Washington, says, "He was a sincere believer in the Christian
faith, and a truly devout man." Judge Boudinot, who knew him

well during and after the Revolution, testifies to the same. General
Henry Lee, who served under him during the war, and afterward
in the civil department, and who was chosen by Congress to
deliver his funeral oration, says, in that oration, "First in war,
first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen, he was second
to none in the endearing scenes of private life. Pious, just, humane,
temperate, and sincere,—uniform, dignified, and commanding,—his
example was edifying to all around him, as were the effects of that
example lasting." Sermons and orations by divines and statesmen
were delivered all over the land at the death of Washington.
A large volume of such was published. I have seen and read them,
and the religious character of Washington was a most prominent
feature in them; and for this there must have been some good
cause. Let the following extracts suffice. Mr. Sewell, of New
Hampshire, says:—

Thus spake New Hampshire. What says South Carolina?
David Ramsay, the historian, says:—

Mr. J. Biglow, of Boston, says:—

To the foregoing I will only add, that Major William Jackson,
aid-de-camp to Washington, in his address, speaks of the "milder
radiance of religion and morality `as shining in his character,' and
of his being beloved and admired by the holy ministers of religion;"
and that Captain Dunham of the Revolution, in his oration,
says of him, "A friend to our holy religion, he was ever guided
by its pious doctrines. He had embraced the tenets of the Episcopal
Church; yet his charity, unbounded as his immortal mind, led
him equally to respect every denomination of the followers of
Jesus." The Rev. Mr. Kirkland, of Boston, says, "The virtues
of our departed friend were crowned with piety. He is known to
have been habitually devout." We conclude with the testimony of
our own Devereux Jarratt, of Virginia, whom none will suspect of
flattery or low views of religion:—

Nor was the belief of his piety confined to America. The Rev.
Thomas Wilson, the pious son of the pious Bishop Wilson, of Sodor
and Mann, thought he could make no more suitable present to
General Washington than his father's family Bible in three volumes,
with notes, and a folio volume of his father's works. The former
was left by the will of General Washington to his friend the Rev.
Bryan Fairfax, minister of Christ Church, Alexandria; the latter
is, I presume, still in the Arlington library. From the latter I
selected, forty-six years ago, a small volume of private and family
prayers, as I have elsewhere stated.

If more certain proofs of personal piety in Washington be required
than these general impressions and declarations of his coevals
and compatriots, founded on their observation of his public
conduct, and derived from his public addresses, we proceed to
furnish them. They will be taken from the testimony of those
whose intimacy with his domestic habits enable them to judge, and
from his own diary. As to his private devotions, of course the
same kind of testimony is not to be expected as that which attests

his public observances. It may most positively be affirmed, that
the impression on the minds of his family was, that when on each
night he regularly took his candle and went to his study at nine
o'clock and remained there until ten, it was for the purpose of
reading the Scriptures and prayer. It is affirmed by more than
one that he has been seen there on his knees and also been heard
at his prayers. In like manner it is believed, that when at five
o'clock each morning, winter and summer, he went to that same
study, a portion of time was then spent in the same way. It is
also well known that it was the impression in the army that Washington,
either in his tent or in his room, practised the same thing.
One testifies to having seen him on more than one occasion thus
engaged on his bended knees. It is firmly believed that when in
crowded lodgings at Valley Forge, where every thing was unfavourable
to private devotions, his frequent visits to a neighbouring
wood were for this purpose. It is also a fact well known to the
family that, when prevented from public worship, he used to
read the Scriptures and other books with Mrs. Washington in her
chamber.

That there was a devotional spirit in Washington, a belief in the
virtue of prayer, leading to private supplication, is also rendered
most probable by his conduct as an officer in seeking to have public
prayer for his soldiers, and even conducting them himself in the
absence of a minister.

At twenty-two years of age, when heading an expedition against
the Indians, he was in the habit of having prayer in the camp at
Fort Necessity, at the Great Meadows, in the Alleghany Mountains.
His friend and neighbour, Mr. William Fairfax, of Belvoir, a few
miles from Mount Vernon, and whose daughter, Lawrence, the elder
brother of George Washington, married, thus writes to him while
at the Great Meadows, and in the letter evinces not only his own
pious disposition, but his confidence in that of the youthful Washington:—"I
will not doubt your having public prayer in the camp,
especially when the Indian families are your guests, that they, seeing
your plain manner of worship, may have their curiosity to be
informed why we do not use the ceremonies of the French, which,
being well explained to their understandings, will more and more
dispose them to receive our baptism and unite in strict bonds of
cordial friendship."

In the year 1755, Washington was the volunteer aid-de-camp to
General Braddock, and, though in danger of pursuit by the Indians,
he did, on the night after the memorable defeat, in the absence of

a chaplain, himself perform the last funeral rites over the body of
Braddock, a soldier holding the candle or lighted torch while the
solemn words were read. For several successive years Washington
was engaged in a trying contest with the Indians, and during
a considerable portion of that time—according to the testimony
of one of his aids, Colonel B. Temple, of King William county—
he frequently, on the Sabbath, performed divine service, reading
the Scriptures and praying with them when no chaplain could be
had. It was during this period that a sharp correspondence was
carried on between Washington and Dinwiddie, the latter being
offended at the persevering importunity of the former that a chaplain
might be allowed his army. At the recall of Dinwiddie, Washington
addressed the following letter to the President of the Council,
who was chief in the Colony until the arrival of Governor Fauquier,
saying, "The last Assembly, in their Supply Bill, provided for a
chaplain to our regiment. On this subject I had often, without any
success, applied to Governor Dinwiddie. I now flatter myself that
your honour will be pleased to appoint a sober, serious man for this
duty. Common decency, sir, in a camp, calls for the services of a
divine, which ought not to be dispensed with, although the world
may think us void of religion and incapable of good instructions."

In the year 1759 Colonel Washington was married, and until the
Revolution lived at Mount Vernon. That he was interested in the
affairs of the Church at this time is evident from what we have said
as to the part he acted in relation to the building of Pohick Church.
The Rev. Lee Massey was the minister during part of this time.
His testimony was, "I never knew so constant an attendant at
church as Washington. His behaviour in the house of God was
ever so reverential that it produced the happiest effects on my congregation
and greatly assisted me in my pulpit labours. No company
ever kept him from church."

In the year 1774 he was sent as a Burgess to Williamsburg. It
was at that time that a day of fasting and prayer was appointed in
view of the approaching difficulties with England. The following
entry in his diary shows his conduct on that occasion:—"June 1st,
Wednesday. Went to church and fasted all day." In September
of that year he was in Philadelphia, a member of the first Congress.
In his diary he speaks of going, during the three first Sabbaths,
three times to Episcopal churches, once to the Quaker, once to the
Presbyterian, and once to the Roman Catholic. He was a member
of Congress again the next year, and then chosen commander-in-chief
of our army. On the day after assuming its command he

issued the following order:—"The General requires and expects of
all officers and soldiers, not engaged on actual duty, a punctual
attendance on divine service, to implore the blessings of Heaven
upon the means used for our safety and defence." On the 15th of
May, 1776, Congress having appointed a day of humiliation, the
following order is given:—"The General commands all officers and
soldiers to pay strict obedience to the order of the Continental
Congress, that by their unfeigned and pious observance of their
religious duties they may incline the Lord and giver of victory to
prosper our arms." The situation of the army not admitting the
regular service every Sunday, he requires the chaplains to meet
together and agree on some method of performing it at other times,
and make it known to him. Such was Washington as head of the
army.

As President of the United States his conduct exhibited the same
faith in and reverence for religion. Not only did he regularly
attend divine service in the Church of his fathers and of his choice,
but he let it be understood that he would receive no visits on the
Sabbath. The only exception to this was an occasional visit, in
the latter part of the day, from his old friend, the Speaker of the
House of Representatives, Colonel Trumbull, who was confessedly
one of the most pious men of the age, and who would not have
sought the company of an irreligious man on the Sabbath, even
though that man were President of the United States. On the
subject of a strict observance of the Sabbath, we might have mentioned
other proofs of it, occurring before his being elevated to the
chief command of the army or first Presidency in the Republic.
His private diary shows it in various places. Let one suffice. On
a certain occasion he was informed on Saturday evening that the
smallpox was among his servants in the valley. He set out the
next morning to visit them, but notes in his diary, "Took church
on the way," thus combining duty to the poor and to his God.

His condemnation of the prevailing vices of the day deserves also
to be mentioned in proof that he understood Christianity as being
that "grace of God which hath appeared unto all men, teaching
us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live
soberly, righteously, and godly in this present evil world."

Not only was he addicted to no kind of intemperance, scarcely ever
tasting ardent spirits or exceeding two glasses of wine,—which was
equal to total abstinence in our day,—and not using tobacco in any
shape, but he used his authority in the army to the utmost to put
down swearing, games of chance, and drinking, and irregularities

of every other kind. Whilst at Fort Cumberland in 1757, we find
the following order:—"Colonel Washington has observed that the
men of his regiment are very profane and reprobate. He takes this
opportunity to inform them of his great displeasure at such practices,
and assures them that if they do not leave them off they shall be
severely punished. The officers are desired, if they hear any man
swear, or make use of an oath or execration, to order the offender
twenty-five lashes immediately, without a court-martial. For the
second offence he shall be punished more severely." The day after
General Washington took command of the American army he issued
orders to the troops, from which we take the following:—"The
General most earnestly requires and expects a due observance of
those articles of war which prohibit profane cursing, swearing, and
drunkenness," and soon after issued the following order:—

"All officers, non-commissioned officers, and soldiers are positively
forbid playing at cards and other games of chance. At this
time of public distress men may find enough to do in the service
of their God and their country, without abandoning themselves to
vice and immorality." Again, we find in August of that year an
order in these remarkable words:—"The General is sorry to be informed
that the foolish and wicked practice of profane cursing and
swearing—a vice hitherto little known in the American army—is
growing into fashion. He hopes the officers will, by example as
well as influence, endeavour to check it; and that both they and
the men will reflect that we can have little hope of the blessing of
Heaven on our arms, if we insult it by our own folly and impiety:
added to this, it is a vice so mean and low, without any temptation,
that every man of sense and character detests and despises it."
And is this the man of whom some have reported that he was
addicted to this very disgusting vice, only saying that he did it
most gracefully and swore like an angel? Credat Judæus Apella.
It has also been attempted by some to introduce greater variety into
the character of Washington, and bring him down to the common
level, by representing him as passionately fond not merely of the
chase and much addicted to it, but also of the dance, the ballroom,
and the theatre. On what ground does this rest? His fondness
for the chase is associated with that of Lord Fairfax, during the
time that he lived at Mount Vernon and his lordship at Belvoir,
the seat of his relation, William Fairfax, a few miles off. But how
long did this sporting-intimacy continue? Washington came to
Mount Vernon in his sixteenth year. Lord Fairfax came to
Virginia at that time, and young Washington for a few months

sometimes attended him in hunting, but not neglecting his mathematical
studies and surveying, which recommended him to Lord
Fairfax as a suitable agent in the valley. At the beginning of his
seventeenth year, Washington came over the Blue Ridge on duty,—
laborious duty. Lord Fairfax, after visiting England, settled at
Greenway Court. His house was only the occasional abode of
Washington during the two years in which he was surveying and
dividing the immense landed possessions of Lord Fairfax, and also
acting as public surveyor in all Western Virginia. What time was
left him to waste in the sports of the chase? From the age of
nineteen he was faithfully and painfully serving his country in the
field of battle, except when on his voyage to the West Indies with
a sick brother. During the period between his marriage and the
Revolution, he was a most diligent farmer at Mount Vernon,—
sometimes visiting his plantations in Jefferson, and acting as Burgess
in Virginia and Delegate to the earlier American Congresses.
What time, I ask, for the sports of the field? What do we find, in
his diary, of dogs and kennels and the chase? We do not say that
he may never have thus exercised himself at a time and in a country
where game and forests abounded and it was less a waste of time
than at other periods and other places: but how different must have
been the pursuit with Washington from that of the idlers of his
day?[44] And as to his admiration of the theatre and his delighting
in its ludicrous and indelicate exhibitions, does it seem probable
that the grave and dignified Washington, with all the cares of the
army and afterward of the state pressing upon him, should have
found time for such entertainments? In a letter to the President
of Congress, dated New York, April, 1776, he thus writes:—"I
give in to no kind of amusements myself, and consequently those
about me [alluding to his aids] can have none." On the 12th of
October, 1778, the following preamble and resolutions were adopted
by the American Congress:—"Whereas, true religion and good
morals are the only solid foundation of public liberty and happiness,
Therefore, resolved, that it be, and is hereby, recommended to
the several States to take the most effectual measures for the encouragement
thereof, and for suppressing theatrical entertainments,
horse-racing, gaming, and such other diversions as are productive
of idleness, dissipation, and a general depravity of manners." Is
it probable that Washington, at the head of the army, then calling
upon his officers and soldiers to abandon their oaths and drinking
and games of chance, in obedience to military laws and lest they
should offend God and lose his favour, would himself despise and
disobey this solemn call of Congress, and that too when the names of
Adams and Gerry, Sherman and Ellsworth, Morris and Dean, Lee
and Smith, of Virginia, Laurence and Mathews, of South Carolina,
were on the list of those who voted for it, and so few were against it?

As to Washington's passionate fondness for the dance, if Cicero
thought it an unbecoming exercise for any Roman citizen, as beneath
the dignity of any who were admitted to the citizenship of
that great republic, how unlikely that our great Washington—even
if feeling no religious objection to this childish amusement—
should be still a child and delight himself in such frivolous things!
May we not rather suppose him to have felt and said, with a great
man in Israel when tempted to leave the work of the Lord—the
building of his house on Mount Zion—and come down to some
meeting in one of the villages of the plain, "I am doing a great
work, so that I cannot come down"? Let not the sons and daughters
of idleness, vanity, and pleasure seek to find a sanction for their
favourite amusements in the example of Washington,—even though
in a dark age and under peculiar circumstances he may at times
have lent himself to some of them.

I come now to speak of that feature in Washington's religious
character which must most forcibly strike every reader of his public
and private communications,—his firm reliance on a special Providence,
as distinguished from that philosophic belief in Providence
which is little better than atheism. In a letter to his brother, John

A. Washington, written a few days after Braddock's defeat, he says,
"By the all-powerful dispensations of Providence, I have been protected
beyond all human probability or expectation; for I had four
bullets through my coat and two horses shot under me,—yet escaped
unhurt,—although death was levelling my companions on every side
of me." In his entrance on the contest with England, he thus
writes to General Gage:—"May that God to whom you appeal
judge between America and you! Under his providence, those who
influenced the councils of America, and all the other inhabitants
of the Colonies, at the hazard of their lives, are determined to hand
down to posterity those just and invaluable privileges which they
received from their ancestors." In a letter to his friend, Joseph
Reed, in 1776, under some great trials in relation to his supplies,
he writes, "How it will end, God in his great goodness will direct.
I am thankful for his protection to this time." In his address to
the General Assembly of Massachusetts, after the evacuation of
Boston without blood, he ascribes it "to the interposition of that
Providence which has manifestly appeared in our behalf through
the whole of this important struggle." Speaking of the expectation
of a bloody battle, he says, in a letter to his brother John, "It
is to be hoped that, if our cause be just,—as I do most religiously
believe it to be,—the same Providence which has in so many instances
appeared for us will still go on to afford its aid." In view
of an expected attack from the combined forces of the enemy he
thus calls on his soldiers:—"The fate of unborn millions will now
depend, under God, on the courage and conduct of this army. Let
us rely upon the goodness of the cause, and the aid of the Supreme
Being, in whose hand victory is, to animate and encourage us to
noble actions." After the surrender of Burgoyne's army, he writes
to his brother John, "I most devoutly congratulate my country and
every well-wisher to the cause on this signal stroke of Providence."
In the year 1778, just after the battle of Monmouth, he writes to
his brother, that all would have been lost "had not that bountiful
Providence, which has never failed us in the hour of distress, enabled
me to form a regiment or two of those who were retreating in the
face of the enemy and under their fire." To General Nelson, in
that same year, in taking a retrospect of the vicissitudes of the
war, he says, "The hand of Providence is so conspicuous in all this,
that he must be worse than an infidel that lacks faith, and more
than wicked that has not gratitude enough to acknowledge his obligations."
In a letter to Benjamin Harrison, in 1778, he writes,
"Providence has heretofore taken care of us when all other means
seemed to be departing from us." To General Armstrong, in 1781,
he writes, "Our affairs are brought to a perilous crisis, that the
hand of Providence may be more conspicuous in our deliverance.
The many remarkable interpositions of the Divine government in
the hours of our deepest distress and darkness have been too luminous
to suffer me to doubt the issue of the present contest." The
foregoing are only a few out of the many passages which pervade
all the private letters and public communications of Washington
touching a special Providence. Is it too much to say that the
communications of no king, ruler, general, or statesman in Christendom
ever so abounded in expressions of pious dependence on
God? There was an habitual reliance on God which must have
been connected with habitual prayer to God. Nor can we forbear
to institute a comparison between the language of trust in Providence,
as seen in the letters and orders of Washington, and those
of Cromwell. Who for a moment questions the sincerity and deep
feeling of Washington in all he writes? Who does not sometimes
suspect at least the hypocrisy of Cromwell and revolt at his cant?
Who does not see and feel that, while Washington was all for his
country and his God, Cromwell was sometimes seeking his own?

On one other subject in connection with the religious character
of Washington I must ask the attention of the reader. Washington
in word and deed condemned duelling. Nearly all our great men
have done it by word, but, if they have not recommended it by deed,
have been afraid to say that they might not so do, either by giving or
receiving a challenge. When a young man in Alexandria and an
officer in the army, a quarrel ensued on an election-day, in which
he used strong and offensive language to one who, with a stick,
prostrated him to the ground. On the following day he sought
an interview with his antagonist, when it was fully expected that
another rencounter or the preliminaries for one would take place.
Instead of this, Captain Washington, conscious of being in fault,
declared that the interview was sought in order to acknowledge it.
Here was true greatness of soul. Here was the true courage of
the Christian, breathed into the soul by the Spirit of God. God was
training up the spirit of Washington for all the subsequent trials
and duties of life. In the army he of course discouraged and
prevented this most foolish and wicked practice. M. Lafayette, in
a chivalrous spirit, wished to revenge some supposed insult to his
country on an Englishman who offered it, and asked leave of Washington
to send a challenge. Washington conducted the matter
with consummate skill,—and, while fully resolved not to permit it,

chose rather by a grave irony to laugh him out of it. What an
example was thus set to the gentlemen and officers and public
functionaries of America! How does Washington tower above those
who, while acknowledging that the practice is indefensible by any
laws of God or man, and utterly opposed to them, and condemned by
common sense and true honour and humanity, yet, in a most inconsistent
and cowardly manner declare that, nevertheless, such is their
apprehension of public opinion, they might be induced to engage
in this murderous act! To receive a blow, be felled to the earth
before a crowd, and then ask pardon for having provoked the blow,
must surely be considered in a young officer as an act of moral
courage which is prompted by the Spirit of God.

One question only remains to be settled:—Was Washington a
communicant of the Church? That he was, might be reasonably
inferred from the indication of youthful piety, his religious, his
ministerial offices at the head of his regiment, the active part taken
in the concerns of the parish, his habits of devotion, his regular
attendance at church, his conscientious observance of the Sabbath,
his strict fasting on appointed days. It is also believed that he was
a communicant, from the testimony of the Rev. Lee Massey, as
handed down through his family, and also of others which have come
down to us. The testimony which has often been adduced to prove
that, during the war, he did commune on a certain Sabbath in a
Presbyterian church at Morristown, New Jersey, ought to be enough
to satisfy a reasonable man of the fact. Add to these the declaration
of so many, in the sermons and orations at the time of his
death. But still it has been made a question, and it may be well
to consider on what ground. It is certainly a fact, that for a certain
period of time during his Presidential term, while the Congress was
held in Philadelphia, he did not commune. This fact rests on the
authority of Bishop White, under whose ministry the President sat,
and who was on the most intimate terms with himself and Mrs.
Washington. I will relate what the Bishop told myself and others
in relation to it. During the session or sessions of Congress held
in Philadelphia, General Washington was, with his family, a regular
attendant at one of the churches under the care of Bishop White
and his assistants. On Communion-days, when the congregation was
dismissed, (except the portion which communed,) the General left
the church, until a certain Sabbath on which Dr. Abercrombie,
in his sermon, spoke of the impropriety of turning our backs on the
Lord's table,—that is, neglecting to commune,—from which time
General Washington came no more on Communion-days. Bishop

White supposes that the General understood the "words turning our
backs on the Lord's table" in a somewhat different sense than was
designed by the preacher; that he supposed it was intended to censure
those who left the church at the time of its administration, and, in
order not to seem to be disrespectful to that ordinance, thought it
better not to be present at all on such occasions. It is needless to
attempt to conjecture what may have been the reason of this temporary
(as we hope it was) suspension of the act of communicating.
A regard for historic truth has led to the mention of this subject.
The question as to his ever having been a communicant has been
raised on this fact, as stated by Bishop White, and we have thought
it best to give the narrative as we heard it from the lips of the
Bishop himself. It has been asked why he did not, in the dying
hour, send for some minister and receive the emblems of a Saviour's
death. The same might be asked of thousands of pious communicants
who do not regard the sacrament as indispensable to a happy
death and glorious eternity, as some Romanists do. Moreover, the
short and painful illness of Washington would have forbidden it.
But his death was not without proofs of a gracious state. He told
to surrounding friends that it had no terrors for him,—that all was
well. The Bible was on his bed: he closed his own eyes, and,
folding his arms over his breast, expired in peace.