recompense for the solicitude for your welfare, by which they have been dictated. How far in the discharge of my official duties, I have been guided by the principles which have been delineated, the public Records and other evidences of my conduct must witness to You, and to the World. To myself, the assurance of my own conscience is, that I have at least believed myself to be guided by them. In relation to the still subsisting War in Europe, my Proclamation of the 22d of April 1793 is the index to my plan.'-Sanctioned by your approving voice and by that of Your Representatives in both Houses of Congress, the spirit of that measure has continually governed me:-uninfluenced by any attempts to deter or divert me from it. After deliberate examination with the aid of the best lights I could obtain, I was well satisfied that our country, under all the circumstances of the case, had a right to take, and was bound in duty and interest, to take a Neutral position.-Having taken it, I determined, as far as should depend upon me, to maintain it, with moderation, perseverance, and firmness. The considerations which respect the right to hold this conduct, it is not necessary on this occasion to detail. I will only observe, that according to my understanding of the matter, that right, so far from being denied by any of the Belligerent Powers, has been virtually admitted by all.— The duty of holding a neutral conduct may be 1 See page 408. inferred, without any thing more, from the obligation which justice and humanity impose on every Nation, in cases in which it is free to act, to maintain inviolate the relations of Peace and Amity towards other Nations. The inducements of interest for observing that conduct will best be referred to your own reflections and experience.—With me, a predominant motive has been to endeavour to gain time to our country to settle and mature its yet recent institutions, and to progress without interruption to that degree of strength and consistency, which is necessary to give it, humanly speaking, the command of its own fortunes. Though, in reviewing the incidents of my Administration, I am unconscious of intentional error -I am nevertheless too sensible of my defects not to think it probable that I may have committed many errors. Whatever they may be I fervently beseech the Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which they may tend.-I shall also carry with me the hope that my country will never cease to view them with indulgence; and that after fortyfive years of my life dedicated to its service, with an upright zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be consigned to oblivion, as myself must soon be to the mansions of rest. Relying on its kindness in this as in other things, and actuated by that fervent love towards it, which is so natural to a man, who views in it the native soil of himself and his progenitors for several generations;—I anticipate with pleasing expectation that retreat, in which I promise myself to realize, without alloy, the sweet enjoyment of partaking, in the midst of my fellow-citizens, the benign influence of good Laws under a free Government,-the ever favourite object of my heart, and the happy reward, as I trust, of our mutual cares, labours, and dangers. GO WASHINGTON. UNITED STATES, 19th September, S 1796 INDEX Adams, Charles Francis, quoted, 26 n. Agriculture, 319, 331 Addresses, anonymous, of Great Britain to the American army, Anonymous Addresses to the Armed Neutrality of 1780, 161 n. Armstrong, Major John, author Army, Continental, condition Army of the United States, Articles of War, Continental, 38 Bache, attacks of, on Washing- ton, 354, 354 n., 456 n. Ball, Burges, letters to, 446, Banister, John, letter to, 108 Boston, closing of the port of, Brandywine, battle of, 88-89 Cabinet, letters to, 393, 405 the Jay treaty, 382, 382 n. Carrington, Edward, letter to, 402 Cary, Robert, letter to, 14 n. China, stone placed by, in Wash- Clinton, General Sir Henry, 50 Command of the army, address 442 Commerce, treaty of, with Great Britain, 365, 367, 368 n., 372, Commercial policy of America, 556 Commissioners of the Federal Congress, Second Continental, 320; mutiny of troops of, 148 Cornwallis, letter to, 171; sur- Credit, public 318, 332, 339, 551 Dandridge, Francis, letter to, 7 Debts, repudiation of those ow- Desertions from the army, 75, 94 |