This he has himself honestly and publicly
declared since his return; and from his well known character and every
other circumstance, every candid man must perceive that his
enterprise was dictated by his own enthusiasm, without consultation or
communication with any one; that he acted in Paris on his own ground,
and made his own way. Yet to give some color to his proceedings, which
might implicate the republicans in general, and myself particularly,
they have not been ashamed to bring forward a supposititious paper,
drawn by one of their own party in the name of Logan, and falsely
pretended to have been presented by him to the government of France;
counting that the bare mention of my name therein, would connect that in
the eye of the public with this transaction. In confutation of these
and all future calumnies, by way of anticipation, I shall make to you a
profession of my political faith; in confidence that you will consider
every future imputation on me of a contrary complexion, as bearing on
its front the mark of falsehood and calumny.
I do then, with sincere zeal, wish an inviolable preservation of our
present federal constitution, according to the true sense in which
it was adopted by the States, that in which it was advocated by its
friends, and not that which its enemies apprehended, who, therefore,
became its enemies: and I am opposed to the monarchizing its features
by the forms of its administration, with a view to conciliate a first
transition to a President and Senate for life, and from that to an
hereditary tenure of these offices, and thus to worm out the elective
principle.
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