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Subject Area: Political Theory
Topic: The American Revolution and Constitution

TO JOHN LANGHORNE. - George Washington, The Writings of George Washington, vol. XIII (1794-1798) [1892]

Edition used:

The Writings of George Washington, collected and edited by Worthington Chauncey Ford (New York and London: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1890). Vol. XIII (1794-1798).

Part of: The Writings of George Washington, 14 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


TO JOHN LANGHORNE.

Mount Vernon, 15 October, 1797.

Sir,

Your favor of the 25th ultimo has been received, but not so soon as might have been expected from the date of it. For the favorable sentiments you have been pleased to express, relative to my conduct in public life, I thank you. For the divisions which have taken place among us, with respect to our political concerns, for the attacks which have been made upon those, to whom the administration of the government has been intrusted by the people, and for the calumnies which are levelled at all those, who are disposed to support the measures thereof, I feel, on public account, as much as any man can do, because in my opinion much evil and no good can result to this country from such conduct.

So far as these attacks are aimed at me personally, it is, I can assure you, Sir, a misconception, if it be supposed I feel the venom of the darts. Within me I have a consolation, which proves an antidote against their utmost malignity, rendering my mind in the retirement I have long panted after perfectly tranquil. I am, &c.1

[1 ]The name placed at the head of this letter was fictitious. A person, signing himself “John Langhorne,” had written to General Washington, with the insidious design of drawing from him remarks and opinions on political subjects, which might be turned to his injury, and promote the aims of a party. The fraud was detected by Mr. John Nicholas, who ascertained accidentally that a letter from General Washington was in the post-office at Charlottesville, in Albemarle County, directed to John Langhorne (a name unknown in that neighborhood), and that it was sent for by a person whose political connexions and sentiments were in harmony with the party which had opposed the measures of Washington.

“I know not how to thank you sufficiently, for the kind intention of your obliging favor of the 18th instant. If the object of Mr. Langhorne, who to me in personal character is an entire stranger, was such as you suspect, it will appear from my answer to his letter, that he fell far short of his mark. But as the writer of it seems to be better known to you, and that you may be the better enabled to form a more correct opinion of the design, I take the liberty of transmitting a copy of it along with the answer. If they should be a means of detecting any nefarious plan of those, who are assailing the government in every shape that can be devised, I shall feel happy in having had it in my power to furnish them. If the case be otherwise, the papers may be committed to the flames, and the transaction buried in oblivion. To confess the truth, I considered Mr. Langhorne in my “mind’s eye” a pedant, who was desirous of displaying the flowers of his pen. In either case, I would thank you for the result of the investigation.”—Washington to John Nicholas, 30 November, 1797.