MR. PETER MILLER, President of the Cloister at Ephrata.
_To the Memory of the Honourable Thomas Penn, Esq. who died March 21.
1775._
Peace, worthy shade! Peace to thy virtuous soul;
Life’s contest past, thou now hast gain’d the goal,
Destin’d for honest innate truth, like thine,
Where moral goodness rises to divine.
True to thy friendship, sacred to each trust,
In every duty most exactly just:
A princely wealth fill’d not thy heart with pride,
Thou nobly cast the glitt’ring bait aside;
Made it subservient to some useful aim,
Some gen’rous purpose, or some proper claim:
As bounteous streams in pleasing currents glide,
It roll’d, refreshing, like some charming tide;
Cheer’d the lone widow in her humble dome,
And scatter’d comfort o’er her lonely home.
Thy guardian angel snatch’d thee from below,
E’er Pennsylvania was consign’d to woe:
Thou now may’st view, without one kindred tear,
What we deem harsh, oppressive and severe;—
Life’s motley picture, at one view, may’st scan,—
Unwind its tangled, complicated plan,—
Where this great truth is clearly understood,
That “partial evil’s universal good.”
In broken parts, man the dark system spies,
While all lies open to celestial eyes;
The links, united, of our scatter’d chain,
Shew why PENN suffer’d tedious years of pain,—
Shew why one patient virtuous mind doth mourn,
And why sweet Peace is from a people torn.
For, individuals of earth’s humble vale
Mount, in gradation, on a heav’nly scale:
Yet _Virtue_, only, has a charm in death;
Wealth droops his plumes, as man resigns his breath;
Its social merits can’t ascend the skies,
Terrestrial substance can’t to heav’n arise;
Too gross to enter the abodes divine,
In earthly darkness it can only shine.
_Letter from General Washington to the Writer of these Memoirs._
_Mount Vernon, Sep. 7th. 1788._
Sir,
At the same time I announce to you the receipt of your obliging letter
of the 28th of last month, which covered an ingenious essay on
Heraldry, I have to acknowledge my obligations for the sentiments your
partiality has been indulgent enough to form of me, and my thanks for
the terms in which your urbanity has been pleased to express them.
Imperfectly acquainted with the subject, as I profess myself to be;
and persuaded of your skill, as I am; it is far from my design to
intimate an opinion, that Heraldry, Coat-Armour, &c, might not be
rendered conducive to public and private uses, with us,—or, that they
can have any tendency _unfriendly to the purest spirit of
Republicanism_: on the contrary, a different conclusion is deducible
from the practice of Congress and the States; all of which have
established some kind of _Armorial Devices_, to authenticate their
official instruments. But, sir, you must be sensible, that political
sentiments are very various among the people in the several states;
and that a formidable opposition to what appears to be the prevailing
sense of the Union, is but just declining into peaceable acquiescence.
While, therefore, the minds of a certain portion of the community
(possibly from turbulent or sinister views) are, or affect to be,
haunted with the very _spectre of innovation_;—while they are
indefatigably striving to make the credulity of the less-informed part
of the citizens subservient to their schemes, in believing that the
proposed General Government is pregnant with the seeds of
Discrimination, Oligarchy and Despotism;—while they are clamourously
endeavouring to propagate an idea, that those whom they wish,
invidiously, to designate by the name of the “well-born,” are
meditating in the first instance to distinguish themselves from their
compatriots, and to wrest the dearest privileges from the bulk of the
people; and while the apprehensions of _some_, who have demonstrated
themselves the sincere, but too jealous, friends of Liberty, are
feelingly alive to the effects of the actual Revolution and too much
inclined to coincide with the prejudices above described,—it might not
perhaps be advisable to stir any question that would tend to reanimate
the dying embers of faction, or blow the dormant spark of jealousy
into an inextinguishable flame. I need not say, that the deplorable
consequences would be the same, allowing there should be no real
foundation for jealousy: (in the judgment of sober reason,) as if
there were demonstrable, even palpable, causes for it.
I make these observations with the greater freedom, because I have
once been a witness to what I conceived to have been a most
unreasonable prejudice, against an innocent institution: I mean, the
Society of the Cincinnati. I was conscious that my own proceedings on
that subject were immaculate. I was also convinced, that the
members,—actuated by motives of sensibility, charity and
patriotism,—were doing a laudable thing, in erecting that memorial of
their common services, sufferings and friendships;—and I had not the
most remote suspicion, that our conduct therein would have been
unprofitable, or unpleasing to our countrymen. Yet have we been
virulently traduced, as to our designs: and I have not even escaped
being represented as short-sighted, in not foreseeing the
consequences,—or wanting in patriotism, for not discouraging an
establishment, calculated to create distinctions in society and
subvert the principles of a republican government. Indeed, the
_phantom_ seems now to be pretty well laid; except on certain
occasions,—when it is conjured up, by designing men, to work their own
purposes upon terrified immaginations:—You will recollect there have
not been wanting, in the late political discussions, those who were
hardy enough to assert, that the proposed General Government was the
wicked and traitorous fabrication of the Cincinnati!
At this moment of general agitation and earnest solicitude, I should
not be surprised to hear a violent outcry raised, by those who are
hostile to the New Constitution, that the proposition contained in
your paper had verified their suspicions, and proved the design of
establishing unjustifiable discriminations. Did I believe that to be
the case, I should not hesitate to give it my hearty disapprobation.
But I proceed on other grounds:—Although I make not the clamour of
credulous, disappointed, or unreasonable men, the criterion of Truth;
yet, I think, their clamour might have an ungracious influence at the
present critical juncture: and, in my judgment, some respect should
not only be paid to prevalent opinions,—but even some sacrifices might
innocently be made to well meant prejudices, in a popular government.
Nor could we hope the evil impression would be sufficiently removed,
should your Account, and Illustrations, be found adequate to produce
conviction on candid and unprejudiced minds.
For myself, I can readily acquit you of having any design of
facilitating the setting up an “Order of Nobility:”—I do not doubt the
rectitude of your intentions. But, under the existing circumstances, I
would willingly decline the honour you have intended me, by your
polite INSCRIPTION; if there should be any danger of giving serious
pretext (however ill-founded in reality) for producing or confirming
jealousy and dissention, in a single instance; when harmony and
accommodation are most essentially requisite to our public
prosperity,—perhaps, to our national existence.
My remarks, you will please to observe, go only to the expediency, not
to the merits of the proposition: what may be necessary and proper
hereafter, I hold myself incompetent to decide; as I am but a private
citizen. You may, however, rest satisfied, that your composition is
calculated to give favourable impressions of the science, candour and
ingenuity, with which you have handled the subject; and that, in all
personal considerations, I remain with great esteem, Sir, your most
obedient and most humble servant,