_Mr. Vice-President and Gentlemen of the Senate_:
It would be an affectation in me to dissemble the pleasure I feel on
receiving this kind address.
My long experience of the wisdom, fortitude, and patriotism of the
Senate of the United States enhances in my estimation the value of those
obliging expressions of your approbation of my conduct, which are a
generous reward for the past and an affecting encouragement to constancy
and perseverance in future.
Our sentiments appear to be so entirely in unison that I can not but
believe them to be the rational result of the understandings and the
natural feelings of the hearts of Americans in general on contemplating
the present state of the nation.
While such principles and affections prevail they will form an
indissoluble bond of union and a sure pledge that our country has no
essential injury to apprehend from any portentous appearances abroad.
In a humble reliance on Divine Providence we may rest assured that
while we reiterate with sincerity our endeavors to accommodate all our
differences with France, the independence of our country can not be
diminished, its dignity degraded, or its glory tarnished by any nation
or combination of nations, whether friends or enemies.