21To John Adams from Richard Rush, 30 November 1813 (Adams Papers)
I had hoped that this letter would have shaped itself by some of the agreeable topicks touched in your two most agreeable favors of the 5th and 20th; the former of which my better half has put into one of her own drawers claiming it as her own property and desiring her most dutiful compliments and acknowledgements for the handsome things said of her; and the latter of which I received...
22To John Adams from Richard Rush, 18 July 1812 (Adams Papers)
I beg you will do me the honor to accept a Copy of a discourse I delivered on the 4th of July at this place. The present crisis of our country, sir, is most momentous; but it seems greatly to be feared that the powerful and intelligent state of Massachusetts will not yield her zealous cooperation to the nation in its present struggle. With constant wishes for your health and happiness allow...
23To John Adams from Richard Rush, 20 April 1814 (Adams Papers)
After having read, for a fifth time, the elegant letter of Mr. J. Q. Adams, I return it with renewed thanks; and as in the postscript to your favor of the 6th instant I think I recognise the hand writing of Mrs Adams, I must beg my respectful compliments and thanks to her also, to whom I feel indebted in part for the pleasure and benefit of perusing the letter in question. And next, sir, for...
24To John Adams from Richard Rush, 29 September 1816 (Adams Papers)
For the first time since I was a lad, I have been making an excursion this season. Health and recreation were the double motive, though I am glad to say the latter predominated. I set out on horseback for the mountains in Virginia. I had never been into the antient dominion before, except merely upon its edge. Although it is filled with “Blenheims,” and “Hagleys” and “Mount Airys.” I was still...
25To John Adams from Richard Rush, 4 January 1811 (Adams Papers)
Encouraged by the very flattering permission you have given me, I am venturing to say to you in the form of a letter, (a liberty which I hope you will pardon,) that I have read the “review of the works of Fisher Ames.” And I must be allowed to say, that I have read it with the pleasure naturally belonging to the perusal of so able a performance. Although I carefully treasure up every thing...
26To John Adams from Richard Rush, 6 March 1815 (Adams Papers)
After thanking you, most cordially, for the affectionate interest you have taken in my late indisposition, I must now say that I have happily gotten rid of all my complaints. Daily rides and walks this fine weather, with fish, oysters, and other good things in moderation, are fast giving me my usual strength. I hope soon to be better than ever. The Jesuits bark I hope I shall be able to do...
27To John Adams from Richard Rush, 9 June 1816 (Adams Papers)
I think I must have been the debtor. But be that as it may, I seized, with equal avidity and delight the letter that had upon it the well-known and always welcome Quincy post mark and the commencement of which flattered me so much. Time and knowledge are powerful agents in working upon the judgment. I never knew Mr Dexter until the last supreme court. I had, indeed, seen him before, conversed...
28To John Adams from Richard Rush, 7 February 1814 (Adams Papers)
Mr Hay is the son in law of Mr Munroe, and the day after I received your last favor I took the liberty to read a passage from it to the latter. This morning he requested of me an extract of it to send to Mr Hay, saying that he knew how highly it would gratify him. I ha ve cheerfully consented. Thus, Sir, while your kind correspondence is a source of pleasure and of pride to me, I make it also...
29To John Adams from Richard Rush, 16 August 1815 (Adams Papers)
Grattan said of Burke lately, “that he had read more than all mankind, and that his command of history gave him the powers of prophecy.” I do not say it idly, sir,—I say it because I believe it,—the book of history lies more open to you than to any individual, at least, on this side of the water. Pray what is to be the end of the great scenes that are passing? What is to become of poor France?...
30To John Adams from Richard Rush, 11 May 1815 (Adams Papers)
The enclosed papers have just been sent on to R. Rush by this days southern mail, and he loses not a moment in forwarding them to Mr Adams, with renewed apologies, with renewed thanks, with cordial respects and compliments, with a hope that they will find him in his usual health. His mother also, under whose roof he now has the happiness to be a guest for a few days, desires that he will make...
31To John Adams from Richard Rush, 8 April 1811 (Adams Papers)
A day or two before I had the pleasure to receive your last valued favor of the 3rd of February, the governor of this state was pleased to honor me with the commission of Attorney general. It so happened that, at that moment our criminal courts here were upon the eve of sitting, which suddenly threw upon me a good deal of publick business. This is the chief cause to which I owe the loss, until...
32To John Adams from Richard Rush, 20 August 1815 (Adams Papers)
Your opportunities of obtaining correct information from St Petersburgh, were long superior to those of any one else. In the loss of your accustomed fountain of supply, I send you a few extracts that I have copied from a couple of letters lately received from Mr Harris. I think they will afford you pleasure. Mr Russel writes from Stockholm under date of May 27th, that, the crown Prince was so...
33To John Adams from Richard Rush, 25 December 1813 (Adams Papers)
Christmas Day I sit down to offer you the compliments of the season, in the most respectful, cordial, and friendly way in which they can be tendered. May you live to see many Christmases more, and may each find you in possession of health to enjoy the blessings and fame that surround you; of the faculties of a mind more full of wisdom as age continues to come over it; and of a heart still, as...
34To John Adams from Richard Rush, 31 December 1813 (Adams Papers)
Since writing the enclosed, which I wrote at home, I have come to the Treasury building where mr Nourse has stepped into my office to ask if I have heard any thing of the report of the morning. It seems it is, that a flag of truce arrived at Annapolis yesterday after a short passage from England with dispatches from Lord Castlereagh to our government, which came on by express from Annapolis to...
35To John Adams from Richard Rush, 27 January 1811 (Adams Papers)
I was more gratified sir, than I can express at the letter which you did me the honor to write to me. The very evening before it came to hand I had finished reading, in course, the last of the lectures upon rhetoric and oratory, which for several weeks had occasionally yielded me great delight during the intervals of a busy profession. The just and often original reflections which they...
36To John Adams from Richard Rush, 29 June 1813 (Adams Papers)
Your kind letter of the 13th has gratified me very much. When I spoke of New York having joined in with Pennsylvania and Virginia, I alluded to the issue of the late election for governor there. From a variety of local causes existing in that state, this last election seems to have been the only one they have had since the war began which fairly brought to a test the relative numbers of the...
37To John Adams from Richard Rush, 24 October 1813 (Adams Papers)
As soon as I received your acceptable and instructing letter of the 8th of this month, I wrote to a friend in Philadelphia, who is much in the literary and political way, to beg he would inform me, if he knew, who had been writing or preparing to write a commentary upon the “Defence of the American Constitutions,” for that I had understood there was such a work on hand, if not published. As to...
38To John Adams from Richard Rush, 7 January 1817 (Adams Papers)
The winter is always the busy season here. With me, it is especially so from the fortnight that precedes the session of the supreme court, until its close. Therefore, before the arrival of that time, I must, while I can, have the pleasure of writing to you. It is chiefly that I may thank you for one or two of your late favors. That from “Montezillo”, written on Christmas day, I have...
39To John Adams from Richard Rush, 27 March 1815 (Adams Papers)
Since writing to you this morning, I have determined upon doing a bold thing. I do not often write for the newspapers, as other duties and studies give me for the most part, as I would hope, better employment. But, a week or ten days ago, as the first small effort of industry after my recovery, I threw together some loose reflections upon our late war, which are here enclosed in three half...
40To John Adams from Richard Rush, 18 November 1816 (Adams Papers)
You have seen so much, read so much, and thought so much, of publick affairs under all aspects; you know so well what is becoming in national dignity and spirit, and what is due also to policy and seemliness, that I declare, according as your ripe judgment may disapprove or sanction the enclosed paper, will I either put it by, or lay it before those who have the power, if they think fit, to...
41To John Adams from Richard Rush, 8 November 1813 (Adams Papers)
According to the intimation contained in one of the letters I have had the pleasure to write to you, I took the liberty of enclosing to Mr St George Tucker, though entirely unknown to him; not the copy, but the original, of your favor to me of the 13th of August. It was the one in which you acknowledged the receipt of his beautiful little poem, and I was sure the original, in your own hand...
42To John Adams from Richard Rush, 17 June 1814 (Adams Papers)
Since you first allowed me the honor and gratification of corresponding with you, I have observed, that important events in the political world have trodden so closely upon each other that they interpose themselves between the successive favors I receive from you, and to such a degree as often to bear out of the view the subject of the last by drawing the eye towards some new occurrence, or...
43To John Adams from Richard Rush, 21 March 1814 (Adams Papers)
At the very beginning of the last month my new appointment was bestowed upon me, and I was suddenly thrown into the midst of the supreme court the very day after, without the least previous acquaintance with any of its business. There I have been, day in and day out, ever since until last thursday blundering on in an agony of embarrassment and ignorance, doing the business of the court and not...
44To John Adams from Richard Rush, 6 June 1813 (Adams Papers)
It was only the day before yesterday that Mr Andrew Eliot handed me your letter dated the 5th of May. Although you do not speak of him as being particularly known to you yet the mere circumstance of his bringing a letter to me from your hand was gratifying, and constitutes the highest claim to my attention to him. As yet I have seen him but once when he delivered it to me; but in whatever way...
45To John Adams from Richard Rush, 24 December 1814 (Adams Papers)
I do not know that I have ever yet made my acknowledgments to you for the favor you were kind enough to do me in sending me a letter by the Revd. Mr Everett. That I was not fortunate enough to make his acquaintance I consider a real loss. I knew of his being here only the day before he went away, and was unlucky enough, (a thing that very rarely happens with me,) to have an engagement that...
46To John Adams from Richard Rush, 2 October 1815 (Adams Papers)
I have been obliged within the last year or two to be very much of a law student. The solitude of Washington during the present and past season, has favored the habit; and for three or four months I have been reading and reading until I have found myself alternately a languid book-worm, and a heated enthusiast. The three last volumes of Robinson’s admiralty reports systematically; Pothier on...
47To John Adams from Richard Rush, 17 January 1814 (Adams Papers)
Timeo Danaos, et dona ferentes. Nothing can be more applicable to our situation, and the late offer of Britain. I repeated it in conversation a few days ago in the hearing of Mr Ingersoll, of the house or representatives from Pennsylvania, and I have since heard with pleasure that he took occasion to thunder it out in his place at the capitol, and that it caught the ear of the house to a...
48To John Adams from Richard Rush, 10 July 1812 (Adams Papers)
I beg you will do me the honor to accept a copy of a discourse I delivered on the 4th of July at this place. The present crisis of our country, Sir, is most momentous; but it seems greatly to be feared that the powerful and intelligent state of Massachusetts will not yield her zealous cooperation to the nation in its present struggle. With constant wishes for your health and happiness allow...
49To John Adams from Richard Rush, 25 September 1813 (Adams Papers)
I must be allowed to offer you my heartiest congratulations upon Commodore Perrys great victory on lake Erie. I know of nobody who will take as much pleasure in it as you. I know of nobody, sir, who has so just a title to rejoice at our splendid naval trophies as you. The Navy is yours. Hull must have been your officer. Decatur I know was. Bainbridge, Jones, Lawrence, Burrows, all of...
50To John Adams from Richard Rush, 13 November 1814 (Adams Papers)
Mr Dallas insists upon it that the emperor Alexander is a republican. As one proof of it he tells this anecdote. Conversing with Louis the 18th, he said “Sir, were I so happy as to reign over such a people as the French, it should be my study to make them perfectly free.” This is a noble sentiment even if it does not prove him a republican. Kings and Emperors, by the way, are very apt to be...
51To John Adams from Richard Rush, 17 April 1814 (Adams Papers)
You could have sent me no greater treat than the letter of Mr Adams which you were so kind as to enclose in your last favor. I had before now, and from the best sources, heard that his diplomatic correspondence on a file in the department of state exhibited when, taken from the beginning, a fulness, an elegance, an accuracy, an extent of observation, a sagacity, a profoundness of political...
52To John Adams from Richard Rush, 3 November 1815 (Adams Papers)
Professor Cooper of Carlisle in Pennsylvania, formerly Tom Cooper the friend of Dr Priestly, is, I imagine, one of the most learned men in this, or in any country. His genius is universal, and his attainments seem without limit. Abandoning politicks, he is more usefully engaged in scientifick and literary discussions. My father used to doubt whether he or Priestly had most knowledge. He now...
53To John Adams from Richard Rush, 24 August 1813 (Adams Papers)
Mr St George Tucker is, I believe, a native of one of the West India islands. He was brought to Virginia quite a boy before the revolution, fought with reputation at Camden as a militia major, was next a lawyer, and has held several civil stations in Virginia, where, as I understand, he has always been greatly esteemed for his virtues and learning. He is now, on the late appointment of...
54To John Adams from Richard Rush, 25 April 1815 (Adams Papers)
R. Rush presents his respectful compliments to Mr Adams, and begs leave to enclose him a note which he has just received from Mr Monroe. In consequence of it, R. R. has, in the face of all past trespasses, ventured to send the papers back again to Mr Monroe. This will add a few days more to delays hitherto incurred, but to such good purpose that R. R. flatters himself with the hope of...
55To John Adams from Richard Rush, 11 July 1814 (Adams Papers)
The pleasure I usually derive in opening a letter from you, was considerably abated at the receipt of your last favor, because it spoke of your indisposition. I hope the cessation of your north and north east winds, with a return of dryer weather, will have restored you to health. I hope that years of tranquility and happiness are yet to shine upon you before the close of your illustrious...
56To John Adams from Richard Rush, 20 May 1814 (Adams Papers)
On my return four day ago from Philadelphia where I had been for a fortnight I had the pleasure to find your favor of the 2d of this month which arrived during my absence, for which, as for all I get from you, I must return my thanks. One of the objects of my visit was to lay in a stock of new law books, as I hope, by hard study, to lay in a stock of law knowledge. At least I know this is my...
57To John Adams from Richard Rush, 13 July 1816 (Adams Papers)
In a letter from one of our family in Philadelphia, I am given to understand, that Mr Dellaplaine has, as yet, made no request for the little manuscript character alluded to in a former letter which I had the pleasure to write you. But I have obtained a copy of it, which I beg leave herewith to enclose. It may be much too imperfect for the publick eye. I will say this of it however, that as...
58Richard Rush’s Proposal that Thomas Jefferson become Secretary of State, 24 May 1812 (Jefferson Papers)
I enclose you a paper for your perusal and perhaps amusement. I mentioned to you lately that I had a great plan in my head.—a fortnight or three weeks ago it started to my reveries that Mr Jefferson ought to be called out, like an old pater patria , in a crisis like the present, and not suffered to repose upon his mountain. At length I determined he should be secretary of state again, which so...
59Richard Rush’s Account of a Visit to Montpellier and Monticello, 9 October 1816 (Jefferson Papers)
I have never seen Mr Madison so well fixed any where as on his estate in Virginia , not even before he was burnt out here. His house would be esteemed a good one for any of our country seats near Philadelphia , and is much larger than most of them. The situation is among mountains, and very beautiful. A fine estate surrounds him, at the head of which he appears to eminent advantage, as well in...
60Richard Rush to Thomas Jefferson, 20 October 1815 (Jefferson Papers)
R. Rush presents his compliments to M r Jefferson , and begs he will do him the honor to accept the little pamphlet herewith sent. RC ( MHi ); dateline at foot of text; addressed: “M r Jefferson”; endorsed by TJ as received 25 Oct. 1815 and so recorded in SJL . Enclosure: Rush, American Jurisprudence, written and published at Washington, being a few reflections suggested on reading “Wheaton on...
61Richard Rush to Thomas Jefferson, 12 June 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
I received, yesterday, your favor of the 31. of last month , and beg leave to return my warm thanks for your kind and obliging sympathy on the melancholy occasion of the death of my father . Few men, I believe, who have lived ever acted up more faithfully to what he took to be the line of rectitude and duty in all the actions of his laborious life; but in whatever lights he may have appeared...
62Richard Rush to Thomas Jefferson, 19 February 1817 (Jefferson Papers)
There are so many motives for visiting Monticello , that it is no wonder all are ambitious to do so. M r Derby , a gentleman of Boston and greatly in esteem among those who have the pleasure of his acquaintance, desires to pay his respects to you, and I know how largely I shall promote his gratification in thus affording him an opportunity. Inducements more than common, operate with M r Derby...
63Richard Rush to Thomas Jefferson, 13 November 1816 (Jefferson Papers)
I have to offer many apologies for detaining so long the letters you were kind enough to put into my hands , and which I now return. When I got back from my short, though most pleasant and gratifying excursion as far as Monticello , I sent them on to Philadelphia . Intending to go there in the course of the autumn, I did not ask that they should be transmitted back to me, preferring to bring...
64Richard Rush to Thomas Jefferson, 27 June 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
Immediately after the receipt of your favor of the 17th instant I wrote to Philadelphia , and have received from my mother an answer which I beg leave to lay before you, in her own words, as far as relates to the subject of our correspondence. “Both James and I have made search for the letters for Mr Jefferson ; the first he names (that of April 21. 1803 ) is not to be found; those I enclose...
65Richard Rush to Thomas Jefferson, 12 August 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
Since I had the pleasure to receive your letter of the 11th of last month , the two written to my father , mentioned in your favor to me of the 31. of May , have come to light. As was thought possible, they had been put away even with more care than the rest, and on that account were not found as soon as the rest. I lose no time in enclosing them to you, happy in accompanying them with the...
66Richard Rush to Thomas Jefferson, 18 July 1812 (Jefferson Papers)
By the mail of this day, I take the liberty to send you a small pamphlet , which I have to beg you will do me the honor to accept. That you may continue to be blessed with health in your retirement, and that your illustrious life may long be spared, is the wish of one who has the honor to subscribe himself, RC ( MHi ); at foot of text: “Ths: Jefferson, Esquire”; endorsed by TJ as received 23...
67To James Madison from Richard Rush, 12 February 1814 (Madison Papers)
Having received the commission of attorney general of the United states which you have been pleased to confer upon me, I have the honor to signify, respectfully, my acceptance of it. Amidst the sensibilities I feel at so signal a mark of confidence at your hands I can only say, that I am enabled to sustain the sense of responsibility it implies by nothing else than a consciousness of the good...
68To James Madison from Richard Rush, 24 September 1815 (Madison Papers)
Since the receipt of your letter of the 19th instant I have dropped a line to Mr Yates, and been with Mr Graham upon the subject of it. The case is, I hope, placed in a way to be satisfactorily adjusted. I enclose another letter from Mr. Dick. The accompanying documents to which he alludes, I have not thought it necessary to trouble you with. It does appear to me, that his sensibility has been...
69To James Madison from Richard Rush, 14 July 1816 (Madison Papers)
I had before observed, in the newspapers, some account of the affair of which Judge Tucker’s letter speaks more particularly. I doubt, from the state of the facts which he exhibits, if the case can be reached with any effect unless under the act of June 5. 1794. There may be difficulties even under this act. The pamphlet which I beg leave to enclose, will serve to show the footing upon which...
70To James Madison from Richard Rush, 13 September 1815 (Madison Papers)
I have just been favored with your confidential letter of the 11th instant, and will lose not a moment in adopting every possible precaution calculated to give effect to its just wishes. I am astonished at the gross indiscretion that could have dictated or permitted the measure, and you may confidently trust to its being defeated. With very cordial respect &c RC ( PHi : Richard Rush Papers).