George Washington Papers

To George Washington from Ezra Stiles, 9 November 1786

From Ezra Stiles

Yale College [Conn.] Nov. 9. 1786.

Sir

Permit me to ask your Acceptance of an Election Sermon, which the Reverend Mr Morse a Tutor in this College will have the Honor to present to you.1 I know you must feel sollicitous for the Tumults in Massachusetts. They are doubtless magnified at a Distance. I confide in it that there is Wisdom in the Legislature of that State sufficient to rectify the public Disorders and recover the public Peace and Tranquillity. Perhaps all Things are cooperating & conspiring to effect the public Conviction of the Expediency & Necessity of a Cession of further Powers to Congress, adequate to the political Administration of a new and great Republic, to whose Origination your great Services have so highly contributed.2 I have the Honor to be, Sir, Your most obedt Very hble servt

Ezra Stiles

ALS, DLC:GW.

1Ezra Stiles (1727–1795), president of Yale College, sent GW a copy of the second, corrected edition of his The United States Elevated to Glory and Honor, a sermon that he delivered at the annual election on 8 May 1783 before Gov. Jonathan Trumbull and the Connecticut legislature in Hartford. This edition was printed at Worcester, Mass., by Isaiah Thomas in 1785, and GW’s copy is inscribed by Stiles, “General Washington, Ezra Stiles.” Stiles earlier had presented GW with the initial edition printed in 1783 in New Haven by Thomas & Samuel Green. He inscribed this: “His Excellency General Washington, from his most humble Servt Ezra Stiles” (Griffin, Boston Athenæum Collection, description begins Appleton P. C. Griffin, comp. A Catalogue of the Washington Collection in the Boston Athenæum. Cambridge, Mass., 1897. description ends 194).

2GW’s acknowledgment of this letter and its enclosures is printed in note 1, Stiles to GW, 7 Feb. 1787.

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