TO DOCTOR BENJAMIN RUSH.

Poplar Forest, December 5, 1811.

Dear Sir,

While at Monticello I am so much engrossed by business or society, that
I can only write on matters of strong urgency. Here I have leisure, as
I have every where the disposition, to think of my friends. I recur,
therefore, to the subject of your kind letters relating to Mr. Adams
and myself, which a late occurrence has again presented to me. I
communicated to you the correspondence which had parted Mrs. Adams and
myself, in proof that I could not give friendship in exchange for such
sentiments as she had recently taken up towards myself, and avowed and
maintained in her letters to me. Nothing but a total renunciation of
these could admit a reconciliation, and that could be cordial only in
proportion as the return to ancient opinions was believed sincere. In
these jaundiced sentiments of hers I had associated Mr. Adams, knowing
the weight which her opinions had with him, and notwithstanding she
declared in her letters that they were not communicated to him. A late
incident has satisfied me that I wronged him as well as her in not
yielding entire confidence to this assurance on her part. Two of the Mr.
------, my neighbors and friends, took a tour to the northward during
the last summer. In Boston they fell into company with Mr. Adams, and by
his invitation passed a day with him at Braintree. He spoke out to
them every thing which came uppermost, and as it occurred to his mind,
without any reserve, and seemed most disposed to dwell on those things
which happened during his own administration. He spoke of his masters,
as he called his Heads of departments, as acting above his control, and
often against his opinions. Among many other topics, he adverted to
the unprincipled licentiousness of the press against myself, adding, 'I
always loved Jefferson, and still love him.'

This is enough for me. I only needed this knowledge to revive towards
him all the affections of the most cordial moments of our lives.
Changing a single word only in Dr. Franklin's character of him, I
knew him to be always an honest man, often a great one, but sometimes
incorrect and precipitate in his judgments: and it is known to those who
have ever heard me speak of Mr. Adams, that I have ever done him justice
myself, and defended him when assailed by others, with the single
exception as to his political opinions. But with a man possessing so
many other estimable qualities, w