eedy end, there are no means of knowing.
The trial and conviction of Lyon and Cooper under the Sedition Law,
aroused a burst of indignation from the people. Still it taught no
wisdom to Mr. Adams. He was urged to have their prosecutions abandoned,
but he refused. After conviction, he was seriously pressed to pardon
these men, in obedience to the popular will, but he persistently
refused, and Lyon was continued in prison until liberated by the
success of the Republican party, and the repeal of the offensive and
impolitic laws soon after.

Adams professed great veneration for the character of Washington, and
he was doubtless sincere. Yet he never lost sight of the fact that it
was he who had seconded the motion when made in Congress by Samuel
Adams to appoint Washington commander-in-chief of the armies of the
Revolution, or that it was he who suggested it to Samuel Adams, and
that he sustained the motion in a speech of burning eloquence. He felt
that this conferred an obligation and that Washington was at times
unmindful of this. He was more exacting than generous, and more
suspicious than confiding. In truth, Adams had more mind than soul;
more ambition than patriotism, and more impulse than discretion. Yet
the country owes him much. He was a great support in the cause of the
Revolution, and his folly was to charge too high for his services. The
people honored him--they have honored his family, and will yet make his
son President. He received all they could give, and his littleness
crept out in his desire for more.

General Washington's estimate of men was generally correct. He
understood Adams, Jefferson, Hamilton, and Burr. I do not think he was
personally attached to any one of them; yet he appreciated them as the
public now do. He had need of the talents of Hamilton and Jefferson.
The organization of the Government required the first minds of the
country; and Washington was the man to call them to his side. In
nothing did he show more greatness than in this. He knew Jefferson was
without principle, but he knew that he was eminently talented; he could
forget the one, and call to his aid the other. His confidence in the
integrity of Hamilton was stronger, as well as in his ability. Upon all
matters of deep concern to the country he consulted both, and these
consultations often brought these two men into antagonistical positions
before him, and upon important public matters--one of which was the
constitutionality of a