With respect to the tour my friends to the north have proposed that I
should make in that quarter, I have not made up a final opinion. The
course of life which General Washington had run, civil and military,
the services he had rendered, and the space he therefore occupied in the
affections of his fellow-citizens, take from his examples the weight of
precedents for others, because no others can arrogate to themselves the
claims which he had on the public homage. To myself, therefore, it comes
as a new question, to be viewed under all the phases it may present.
I confess, that I am not reconciled to the idea of a chief magistrate
parading himself through the several States as an object of public gaze,
and in quest of an applause, which, to be valuable, should be purely
voluntary. I had rather acquire silent good will by a faithful discharge
of my duties, than owe expressions of it to my putting myself in the way
of receiving them. Were I to make such a tour to Portsmouth or Portland,
I must do it to Savannah, perhaps to Orleans and Frankfort. As I have
never yet seen the time when the public business would have permitted me
to be so long in a situation in which I could not carry it on, so I have
no reason to expect that such a time will come while I remain in office.
A journey to Boston or Portsmouth, after I shall be a private citizen,
would much better harmonize with my feelings, as well as duties; and,
founded in curiosity, would give no claims to an extension of it.
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