That was his concern, not mine, and his character was sufficient to
sustain the responsibility for it. I knew, too, that if an uncandid use
should be made of it, there would be found those who would so prove it.
Independent of the terms of intimate friendship on which Mr. Giles and
myself have ever lived together, the world's respect entitled him to
the justice of my testimony to any truth he might call for; and how that
testimony should connect me with whatever he may do or write hereafter,
and with his whole career, as you apprehend, is not understood by me.
With his personal controversies I have nothing to do. I never took any
part in them, or in those of any other person. Add to this, that the
statement I have given him on the subject of Mr. Adams, is entirely
honorable to him in every sentiment and fact it contains. There is not
a word in it which I would wish to recall. It is one which Mr. Adams
himself might willingly quote, did he need to quote any thing. It was
simply, that during the continuance of the embargo, Mr. Adams informed
me of a combination (without naming any one concerned in it), which had
for its object a severance of the Union, for a time at least. That Mr.
Adams and myself not being then in the habit of mutual consultation and
confidence, I considered it as the stronger proof of the purity of his
patriotism, which was able to lift him above all party passions when
the safety of his country was endangered.
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