He afterwards called on me
at that place, on his way to a meeting of the society, and after a whole
evening of consultation, he left that place fully determined to use
all his endeavors for its total suppression. But he found it so firmly
riveted in the affections of the members, that, strengthened as they
happened to be by an adventitious occurrence of the moment, he could
effect no more than the abolition of its hereditary principle. He called
again on his return, and explained to me fully the opposition which had
been made, the effect of the occurrence from France, and the difficulty
with which its duration had been limited to the lives of the present
members. Further details will be found among my papers, in his and
my letters, and some in the _Encyclopedic Methodique et Dictionnaire
d'Economic Politique_, communicated by myself to M. Meusnier, its
author, who had made the establishment of this society the ground, in
that work, of a libel on our country.
The want of some authority which should procure justice to the public
creditors, and an observance of treaties with foreign nations, produced,
some time after, the call of a convention of the States at Annapolis.
Although, at this meeting, a difference of opinion was evident on the
question of a republican or kingly government, yet, so general through
the States was the sentiment in favor of the former, that the friends
of the latter confined themselves to a course of obstruction only, and
delay, to every thing proposed; they hoped, that nothing being done,
and all things going from bad to worse, a kingly government might be
usurped, and submitted to by the people, as better than anarchy and
wars, internal and external, the certain consequences of the present
want of a general government.
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