The Correspondence of Thomas Jefferson
By Subject
FOUNDERS
Your favor of August the 4th came to hand by our last post, together
with the "extract of a letter from a gentleman of Philadelphia,
dated July the 10th," cut from a newspaper stating some facts
which respect me. I shall notice these facts. The writer says that "the
day after the last despatches were communicated to Congress, Bache,
Leib, etc., and a Dr. Reynolds, were
closeted with me." If the receipt of visits in my public
room, the door continuing free to every one who should call at the
same time, may be called closeting, then it is true that I was
closeted with every person who visited me; in no other sense
is it true as to any person. I sometimes received visits from Mr.
Bache and Dr. Leib. I received them always with pleasure, because they
are men of abilities, and of principles the most friendly to liberty
and our present form of government. Mr. Bache has another claim on my
respect, as being the grandson of Dr. Franklin, the greatest man and
Ornament of the age and country in which he lived. Whether I was
Visited by Mr. Bache or Dr. Leib the day after the communication
referred to, I do not remember. I know that all my motions in
Philadelphia, here, and everywhere, are watched and recorded. Some of
these spies, therefore, may remember better than I do, the dates of
these visits.
to Samuel Smith, 22 August 1798
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