However gratified we may be, to witness the second, or third coming of an able, ardent, and ambitious politician, it is not in the gravest nature to restrain a smile, while we contrast that vehemence, which no time can temper--that _vis vivida vitæ_--ready for all things, in the forum or the field--that unquenchable fire, brightly burning, beneath the frost of more than seventy winters--with those sad infirmities of ace--those silver hairs--that one foot in the grave--the necessity of turning from all sublunary things, and making way for Heaven, under the pale rays of life's parting sun--those senatorial adieus--and long, last farewells--those solemn prayers and fervent hopes for the happiness of his associates, whom he should meet no more, on this side of the eternal world--those _esto perpetuas_ for his country! How touching these things would be, but for their frequency! What more natural, or more excusable, having enjoyed the luxury of leave-taking, than a desire--after a reasonable interval--to repeat the process, which afforded so much pleasure, and inflicted so little pain! As to my own comparatively humble relation to the public--_parvis componere magna_--I am of opinion, that I should gain nothing, by affecting to retire, or by pretending to be dead. As to the former, it may be as truly averred of sextons, as it was, by Mr. Jefferson, of office-holders--"_few die and none resign_;" and, in respect to the latter, I not only despise the idea of such an imposition upon the public, but have some little fear, that the affectation might be too suddenly followed, by the reality, as Dr. Robertson, rightly or wrongly, affirms it to have been, in the case of Charles the Fifth. I am now fairly committed, for the first number, at least, of another hundred, but for nothing more. I pretend not to look deeper into futurity, than six feet, which is the depth of a well-made grave. When I shall have completed the second hundred, and commenced upon a third, I shall be well nigh ready to exclaim, in the words of Ovid-- "Vixi Annos bis centum: nunc tertia vivitur ætas." A relation of liberty and equality is decidedly the best, for my reader and for me--I am not constrained to write, nor he to read--if he cannot lie cozily, in a grave of my digging--I do not propose to detain him there--to bury him alive. Dealing with the dead has not hardened my heart. I am a sexton of very considerable sensibility; and have, occasionally, mingled my tears with the earth, as I shovelled it in. In less figurative phrase, it is my desire to write, for my amusement, till one of us, the reader or myself, gives in, or gives out, and cries _enough_. I have a perfect respect for the old proverb, _de gustibus_, and by no means anticipate the pleasure of pleasing every body-- Men' moveat cimex Pantilius? aut cruciet, quod Vellicet absentem Demetrius? aut quod ineptus Fannius Hermogenis lædat conviva Tigelli?