When the eight years of presidential life were over, Jackson sent his farewell address to the people of the country, who had idolized him, and whom he had loved, he said, "with the affection of a son," and retired to the Hermitage. The people of Nashville met him with outstretched arms and tearful faces. He was seventy years old, _their_ President, and he had come home to live and die with them. He was now through with politics, and wanted to carry out _her_ wishes, to join the little Hermitage church. The night of decision was full of meditation and prayer. One morning in 1843, the church was crowded to see the ex-President make a public confession of the Christian religion. He went home to read his Bible more carefully than ever--he had never read less than three chapters daily for thirty-five years, such is the influence of early education received at a mother's knee. The following year, 1844, Commodore Elliot offered the sarcophagus which he brought from Palestine, believed to have contained the remains of the Roman Emperor, Alexander Severus, to President Jackson for his final resting-place. A letter of cordial thanks was returned, with the words, "I cannot consent that my mortal body shall be laid in a repository prepared for an emperor or a king. My republican feelings and principles forbid it; the simplicity of our system of government forbids it.... I have prepared an humble depository for my mortal body beside that wherein lies my beloved wife, where, without any pomp or parade, I have requested, when my God calls me to sleep with my fathers, to be laid." The May of 1845 found General Jackson feeble and emaciated, but still deeply interested in his country, writing letters to President Polk and other statesmen about Texas, hoping ever to avert war if possible. "If not," he said, "let war come. There will be patriots enough in the land to repel foreign aggression, come whence it may, and to maintain sacredly our just rights and to perpetuate our glorious constitution and liberty, and to preserve our happy Union." He made his will, bequeathing all his property to his adopted son, because, said he, "If _she_ were alive, she would wish him to have it all, and to me her wish is law."