But in 1801 the spirited administration of Adams came to an end. He had favored the payment of the national debt; he had dared to anticipate the future, to impose taxes and provide ships; he had aided the formation of a military academy and advocated a system of coast-defence, and had boldly asserted our national rights against the French Republic; and yet he loved peace so well, that, against the advice and wishes of his party and his cabinet, he sent a minister to France, who made an honorable treaty. Posterity sees little to censure in all these measures, for they evince the courage and forecast of the great Statesman of the Revolution; but they were assailed by his opponents, and aided in effecting his defeat. Jefferson came into power as the advocate of retrenchment and reform,--captivating terms! Under his administration the military academy was thrown into the shade, the coast-defences were forgotten, most of the new frigates and sloops built by patriotic citizens were sold, the navy reduced to ten frigates, half of which were suffered to decay, the frames of the ships of the line were used for repairs, and the appropriations for the increase of the navy were reduced to the pitiful sum of a quarter of a million, which was applied principally to gunboats. Of these Jefferson built no less than one hundred and seventy, at a cost of $10,500 each,--incurring for the construction and maintenance of this flotilla an expense of nearly three millions, without a particle of benefit to the country. We would not detract from the services of Jefferson. Posterity will honor him as the Patriot of the Revolution, as the champion of the rights of man; but will it not trace to his policy as a statesman, in the cabinet of Washington, in the opposition to Adams, and in the office of President, the grave errors from which sprang the embargo, non-intercourse, and the second war with England? At the close of his administration in 1809, he claimed credit for having left eighteen millions in the Treasury after payment of twenty-six millions of the debt of the Revolution in less than seven years, and his successor, Madison, in 1812, had over eleven millions in funds and cash in the Treasury after the extinguishment of forty-nine millions of the Revolutionary debt,--the expenses of Government, in the mean time, exclusive of the debt, having averaged from five to seven millions only. But parsimony is not always economy. The embargo cost the nation at least forty millions; non-intercourse twenty more; the war in three years added one hundred and thirteen millions to the debt, with at least an equal loss by the sacrifice of commerce and heavy drafts by taxes: and if the embargo, non-intercourse, and war can be traced to the loss of the navy, we find a saving of a million per annum in ships dearly purchased by a loss of capital which, at compound interest, would exceed to-day one-third the computed wealth of the nation.