The enclosed resolution will inform you that Congress have thought it advisable to new model their department of foreign affairs, by the appointment of a Secretary, through whose hands the communications with their Ministers abroad are to pass. Though they did me the honor to elect me so long since as August last, I but lately determined to accept, and did not enter upon business till two days ago, so that you must not expect those minute communications, which I shall think it my duty to make to you when I have had leisure to arrange my department, and to acquaint myself more fully with the sentiments of Congress, which must upon the whole be my direction. I can only say in general, that we consider your situation as extremely delicate, the state you are in, divided by powerful parties, and the bias that every man has to his own country, naturally gives him a predilection for that which most favors its interests. But this, though the child of virtue, is often the greatest obstacle to successful negotiations; it creates distrust and jealousies; it excites prejudices, which unfit us for conciliating the affections of those whose assistance we require, and induce too fond a reliance upon the information of those who wish to serve us. Aristocratic governments are, of all others, the most jealous of popular commotions; the rich and the powerful are equally engaged to resist them, and nothing will, in my opinion, so soon contribute to a peace between England and the United Provinces as the commotions which now clog the government of the latter. You must, Sir, be infinitely better acquainted with the interior of the State you are in than I can pretend to be, and I rely much on your information for light, which I cannot attain here. If I venture to give you my sentiments, it is with the hope that you will correct my errors when I have discovered them by my freedom.