One cannot read long the columns of the _Jersey Chronicle_ without realizing forcibly the change that had come over Freneau. The poet who emerged from the crucible of the _National Gazette_ was not at all like the poet of "The House of Night" period. He could look upon this product of his early imagination much as Madison would have done, and he could in cold blood cut it down to a mere fragment which would voice his new French Deistic ideas, that he might have room for his Republican songs. The poem "To the Americans of the United States," written in 1797, gives us a true picture of this later Freneau. He would be no courtly singer "beneath some great man's ceiling placed," no solitary dreamer. He would be a man of action travelling over lands and seas, a poet who caught his subjects from the varying scene of human things. "To seize some _features_ from the faithless past; Be this our care--before the century close: The colours strong! for, if we deem aright, The _coming age will be an age of prose_: When _sordid cares_ will break the muses' dream, And COMMON SENSE be ranked in seat supreme." With the fifty-second number of the _Chronicle_, published April 30, 1796, the paper came to an end. Freneau's final editorial stated that: "In number one of the Jersey Chronicle the editor announced his intention of extending the publication beyond the first year, provided the attempt should in the meantime be suitably encouraged and found practicable. But the necessary number of subscribers having not yet appeared, scarcely to defray the expenses of the undertaking, notwithstanding the very low rate at which it has been offered, the editor with some regret declines a further prosecution of his plan at this time. He embraces the present opportunity to return his sincere thanks to such persons in this and the neighboring counties as have favored him with their subscriptions; and have also by their punctuality in complying with the terms originally proposed, thus far enabled him to issue a free, independent, and republican paper." A letter[16] written by Freneau from New York, to Madison, dated December 1, 1796, reveals what was in the poet's mind during the months following the abandonment of the _Chronicle_: