We have been unfortunate in our first military essays by land. Our men are good, but our generals unqualified. Every failure we have incurred has been the fault of the general, the men evincing courage in every instance. At sea we have rescued our character; but the chief fruit of our victories there is to prove to those who have fleets, that the English are not invincible at sea, as Alexander has proved that Bonaparte is not invincible by land. How much to be lamented that the world cannot unite and destroy these two land and sea monsters! The one drenching the earth with human gore, the other ravaging the ocean with lawless piracies and plunder. Bonaparte will die, and the nations of Europe will recover their independence with, I hope, better governments. But the English government never dies, because their king is no part of it, he is a mere formality, and the real government is the aristocracy of the country, for their House of Commons is of that class. Their aim is to claim the dominion of the ocean by conquest, and to make every vessel navigating it pay a tribute to the support of the fleet necessary to maintain that dominion, to which their own resources are inadequate. I see no means of terminating their maritime dominion and tyranny but in their own bankruptcy, which I hope is approaching. But I turn from these painful contemplations to the more pleasing one of my constant friendship and respect for you. JOHN ADAMS TO THOMAS JEFFERSON. QUINCY, July 15, 1813. Never mind it, my dear Sir, if I write four letters to your one, your one is worth more than my four. It is true that I can say, and have said, nothing new on the subject of government. Yet I did say in my defence and in my discourses on Davila, though in an uncouth style, what was new to Locke, to Harrington, to Milton, to Hume, to Montesquieu, to Rousseau, to Turgot, to Condorcet, to Rochefaucault, to Price, to Franklin, and to yourself; and at that time to almost all Europe and America. I can prove all this by indisputable authorities and documents. Writings on government had been not only neglected, but discountenanced and discouraged throughout all Europe, from the restoration of Charles the Second in England, till the French revolution commenced. The English commonwealth, the fate of Charles the 1st, and the military despotism of Cromwell, had sickened mankind with disquisitions on government to such a degree, that there was scarcely a man in Europe who had looked into the subject. David Hume had made himself so fashionable with the aid of the court and clergy, Atheist, as they called him, and by his elegant lies against the republicans and gaudy daubings of the courtiers, that he had nearly laughed into contempt Rapin, Sydney, and even Locke. It was ridiculous and even criminal in almost all Europe to speak of constitutions, or writers upon the principles or the fabrics of them.