Your favor of the 12th: instant came to hand this morning, and I am greatly obliged by the kind invitation it contains to join you & my cousin at Trenton, which it would give me great pleasure to do immediately, but for the desire I feel of procuring an office in to which I may enter immediately on my return to the City.1 The inhabitants are daily flocking to town, but I have not thought it perfectly safe to venture in myself; the moment however, that I can secure my object, I will pay my duty to you at Trenton.

The strain of levity, that ran through my last letter to you, deserved the reproof it has met with in your reply, which though gentle and indulgent, will not fail to persuade me that gravity is an attribute of wisdom, though its opposite may not always be an indication of folly.2

I remember once to have asked my brother, while we were in Holland, how he contrived to make so many precious confessions, respecting himself, in his letters to you and my mother? Observing at the same time, that I had not the courage to do it. His reply was, that “he regarded that freedom of communication between children & parents as a sort of moral obligation, the practise of which served to create & confirm reciprocal confidence.” I was struck with the sentiment & endeavored thenceforward to adopt it, so far as I was capable, and though feelingly alive to either censure or praise, which such ingenuousness may draw upon me, I still believe in its utility, to correct the evil or to confirm the good propensities of nature or habit.

I should have been more convinced of the extravagance of my surmise respecting the influence of wisdom’s rival upon the generality of mortals, if the instance you adduce, wherein wisdom triumphed, had not claimed “descent from heaven” and “birth of heav’nly race.” The labor & difficulty of the victory was judged a task worthy of Hercules the son of Jove.3

The “lesson of wisdom from a negro,” is, I hope, rather designed for instruction than imitation; under this impression I shall be glad to profit by it.

Of one thing, if I know my own heart, I can venture to assure you, that I will never alter my present situation in life, until I shall have been fortunate enough to find “a point on which I can stand,” without a prop.4 I wish this assurance may be believed, because if there exists a jealousy of me on any score, I think it is this. My use of the 15 word Mistress in my last, was rather in a figurative than a literal sense, but most assuredly in no other than a “lawful, delicate & honorable one.” Had I been aware of the construction it admitted, I might have been more cautious in the use of it.

I received a letter from my brother this morning, via New York dated at Töepliz 16 August. He had just recovered from a violent attack of intermittent fever, but hoped benefit from the waters of that place, which are said to be efficacious in such disorders. He writes me nothing so new as what we have in the papers.

I am with true respect & attachment / Dear Sir, / Your Son

I received last night your favour of the 15th, the Sentiments and expressions of which are Such as cannot fail to render your Character Prosperity and Happiness more dear to me than ever.

An Office must be procured, and the Price or Rent must not be an Obstacle. I had rather pay for you a high Rent than you should not have an Office in Market or Chesnut Street.

Your Brothers Observations concerning the Confidence between Parents and Children require many restrictions, distinctions and Limitations. This great Relation and its Duties is a subject of too much magnitude for a Letter. The source of Revolution, Democracy, & Jacobinism in my opinion, has been a systematical dissolution of the true Family Authority. There can never be any regular Government of a Nation, without a marked Subordination of Mothers and Children to the Father. This Opinion is a Secret between you and me.— if you divulge it to any one, it will soon be known to all, and will infallibly raise a Rebellion against me. You may think I am returning Levity for Levity. But We shall understand one another more fully hereafter upon this subject.

Venere et Vino abstinuit, has been a trait in the Character of every 16 real great Man I ever knew or read of.—1 The Votaries of Bacchus and Venus never rise above Mediocrity and most commonly grovel on the ground. Minerva alone can conduct to Wisdom and her fruits. The Institution of Cyrus, & Telemachus are school Books, which because they lie upon the Shelf or the Table and are thumbed, from our Infancy at times and in parcells We suppose We have read: but very few have ever really read them. The Fable of the Choice of Hercules by Prodicus preserved by Xenophon in his memorabilia of Socrates, is a divine Morcel. Siluis Italicus has applied it to Scipio, in very elegant Latin Poetry.2 Your classical Taste will be highly gratified by a Perusal of all these.

If I were a young Man I should endeavour to find a young Wife, who would not be likely by her Fancies to send me to Prison for her debts, but I think nothing but a Necessity of going to Prison for my own debts without a Marriage of an Old Woman, though she were rich would induce me to think of it. The Conduct of Phœbe’s Husband therefore would not be an Object of Imitation for me.3

I have been young and know how tender ’tis to love. I have never dictated to my Children. Perhaps it would have been better in two Instances, if I had.— I wish them to Use a prudent Consideration, and not be led away by a very wild but a very fickle and transeint passion to take a step which they never can tread back, without being discr[…] sure that it does not lead to ruin.

With every sentiment of Kindness / I am &c