terous and assuming, but quiet like the current of his life, and deep like the principles which guided it. When the world shall have sickened, and it is beginning to do so, of those great men who have sport ed with the passions, hopes and wants of humanity, and analyzes before it commends when it seeks a model to live by, rather than a hero to worship, and brazen-faced intellectual selfishness shall have given place to public spirit, and statesman and christian shall have become synonymous terms, then will the country be grateful for the example, as well as the services, of John Jay. It does not lie within the range of our plan to consider the political opinions, but simply to narrate some of the incidents in the life, and to sketch some of the traits in the character of this eminent man. John Jay was born in the City of New York, on the 12th of December, 1745. Mr. Jay's ancestors were Protestants, and prominent enough to attract the persecuting spirit of Popery, and firm enough in their principles to abandon their country, rather than their religion. His grand-father, Augustus Jay, was born in France, and came to this country in the latter part of the 17th century. Just before he emigrated, he had made a voyage to Africa. During his absence, his father had been compelled, on account of religious persecutions, to abandon his property in France, and seek shelter in England. Augustus Jay, when he reached France, and learned the fate of his father, had the good fortune to find a ship bound to Charleston, S. C. On reaching this country, he settled at New York, where he married in 1697, Miss Bayard, one of whose ancestors had been a Protestant professor of theology, in Paris, in the reign of Louis XIII., and who was driven from France by the Jesuit persecutions. Peter Jay, the son of Augustus, and the father of John, married in 1728, Miss Van Cortland, whose ancestors had been driven by the same persecutions, from Bohemia. The infatuation of those times, forced to this country many good men, of whom the old world was not worthy, and whom the new world so much needed. These men brought with them their principles, dearer for the sufferings which they occasioned; and from them sprung the Institutions of this country. Such were the high-principled ancestors of John Jay, and this short sketch of them, furnishes the key to his own character-well grounded principles stronger than power, stronger than temptation. Mr. Jay graduated at Columbia College, in 1764, and immediately entered upon the study of the Law in the City of New York. He was admitted to the Bar in 1768, and almost immediately acquired an extensive and lucrative practice. He soon formed a partnership with Robert R. Livingston, afterwards Chancellor of the State. This connection continued but for a short time. In 1774, he married the daughter of William Livingston, Governor of New Jersey. In May of the same year, upon the receipt of the news of the passage of the Boston Port Bill, the citizens of New York held a meeting, and chose Mr. Jay and others, a committee to correspond with the sister colonies, upon that subject. This committee was the first organized body in New York Colony, chosen in opposition to those measures which resulted in the Revolution. In July following Mr. Jay was elected a member of the Continental Congress, and was the writer of the address from that Congress to the people of Great Britain. From this time to 1778 he was constantly either a member of the Continental Congress, or in some prominent station in his native state, exchanging the one for the other, as the exigencies seemed to require. In 1778 he was a member of the New York Convention to form a State Constitution, and made the draught which was adopted. He was immediately appointed Chief Justice, and his former partner, Livingston, Chancellor. Mr. Jay was at the same time a prominent member of the Committee of Safety, a Committee which exercised nearly uncontrolled and undefined executive functions. The latter part of this year he was elected to Congress, resigned his office of Chief Justice of New York, the Governor attempting unsuccessfully to persuade him to hold both offices. He was soon after elected President of Congress. When the Governor of New York wrote to Jay requesting him to recall his resignation of the office of Chief Justice, he replied, adhering to the resolution which he had taken, and added "the legislature may perhaps in consequence of this step be induced to keep me in Congress. On this head I must inform you that the situation of my father's family is such that I cannot reconcile it to my ideas of filial duty to be absent from them, unless my brother should be so circumstanced as to pay them the necessary attention." At the same time he wrote to his brother as follows: "I am now to inform you that I have resigned the office of Chief Justice, and if the state should incline to keep me here, I shall consent to stay, provided either you or James will undertake to attend constantly to our good old father and his unfortunate family; otherwise I shall, at all events, return for that purpose. Make up your mind on this matter: if you cannot pay the necessary attention, prevent my election, and let me know your intention by the first opportunity." Arrangements were made to render the step which he had determined to take unnecessary and he remained President of Congress. This determination more unequivocably attests the true greatness of the man, than his appointment to all the important offices he ever filled. Aspiring politicians, under such circumstances, would have regarded infirm and unfortunate parents as clogs on their hasty feet, and looked on their homes as the last theatre for the exhibition of a lofty character. It is time we had learned to think and to feel that it is what we are, and not where we are, that elevates or degrades us. No man ever filled so high and varied trusts, or passed through exciting and trying scenes, more entirely anchored upon his own principles than John Jay. Always acting from well considered and firmly fixed opinions, his life exhibits no inconsistencies. The zealous performance of one duty was never allowed to interfere with another. Though one of the earliest and most constant friends of the Revolution, he exerted himself to moderate the resentment of the people against those who took up arms against the colonies, and to meliorate the condition of such of them as were suffering imprisonment. One instance of this kind is so characteristic of the man, and in such contrast with the times, that it may be well to mention it. A gentleman of New York having accepted a royal commission was, afterwards, by the casualties of war, made a prisoner and confined in the jail of Hartford. During his imprisonment Mr. Jay wrote him as follows: "How far your situation may be comfortable and easy I know not. It is my wish and shall be my endeavor that it be as much so as may be consistent with the interest of that great cause to which I have devoted everything I hold dear in this world. I have taken the liberty of requesting Mr. Samuel Broome immediately to advance you $100 on my account." No man more distinctly admitted the claims which country had upon him, or more fully met them. But he recognized no duties in patriotism inconsistent with the demands of christainity. In September, 1779, Mr. Jay was appointed minister plenipotentiary to Spain. During his residence in Spain he was appointed one of the Commissioners to negotiate peace with Great Britain. This last appointment caused him to remove to Paris. He remained in Paris five years, and until 1784, hore an important part in negotiating, and ultimately signed the definative treaty of peace with England. When he reached Paris he found only one of the Commissioners, Dr. Franklin, on the ground. As soon as the negotiation opened, Jay discovered that his duty to his country would require him to disobey the instructions of Congress, and to resist the intrigues of the French Court: that the American Commissioners, if they would preserve the real independence and dignity of their country, would be obliged to meet England not only without the aid but in opposition to the influence of France. All this he did without the aid and in opposition to the opinion of Dr. Franklin. Mr. Adams subsequently arrived, and concurred in the course which Jay had adopted; and Dr. Franklin ultimately came into the same view. This was a trying emergency. Jay alone was to give a direction to the negotiation which was of the first importance to his country, then struggling for independence. He had the instructions of his country, and these he was obliged to disobey. He had but one associate, and his opinionand that a weighty one-he was obliged to disregard. In this crisis, suited to raise a great man, and crush a feeble one, Jay stood unmoved. In resisting the intrigues of France, in piloting his country through the dangers which surrounded it, in snatching it from the attitude of being the foot-ball of European belligerents, in preserving the independence of his nation from the intrigues of diplomacy more dangerous to it than the arms of England: in securing the blessings of peace without planting the seeds of future irritation and wars-his directness and honesty were more than a match for the artful diplomacy by which he was opposed. He baffled the Courts of France and Spain, simply because he did not use their instruments. They were prepared to meet and vanquish an intriguing negotiator. But they were unprepared to resist a frank one, who avowed his object, and set to work to reach it by direct means. None but a pure man could, or would have taken the bold step which Jay adopted. The mere politician would have faltered and left his country to be the plaything of Europe. But the exigency was suited to such a character as Jay's. He saw the line of duty which the good, in opposition to the instructions, of his country required him to pursue; and he adopted it as calmly as he gave an order to relieve a royalist in jail. Having accomplished the objects of his appointment abroad, he returned from Europe in 1784, and upon his return he found that Congress, the body whose instructions he had disobeyed, had appointed him Secretary of Foreign Affairs-an office corresponding to the present Department of State. This appointment indicates the fact that Congress saw and appreciated the propriety of Jay's conduct abroad; that if they could have foreseen the exigency, there would have been no conflict between their instructions and his proceedings. Jay was at the same time solicited to be Governor of New York. This he declined, and accepted the first named appointment. In this situation he soon felt and saw the inefficiency of the old confederation, and he soon after opened a correspondence with Washington and other leading men of the country upon the subject of forming a national government. The Convention soon followed, and a Constitution was proposed. Mr. Jay's attendance upon Congress as Secretary of Foreign Affairs, prevented his being a delegate to the Convention which formed the Constitution. As soon as the Constiution was formed and proposed to the people, a contest commenced more important, as we have said, than the war of the Revolution, and upon the issue of which more doubt was suspended. Mr. Jay's efforts to procure the adoption of the Constitution were uninterrupted and efficient, and felt in every State. His agency with Hamilton and Madison in writing the Federalist, and the influence of those Essays, are well known. But in addition to his general efforts for the benefit of the whole country, which was then vibrating upon the question of adopting the proposed Constitution, Mr. Jay and a few others were relied upon to bring the important State of New York to adopt it. The exertions necessary to this result may be inferred from the fact that when the New York delegates to decide upon the Constitution were elected, eleven were in favor of adopting it, forty-six against it. Hamilton and Jay were among the former, and in the end New York adopted the Constitution by a majority of three. Encountering the prejudices of those who feared that the Constitution confided too much in the people, and those who thought that too much discretion was given to the Government; of those who deemed it more important that they should be great men, than that their country should be happy, and of those who thought freedom and security in some degree incompatible-the adoption of the Constitution is the most wonderful as well as the important event in our history. Mr. Jay's agency in producing this result alone would be sufficient to establish his claims to the affectionate respect and exalted estimation of his countrymen. Real greatness in a man lies largely in an understanding of truth and duty, and a rigid adherence to them. And the same traits of character which made Mr. Jay devoted to duty, gave him the confidence in man, by which he put trust in a federate republican government-not that confidence which would deify the passions of men, but which saw in man the image of the Diety in spite of them. Mr. Jay used to remark that if men would never forget that the world was under the guidance of a Providence which never erred, it would save much useless anxiety, and prevent a great many mistakes. This trust was the foundation of his faith and success. He never feared or doubted. During the revolution, his difficult negotiations for peace, the conflicts upon the Constitution, and the controversy about his Treaty with England, he never for a moment distrusted the result. All his letters, conversation and conduct, indicate a consciousness of having stood by the right, and a confidence that right would prevail. The Federal Constitution being adopted, and Washington elected President, he requested Jay to select the situation in the General Government which he might prefer. This offer could be given to no other man in the country, and it indicates the estimate which a keen discerner of character placed upon Jay. He selected the office of Chief Justice of the United States. He accepted this place rather as the post of duty, than honor. His charac ter was suited to this station. It accords with all our notions of fitness to see such a man in the highest seat of justice. We almost tremble for his purity in the conflict of parties and the intrigues of courts, until he teaches us how to feel and act in them. But we feel that all is safe when he is upon the bench. In this office he effected much in allaying opposition to the Constitution and infusing among the people confidence in the new system of government. Upon the circuits he was everywhere received with demonstrations of respect and confidence. When he came to Portsmouth to hold his first Court, the citizens, to a large number, gave him a public entry into the town, and when he returned, accompanied him some distance on his way. Jay was now in the second office in grade and importance, the emoluments of which could not be diminished, and which he could hold for life. Yet when men in whom he had confidence thought that the stability of the General Government required that the rising opposition to it in New York should be checked, and that this could be done by electing him Governor, he at once consented to be a candidate, and was elected by the people. But the office was withheld from him by the canvassers and Legislature. This produced an excitement which endangered the repose of the State. Jay interposed and told his supporters to yield to the constituted authorities of the State. He admonished them not to violate the principles which they wished to support, by any irregular proceedings, and in asserting their rights to be no less distinguished by temper and moderation, than by constancy and zeal. This line of conduct, so natural in a good man, while it calmed the excitement, deepened the affection for him in the State. He retained the office of Chief Justice. Though in moderate circumstances about 1792-3-4 he was at the expense of keeping at school six indigent boys of the town of Rye, where he himself had been brought up. This act of benevolence was unknown even to his family till after his death, and was revealed by letters found among his papers from a clergyman who acted as his almoner on that occasion. Another anecdote illustrates in him the vigilance of the magistrate and the kindness of the man. While he was Governor, a blacksmith in his neighborhood erected a house and shop upon the highway, in such a manner as to obstruct the public travel. Jay applied to him, saying, that his official duties would not allow him to let such a breach of the law pass unnoticed, and requested the blacksmith to remove the incumbrance. He said he could not, for he had no land. Jay offered to give him an acre of land, or fifty dollars to buy land with. These offers failing, Jay wrote to the appropriate law officer to prosecute the black smith, and repeated the same offer in favor of the delinquent. When the Court compelled him to move the incumbrance, Jay gave him the land to enable him to obey the order of Court. In 1794, in consequence of the European wars and the depredations of England upon our commerce, all were expecting, and many desiring war between this country and Great Britain, and an alliance with Revolutionary France. In this, the most trying exigency of Washington's administration, he determined, in opposition to the wishes of a large portion, if not a majority of the nation, to make one more effort to keep his country out of the strife which was convulsing Europe. About the time of this determination, the setting of the Supreme Court of the United States called Chief Justice Jay to Philadelphia, then the seat of Government. He had from the early part of the Revolution been the confiden- It were a sufficient eulogy of any man to say, that for such a mission, under such circumstances, he was nominated by Washington, opposed by Aaron Burr; that he saved his country from the devastation of war, and secured her commercial prosperity. It will be recollected that he retained the office of Chief Jus Jay never removed an officer on account of his political principles. So entirely did he administer the office in the spirit of the Constitution, that no effective opposition could be made to him, and he enjoyed a popular rather than a party support. The only act of his which seems to have excited much censure, was his proclamation recommending "to his fellow citizens throughout the State, to unite in public thanksgiving to that Being through whose Providence the ravages of the yellow fever had been stayed!" It was upon his suggestion that the penal code of the State was softened, and that the system of employing convicts in industrial pursuits was adopted. tice at this time. In consequence of this circumstance, he refused to receive any compensation as Minister to England. Jay never accepted an appointment so reluctantly. But no one but a pure man would have dared to accept such a mission, or could have awaited with his fixed confidence the result in this country. Persuaded that he had secured the permanent interest of his country, and anticipatel the ultimate judgment of the people, he entered upon the new trusts which awaited him on his return with no fears for the fate of his recent labors. The British Minister whom Mr. Jay met in the negotiation, Lord Grenville, conceived for him a high esteem, and the subsequent correspondence between them exhibits the gratification which they both Jay had no fellowship with that expederived from their joint agency in pre- diency which allows a real wrong to avert serving to their countries the blessings of a probable evil. His business and his aim peace. Conscious that they had both was to do right. Adherence to principles served their respective countries, and the is comparatively easy, when friends apcause of humanity, they could well bear prove, and we see their obvious connecthe censure which they did not deserve. tion with right results. But when friends With his country at peace, and in securi- falter and desert, when the prospect daikty, the clamorous imputations upon Jay, ens and power invites to other courses, which reached him from every quarter of when there is nothing left but the motives the country, calmed rather than disturbed which prompt and reward duty, then the him, because he knew them to be emana- true man stands out in his full proportions from the passions which, under less tions, like the mountain, unshaken by the fortunate circumstances, would have storm which obscured it. There are sefilled his country with the groans of the veral incidents in the administration of dying and bereaved, and prostrated its Gov. Jay, that exhibit him in this light— rising greatness. We trust that when only one of which we have space to reambitious, maddened and short-sighted late. The Presidential canvass was prodemagogues shall again seek, by aggra- gressing in 1800. Jay was known to be vating popular prejudices, to plunge the one of those who distrusted the party nation into a protracted and profitless war, which was opposing the re-election of there will again be found wise and strong President Adams. The election had promen, in our own and other countries, to ceeded so far as to indicate the probability avert so great an evil. that the State of New York would hold the balance of power. The existing Legislature sympathised in opinion with Governor Jay. But it was regarded as quite uncertain if the next Legislature, upon which, in the ordinary mode of procedure, the choice of Electors of President would devolve, might not favor the opponent of Mr. Adams. In this state of things Gov. Jay was appealed to, by prominent men of his party, to convene the existing Legislature, for the purpose of securing the appointment of Electors, favorable to the re-election of Mr. Adams, as the only means, as they said and no doubt thought, of preserving the constitution of the country. A distinguished man wrote to him, referring to this request, and urging him to comply with it. After Jay's death, this letter was found among his papers, with the following memorandum upon it, in his hand wri Mr. Jay returned from Europe in 1795. Five days before he reached this country he was declared elected Governor of New York. The people of New York, anxious to redress the outrage which had been inflicted upon the State by disregarding their clearly expressed voice in his favor on a former occasion, gave him a large majority of their suffrages. His arrival in New York was welcomed by an immense concourse of people and the ringing of bells. He resigned the office of Chief Justice, and accepted that of Governor. He held the office of Governor six years, and although he succeeded a man of opposite politics, who had controlled the appointing power for many years; and although party feelings ran higher at the beginning of his administration, than at any previous time in the history of the State, Governor |