142 ALEXANDER HAMILTON 



Thomas Jefferson. Such mellowing influence does 

 wide and long experience of life sometimes have, 

 when one can witness great changes in the situation 

 of affairs, that we may be sure it would not have been 

 without its effect upon Alexander Hamilton. When 

 the new division of parties came, after 1825, there can 

 hardly be a doubt that he would have found his place 

 by the side of Webster and John Quincy Adams. 



At the time of his death he was inclined to gloomy 

 views of the political future, for he lacked that serene 

 and patient faith in the slow progressiveness of aver- 

 age humanity which was the strong point in Jefferson. 

 His disposition was to force the human plant and to 

 trim and prune it, and when he saw other methods 

 winning favour, it made him despondent. He was in 

 his last days thinking of abandoning practical politics 

 and writing a laborious scientific treatise on the his- 

 tory and philosophy of civil government. Such a 

 book from the principal author of the " Federalist " 

 could hardly have failed to be a great and useful book, 

 whatever theories it might have propounded. But 

 since we have it not, we may well be content with the 

 " Federalist " itself, a literary monument great enough 

 for any man and any nation. And as for Hamilton, 

 his quick insight, his boldness of initiative, and his 

 rare constructive genius have stamped his personality 

 so deeply upon American history that, in spite of his 

 untimely death, his career has for this and for future 

 generations all the interest that belongs to a complete 

 and well-rounded tale. 



