common with my fellow-citizens, in the adoption or rejection of a
constitution which was to rule me and my posterity, as well as
them and theirs, I did not hesitate to express my approbation of
it on all occasions, in public and in private. It was not then,
nor has been since, any objection to it in my mind that the
Executive and Senate were not more permanent. Nor have I ever
entertained a thought of promoting any alteration in it but such
as the people themselves, in the course of their experience,
should see and feel to be necessary or expedient, and by their
representatives in Congress and the State legislatures, according
to the Constitution itself, adopt and ordain.

Returning to the bosom of my country after a painful separation
from it for ten years, I had the honor to be elected to a station
under the new order of things, and I have repeatedly laid myself
under the most serious obligations to support the Constitution.
The operation of it has equaled the most sanguine expectations of
its friends, and from an habitual attention to it, satisfaction in
its administration, and delight in its effects upon the peace,
order, prosperity, and happiness of the nation I have acquired an
habitual attachment to it and veneration for it.

What other form of government, indeed, can so well deserve our
esteem and love?

There may be little solidity in an ancient idea that congregations
of men into cities and nations are the most pleasing objects in
the sight of superior intelligences, but this is very certain,
that to a benevolent human mind there can be no spectacle
presented by any nation more pleasing, more noble, majestic, or