These are the things when once possessed
Will make a life that’s truly blessed
A good estate on healthy soil
Not got by vice nor yet by toil
Round a warm fire a pleasant joke
With chimney over free from smoke.
A strength within, a sparkling bowl.
A quiet wife, a quiet soul.
A mind as well as body whole
Prudent simplicity, constant friends.
A diet which no art commends,
A merry night without much drinking
A happy thought without much thinking
Each night by quiet sleep made short.
A will to be but what thou art
Possessed of these all else defy
And neither wish nor fear to die
These are things when once possessed
Will make a life that’s truly blessed.
35 Grizzard, George Washington: A Biographical Companion p. 94.
36 George Washington Papers at the Library of Congress, 1741-1799: Series 1a.: http://memory.loc.gov/cgibin/ampage?collId=mgw1&fileName=mgw1a/gwpage001.db&recNum=24.
37 Hughes, George Washington the Human Being, p. 554. Also see Grizzard, George Washington: p. 94.
38 George Washington Papers at the Library of Congress, 1741-1799: Series 1a, George Washington, Forms of Writing, and The Rules of Civility and Decent Behavior in Company and Conversation, ante 1747, Image 25 of 36. (may be found online at www.loc.gov). The authors have not yet had the opportunity to examine the poem from the source from which Washington copied it, since his manuscript is illegible in the last 2 lines, the words used in its construction are based upon hints from the meter of the poem the logic of its conclusion and the few random stokes of Washington’s pen that indicate certain letters.
39 To Robert Morris he wrote: Monday, December 24, [1781].
“Dear Sir: Knowing full well the multiplicity and importance of yr. business, it would give me more pain than pleasure if I thought your friendship, or respect for me did, in the smallest degree, interfere with it. At all times I shall be happy to see you, but wish it to be in your moments of leizure, if any such you have.
Mrs. Washington, myself and family, will have the honor of dining with you in the way proposed, to morrow, being Christmas day. I am etc.”
To david Humphreys: “Peace and tranquillity prevail in this State. The Assembly by a very great majority, and in very emphatical terms, have rejected an application for paper money, and spurned the idea of fixing the value of military Certificates by a scale of depreciation. In some other respects too the proceedings of the present Session have been marked with justice and a strong desire of supporting the foederal system. Altho’ I lament the effect, I am pleased at the cause which has deprived us of the pleasure of your aid in the attack of Christmas pies: we had one yesterday on which all the company, tho’ pretty numerous, were hardly able to make an impression. Mrs. Washington and George and his wife (Mr. Lear I had occasion to send to the Western Country) join in affectione regards for you, and with sentiments, WGW, vol. 29 12-26-1786.
To John Bannister, April 21, 1778. vol. 11in general cases, any of the ties, the concerns or interests of Citizens or any other dependence, than what flowed from their Military employ; in short, from their being Mercenaries; hirelings. It is our policy to be prejudiced against them in time of War; and though they are Citizens having all the Ties, and interests of Citizens, and in most cases property totally unconnected with the Military Line. If we would pursue a right System of policy, in my Opinion, there should be none of these distinctions. We should all be considered, Congress, Army, &c. as one people, embarked in one Cause, in one interest; acting on the same principle and to the same End. The distinction, the Jealousies set up, or perhaps only incautiously let out, can answer not a single good purpose. They are impolitic in the extreme. Among Individuals, the most certain way to make a Man your Enemy, is to tell him, you esteem him such; so with public bodies; and the very jealousy, which the narrow politics of some may affect to entertain of the Army, in order to a due subordination to the supreme Civil Authority, is a likely mean to produce a contrary effect; to incline it to the pursuit of those measures which that may wish it to avoid. It is unjust, because no Order of Men in the thirteen States have paid a more sanctimonious regard to their proceedings than the Army; and, indeed, it may be questioned, whether there has been that scrupulus adherence had to them by any other, [for without arrogance, or the smallest deviation from truth it may be said, that no history, now extant, can furnish an instance of an Army’s suffering such uncommon hardships as ours have done, and bearing them with the same patience and Fortitude. To see Men without Cloathes to cover their nakedness, without Blankets to lay on, without Shoes, by which their Marches might be traced by the Blood from their feet, and almost as often without Provisions as with; Marching through frost and Snow, and at Christmas taking up their Winter Quarters within a day’s March of the enemy, without a House or Hurt to cover them till they could be built and submitting to it without a murmur, is a mark of patience and obedience which in my opinion can scarce be parallel’d.
40 See Grizzard, George Washington: A Biographical Companion p. 242, pp. 93-94 as an example. “Charles Moore, who traced these 110 Maxims back through various English and French versions to the sixteenth century in his 1931 book on the subject, rightly summed up the long-held view on the subject: ‘These maxims were so fully exemplified in George Washington’s life that biographers have regarded them as formative influences in the development of his character.’”
41 George Washington Papers at the Library of Congress, 1741-1799: Series 1a.George Washington, Forms of Writing, and “The Rules of Civility” and “Decent Behavior in Company and Conversation,” ante 17: http://memory.loc.gov/cgibin/ampage?collId=mgw1&fileName=mgw1a/gwpage001.db&recNum=26: George Washington Papers at the Library of Congress, 1741-1799: Series 1a. George Washington, Forms of Writing, and “The Rules of Civility” and Decent Behavior in Company and Conversation, ante 1747; http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage (pages 24 and 36)
42 Grizzard, George Washington: A Biographical Companion, pp 361-365; For a contemporary take, see : George Washington, Georgeisms (New York: Atheneum Books for young Readers, 2000)
43 William H. Wilbur, The Making of George Washington (Caldwell: Caxton Printers, 1970 & 1973), p. 107.
44 Ibid., pp. 113-118.
45 WGW, vol. 28, 6-30-1786; 37, 4-25-1799.
46 Kitman, The Making of the President, p. 108
47 Grizzard, George Washington: A Biographical Companion, p. 94.
48 Sawyer, Washington, vol. I. p. 109.
49 Mather, The Young Man’s Companion, p. 310
50 Ibid.
51 Ibid., p. 5b.
