Sold – Character of Washington and the Challenges He Faced and Overcame

Washington: “He fought for a cause, but not for personal renown.”

No portion of Irving’s entire work is more significant than his conclusion to Volume 4, as there he provides his assessments of Washington the man, Washington the leader, the Revolutionary War and the American cause. It is a virtual guide on how to view these, full of insights and valuable perspectives. Here we present the complete Autograph Manuscript Signed of this chapter, at once both literary and biographical, sent by Irving to Putnam and retained by the latter. Now let’s let Irving speak for himself

“In the volumes here concluded, we have endeavored to narrate faithfully the career of Washington from childhood, through his early surveying expeditions in the wilderness, his diplomatic mission to the French posts on the frontier, his campaigns in the French war, his arduous trials as commander-in-chief, throughout the Revolution, the noble simplicity of his life in retirement, until we have shown him elevated to the presidential chair, by no effort of his own, in a manner against his wishes, by the unanimous vote of a grateful country. The plan of our work has necessarily carried us widely into the campaigns of the Revolution, even where Washington was not present in person; for his spirit pervaded and directed the whole, and a general knowledge of the whole is necessary to appreciate the sagacity, forecast, enduring fortitude, and comprehensive wisdom with which he conducted it. He himself has signified to one who aspired to write his biography, that any memoirs of his life, distinct and unconnected with the history of the war, would be unsatisfactory. In treating of the Revolution, we have endeavored to do justice to what we consider its most striking characteristic; the greatness of the object and the scantiness of the means. We have endeavored to keep in view the prevailing poverty of resources, the scandalous neglects, the squalid miseries of all kinds, with which its champions had to contend in their expeditions through trackless wildernesses, or thinly peopled regions; beneath scorching suns or inclement skies; their wintry marches to be traced by bloody foot- prints on snow and ice; their desolate wintry encampments, rendered still more desolate by nakedness and famine. It was in the patience and fortitude with which these ills were sustained by a half-disciplined yeomanry, voluntary exiles from their homes, destitute of all the “pomp and circumstance” of war to excite them, and animated solely by their patriotism, that we read the noblest and most affecting characteristics of that great struggle for human rights. They do wrong to its moral grandeur, who seek by commonplace exaggeration, to give a melodramatic effect and false glare to its military operations, and to place its greatest triumphs in the conflicts of the field. Lafayette showed a true sense of the nature of the struggle, when Napoleon, accustomed to effect ambitious purposes by hundreds of thousands of troops, and tens of thousands of slain, sneered at the scanty armies of the American Revolution and its “boasted allies.” “Sire,” was the admirable and comprehensive reply,” it was the grandest of causes won by skirmishes of sentinels and outposts.”

There for the present we leave him. So far our work is complete, comprehending the whole military life of Washington, and his agency in public affairs, up to the formation of our Constitution. How well we have executed it, we leave to the public to determine; hoping to find it, as heretofore, far more easily satisfied with the result of our labors than we are ourselves. Should the measure of health and good spirits, with which a kind Providence has blessed us beyond the usual term of literary labor, be still continued, we may go on, and in another volume give the presidential career and closing life of Washington. In the meantime, having found a resting-place in our task, we stay our hands, lay by our pen, and seek that relaxation and repose which gathering years require. Sunnyside, 1857. W. I.” Sold with Putnam’s engraving of Washington Irving.