The Correspondence of Thomas Jefferson
By Subject
FOREIGN RELATIONS / RUSSIA
I owe an acknowledgment to your Imperial Majesty for the great
satisfaction I have received from your letter of August the 20th,
1805, and embrace the opportunity it affords of giving expression to
the sincere respect and veneration I entertain for your character. It
will be among the latest and most soothing comforts of my life, to
have seen advanced to the government of so extensive a portion of the
earth, and at so early a period of his life, a sovereign whose ruling
passion is the advancement of the happiness and prosperity of his
people; and not of his own people only, but who can extend his eye and
his good will to a distant and infant nation, unoffending in its
course, unambitious in its views.
The events of Europe come to us so late, and so suspiciously, that
observations on them would certainly be stale, and possibly wide of
their actual state. From their general aspect, however, I collect that
your Majesty's interposition in them has been disinterested and
generous, and having in view only the general good of the great
European family. When you shall proceed to the pacification which is
to re-establish peace and commerce, the same dispositions of mind will
lead you to think of the general inter-course of nations, and to make
that provision for its future maintenance which, in times past, it has
so much needed.
To the Emperor of Russia, 19 April 1806
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