Benjamin Franklin Papers - From Louis-Guillaume Le Veillard (unpublished)

It has been a very long time since you have written me; since your letter from December 10 I have not received any from you. The last news I had indirectly is causing us the greatest pain; M. Jefferson told me you are extremely unwell, you had a fever, and in order to obtain a little rest, you have been obliged to have recourse to sedatives. You know to what degree I love you and how much I share your pain. Please write me just a line, or entreat our friend Benjamin Bache to take the trouble for you and for me. My wife, my daughter, my son and all your friends beg you [to write], they embrace you and are as attached to you as when you were with us.

How much I miss you in the fine moment which we are in! If only you had stayed in France! Oh how much you would enjoy this! How surprised you would be to find so much energy and prudence in this nation which seemed to you so calm, so likable, and perhaps so frivolous! You would have had for the second time the spectacle of an incredible revolution, more difficult, more stunning, and as complete as your own. By a series of unexpected circumstances, the nation has shaken off the yoke of the priests, the nobles, and the King. She is absolute master of her destiny, without any fear of anyone daring to trouble her. The abettors of abuse would have strung together a series of extravagances the most likely of giving them the means of destroying them, that they would not have acted otherwise, and the national assembly profited from this marvelously. This latter body did not make a single mistake—we are already free, without bloodshed, and the chaos which always accompanies these first moments is not to be feared; we are probably going to have an excellent constitution. The great minds of the century, those of our representatives, their harmony, the almost total unanimity of our opinions, and your example give us more than hope. Thus, my dear friend, our happiness adds yet more to your glory, and the part which is my due is all the more dear to me because of it.

Kindly pass on my respects and my affections for your family and allow me to embrace you toto corde [with all my heart]

The destiny of M. de La Fayette wishes that he play a role in all the revolutions. If I was despot, and wished to remain so, I would start by killing him. He is auxiliary deputy, and his patriotic disposition caused him to be chosen as commander of the Paris bourgeois militia, which is armed for its patrol and which, before this nomination, had taken the Bastille, which is being razed at this moment. Monsieur Bailly singularly distinguished himself; he is Mayor of Paris, that is, what was eight days ago the provost of merchants. MM de La Rochefoucauld, de Lally Tollendal, and even Mirabeau are state deputies, and all those whom you love have shown themselves for the good side. The bandits who were chased from Paris burned all the tollhouses, and wished to do as much to us, but we took up arms, and I believe that nothing will happen to us. I am at this moment a military man, and I am commanding three or four hundred men who form the Passy militia.