[Docketing on cover sheet: 27^th July, 1799 / President of the U.S.] [Written vertically on left of cover sheet: Quincy July 27. 1799] Quincy July 27. 1799 Sir I have rec^d your favour of the 20^th. and have no Objection to the plan you propose of raising a Company of Cavalry, — as "our means"! I never think of our means without Shuddering! All the Declamations as well as Demonstrations of Trenchard & Gordon, Bolingbroke Bernard & Walpole, Hume, Burgh and Burke, rush upon my Memory and frighten me out of my Witts. The System of Debt and Taxes is levelling all Governments in Europe; We have, a Career to run to be Sure and Some time before [strikethrough: us] to pass before we arrive at the European Crisis. But we must ultimately go the Same Way. There is no practicable or imaginable Expedient to Escape it, that I can conceive. J. Adams Secretary of War.