As a matter of fact, that phrase does not appear in the “Farewell Address” at all.  It was first used by Thomas Jefferson in his first Inaugural Address, March 4, 1801, sixteen months after Washington was dead and buried.  No doubt the meaning could be deduced from what Washington said in more than one passage of his “Farewell.”  But to understand in 1914 what he said or implied in 1796, we must be historical.  In 1796 the country was torn by conflicting parties for and against strong friendship, if not an actual alliance, between the United States on one side and Great Britain or France on the other.  Any foreign alliance that could be made in 1914, however, could not have been, for the same reason, with either Great Britain or France.  The aim proposed by its advocates was to curb and destroy the German domination of the world.  Now Washington was almost if not quite the most actual of modern statesmen.  All his arrangements at a given moment were directed at the needs and likelihood of the moment, and in 1914 he would have planned as 1914 demanded.  He would have steered his ship by the wind that blew then and not by the wind that had blown and vanished one hundred and twenty years before.

Some one has remarked that, while Washington achieved a great victory in the ratification of the Jay Treaty, that event broke up the Federalist Party.  That is probably inexact, but the break-up of the Federalist Party was taking place during the last years of Washington’s second administration.  The changes in Washington’s Cabinet were most significant, especially as they nearly all meant the change from a more important to a less important Secretary.  Thus John Jay, the first Secretary of State, really only an incumbent ad interim, gave way to Thomas Jefferson, who was replaced by Edmund Randolph in 1794, and who in turn was succeeded by Timothy Pickering in 1795.  Alexander Hamilton was Secretary of the Treasury from the beginning in 1789 to 1795, when he made way for Oliver Wolcott, Jr.  Henry Knox, the original Secretary of War, was succeeded by Timothy Pickering in 1795, who, after less than a year, was followed by James McHenry.  Edmund Randolph served as Attorney-General in 1789 to 1794, then retiring for William Bradford who, after a brief year, was replaced by Charles Lee.  The Postmaster-Generalship was filled from 1789 to 1791 by Samuel Osgood, and then by Timothy Pickering.  Thus at the end of Washington’s eight years we find that in the place of two really eminent men, like Jefferson and Hamilton, he was served by Edmund Randolph and Oliver Wolcott, Jr., and James McHenry, good routine men at the best, mediocrities if judged by comparison with their predecessors.  Moreover, the reputation for discretion of some of them, suffered.  Thus Randolph had not long been Secretary of State when Joseph Fauchet, the French Minister, produced some papers which could be construed as implying that Randolph had accepted money.  Randolph was known