With Madison, Washington held frequent conversations upon the subject of his retirement, but nothing definite was determined when they left Philadelphia at the close of the session. The president went so far, however, as to ask Madison to revolve this subject in his mind, and advise him as to the proper time and the best mode of announcing his intention to the people. But Madison always urged him to relinquish the idea for the public good, and Jefferson desired him to remain in office for the same reason.
Congress having adjourned on Tuesday, the eighth of May, on the tenth Washington set out alone for Mount Vernon, leaving his family in Philadelphia. He carried with him several copies of Paine's _Rights of Man_, already alluded to, fifty of which he received from the author a day or two before he left Philadelphia.[36] With peculiar delight he sat down amid the cool shadows and quiet retreats of his loved home on the Potomac, at the season of flowers; and the desire to leave the turmoils of public life appears to have taken hold of him with a strength which he had never felt before. He resolved to be governed by his inclinations; and on the twentieth he wrote to Madison, announcing his intention in unequivocal terms, and repeating the request for advice which he had made before leaving Philadelphia.
"I have not been unmindful," he said, "of the sentiments expressed by you in the conversations just alluded to. On the contrary, I have again and again revolved them with thoughtful anxiety, but without being able to dispose my mind to a longer continuation in the office I have now the honor to hold.... Nothing but a conviction that my declining the chair of government, if it should be the desire of the people to continue me in it, would involve the country in serious disputes respecting the chief magistrate, and the disagreeable consequences which might result therefrom in the floating and divided opinions which seem to prevail at present, could in any wise induce me to relinquish the determination I have formed.... Under these impressions, then, permit me to reiterate the request I made to you at our last meeting, namely, to think of the proper time and the best mode of announcing the intention, and that you would prepare the latter. In revolving this subject myself, my judgment has always been embarrassed.... I would fain carry my request to you further than is asked above, although I am sensible it would add to your trouble. But as the recess may afford you leisure, and as I flatter myself you have dispositions to oblige me, I will without apology desire, if the measure in itself should strike you as proper, or likely to produce public good or private honor, that you would turn your thoughts to a Valedictory Address from me to the public."