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Washington resigned his commission in 1756; married Mrs. Martha Custis, Jan. 6, 1759; was elected member of the Virginia House of Burgesses the same year, and was appointed Commissioner to settle military accounts in 1765. In the discharge of this trust he manifested that accuracy of detail and that exactness of system in business concerns which have their best illustration in the minute record of his expenses during the Revolutionary War, in which every purchase made for the government or the army, even to a few horse-shoe nails, is accurately stated.

Neither Cæsar’s Commentaries, nor the personal record of any other historical character, more strikingly illustrate an ever-present sense of responsibility to conscience and to country, for trusts reposed, than does that of Washington, whether incurred in camp or in the whirl and crash of battle. Baron Jomini says: “A great soldier must have a physical courage which takes no account of obstacles; and a high moral courage capable of great resolution.” There have been youth, like Hannibal, whose earliest nourishment was a taste of vengeance against his country’s foes, and others have imbibed, as did the ancient Hebrew, abnormal strength to hate their enemies while doing battle; but if the character of Washington be justly delineated, he was, through every refined and lofty channel, prepared, by early aptitudes and training, to honor his chosen profession, with no abatement of aught that dignifies character, and rounds out in harmonious completeness the qualities of a consummate statesman and a great soldier.