Extract of a letter from John Adams to Mrs. Adams: The Congress have at last agreed upon a plan for forming a regular army; and a new set of articles of war are agreed on

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Philadelphia, September 22, 1776.

We have at last agreed upon a plan for forming a regular army. We have offered twenty dollars and a hundred acres of land to every man who will inlist during the war. And a new set of articles of war are agreed on. I will send you, if I can, a copy of these resolutions and regulations.

I am at a loss what to write. News we have not. Congress seems to be forgotten by the armies. We are most unfaithfully served in the Post Office, as well as many other offices, civil and military. Unfaithfulness in publick stations is deeply criminal. But there is no encouragement to be faithful. Neither profit, nor honour, nor applause is acquired by faithfulness. But I know by what. There is too much corruption even in this infant age of our Republick. Virtue is not in fashion; vice is not infamous.