my repugnance to the writing table becomes daily & hourly more deadly & insurmountable. in place of this has come on a canine appetite for reading. and I indulge it: because I see in it a relief against the taedium senectutis; a lamp to lighten my path thro’ the dreary wilderness of time...
what would you say to edifying the world by a chaste, elegant, and philosophical life of Citn Thomas your Uncle? He is in my judgement the best subject for biography after Gen: Washington which our country has afforded. This is a question worthy of consideration. It would be a great thing for a...
“I have made it a rule, said he, whenever in my power, to avoid becoming the draughtsman of papers to be reviewed by a public body. I took my lesson from an incident which I will relate to you. when I was a journeyman printer, one of my companions, an apprentice Hatter ... was about to open shop...
When Dr Franklin went to France, on his revolutionary mission, his eminence as a philosopher, his venerable appearance, and the cause on which he was sent, rendered him extremely popular. for all ranks and conditions of men there, entered warmly into the American interest. he was therefore...
I rejoice, as a Moralist, at the prospect of a reduction of the duties on wine, by our national legislature. it is an error to view a tax on that liquor as merely a tax on the rich it is a prohibition of it’s use to the midling class of our citizens, and a condemnation of them to the poison of...
but I see nothing in this renewal of the game of ‘Robin’s alive’ but a general demoralization of the nation, a filching from industry it’s honest earnings, wherewith to build up palaces, and raise gambling stock for swindlers and shavers, who are to close too their career of piracies by...
I read no newspaper now but Ritchie’s, and in that chiefly the advertisements, for they contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper. I feel a much greater interest in knowing what passed two or three thousand years ago, than in what is now passing. I read nothing therefore but of the...
the mortality among our negroes is still more serious as involving moral as well as interested considerations. I have had n they are well fed, and well clothed, & I have had no reason to believe that any overseer, since Griffin’s time, has over worked them. accordingly the deaths among the...
I am very happy in being able, at last, to congratulate you on the success of the Bill for the establishment of an University at the Central college. It was carried, on yesterday, by in the House of Delegates by the overwhelming & unexpected majority of 141 to 28 ... Among the many sources of...
Mr Jeffersons when I last saw him a bout ten days since look’d as well as he did 10 years ago, and to day tho the wind is blowing a perfect Herricane he rode through Charlottesville to visit the College to morrow he purposes to set out for Poplar Forest to spend a month.
I never go to bed without an hour, or half hour’s previous reading of something moral whereon to ruminate in the intervals of sleep. but whether I retire to bed early or late, I rise with the sun. I use spectacles at night, but not necessarily in the day, unless in reading small print.
I live so much like other people, that I might refer to ordinary life as the history of my own. like my friend the Doctor, I have lived temperately, eating little animal food, & that, not as an aliment so much as a condiment for the vegetables, which constitute my principal diet. I double...
the nation, and especially the wealthier portion of it which is in possession of our legislature the function of legislation, is unfortunately in willing bondage to the snares & seductions of this the painted harlot of banking bubbles and there can be no remedy but by setting their minds to...
were I to be the founder of a new sect, I would call them Apiarians, and, after the example of the bee, advise them to extract the honey of every sect. my fundamental. principle would be ... that we are to be saved by our good works which are within our power, and not by our faith which is not...
my measure is a perfectly sober one of 3. or 4. glasses at dinner, & not a drop at any other time. but in as to these 3. or 4. glasses Je suis bien friand.
the eyes of our citizens are not yet sufficiently open to the true cause of our distresses. they ascribe them to every thing but their true cause, the banking system; a system, which, if it could do good in any form, is yet so certain of leading to abuse, as to be utterly incompatible with the...
in that branch of religion which regards the moralities of life, and the duties of a social being, which teaches us to love our neighbors as ourselves, and to do good to all men, I am sure that you & I do not differ. we probably differ on that which relates to the dogmas of theology, the...
presents his compliments to mr Greenleaf and his thanks for the pamphlet on grammar which came to hand yesterday. the torpor of age and drudgery of letterwriting give him little time to read, and little power of profiting by the advances & improvements in every branch of science. he rejoices...
I am happy in this comfortable view of things, and have taken with contentedness the early and humble place in the procession which the master of the ceremony assigned to me. if I have walked straight, I have done my part; if awry, the train which follows will correct the line of march. to them...
among the values of classical learning I estimate the Luxury of reading the Greek & Roman authors in all the beauties of their originals ... I think myself more indebted to my father for this, than for all the other luxuries his cares and affections have placed within my reach.
while too weak to set up the whole day, and afraid to increase the weakness by lying down, I longed for a Siesta chair which would have admitted the medium position.