Extract from Dabney Carr (1773–1837) to Nicholas P. Trist

The loss of Mr. Jefferson is one over which the whole world will mourn. He was one of those ornaments and benefactors of the human race, whose death forms an epoch, and creates a sensation throughout the whole circle of civilized man ... To me he has been more than a father, and I have ever loved and reverenced him with my whole heart .... Taken as a whole, history presents nothing so grand, so beautiful, so peculiarly felicitous in all the great points, as the life and character of Thomas Jefferson.

Published in Henry S. Randall, Life of Thomas Jefferson (New York, 1858), 3:551.