I am much indebted to you for your attention to my commission about the books, and am well pleased that those which went above the prices I noted, were not purchased. sensible that I labour grievously under the malady of Bibliomanie, I submit to the rule of buying only at reasonable prices, as to...
I set out on this ground, which I suppose to be self evident, ‘that the earth belongs in usufruct to the living:’ that the dead have neither powers nor rights over it. the portion occupied by any individual ceases to be his when himself ceases to be, & reverts to the society.
the ground of liberty is to be gained by inches, that we must be contented to secure what we can get from time to time, and eternally press forward for what is yet to get. it takes time to persuade men to do even what is for their own good.
my method is to make two observations a day, the one as early as possible in the morning, the other from 3. to 4. aclock, because I have found 4. aclock the hottest & day light the coldest point of the 24. hours. I state them in an ivory pocket book in the following form, & copy them out...
in the science of government Montesquieu’s spirit of laws is generally recommended. it contains indeed a great number of political truths; but also an equal number of heresies: so that the reader must be constantly on his guard.
I have always believed it better to be settled on a small farm, just sufficient to furnish the table, and to leave one’s principal plantations free to pursue the single object of cropping without interruption.
I receive with pleasure this recognition & renewal of our former acquaintance, and shall be happy to continue it by an exchange of epistolary communications. your’s to me will be always welcome; your first gives me information in the line of Natural history, & the second (not yet recieved...
whenever it is proposed to prepare plans for the Capitol, I should prefer the adoption of some one of the models of antiquity which have had the approbation of thousands of years
Mr. Madison & myself are so far on the tour we had projected ... we were more pleased however with the botanical objects which continually presented themselves. those either unknown or rare in Virginia were the Sugar maple in vast abundance, the Thuya, silver fir, White pine, Pitch pine,...
I am sorry we did not bring with us some leaves of the different plants which struck our attention, as it is the leaf which principally decides specific differences.
no body wishes more than I do to see such proofs as you exhibit, that nature has given to our black brethren, talents equal to those of the other colours of men, & that the appearance of a want of them is owing merely to the degraded condition of their existence both in Africa & America....
I am happy to be able to inform you that we have now in the United States a negro, the son of a black man born in Africa, and of a black woman born in the United States, who is a very respectable Mathematician. I procured him to be employed under one of our chief directors in laying out the new...
Bishop Grégoire ... wrote to me also on the doubts I had expressed five or six & twenty years ago, in the Notes on Virginia, as to the grade of understanding of the negroes, & he sent me his book on the literature of the negroes. his credulity has made him gather up every story he could...
your account of Clarkson’s conduct gives me great pleasure. my first wish is that the labourers may be well treated, the second that they may enable me to have that treatment continued by making as much as will admit it. the man who can effect both objects is rarely to be found. I wish you would...
I am not afraid to warrant to you any degree of success and consideration you may desire, if you qualify yourself by perseverance in study, and by an invariable determination to do, under all circumstances what reason & rigorous right shall dictate, keeping under absolute subjection all the...