Extract from Thomas Jefferson to Pierre Samuel Du Pont de Nemours
| Washington Mar. 2. 09. |
all these concerns I am now leaving to be settled by my friend mr Madison. within a few days I retire to my family, my books, & farms & having gained the harbor myself, I shall look on my friends still buffeting the storm, with anxiety indeed, but not with envy. never did prisoner, released from his chains, feel such relief as I shall on shaking off the shackles of power. nature intended me for the tranquill pursuits of science, by rendering them my supreme delight. but the enormities of the times in which I have lived, have forced me to take a part in resisting them, and to commit myself on the boisterous ocean of political passions.