Th: Jefferson recieved yesterday Mr Mantz’s present of very handsomely dressed leather, for which he begs leave to return him his thanks, and to express the pleasure he recieves from new discoveries and advances in the ar useful arts. those who by che new processes cheapen the comforts of life...

altho’ much of a sceptic in the practice of medecine, I read with pleasure it’s ingenious theories.

I am a friend to the reformation generally of whatever can be made better

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...

literature is not yet a distinct profession with us. now and then a strong mind arises, and at it’s intervals of leisure from business, emits a flash of light. but the first object of young societies is bread and covering; science is but secondary and subsequent.

I am among those who think well of the human character generally. I consider man as formed for society, and endowed by nature with those dispositions which fit him for society. I believe also ... that his mind is perfectible to a degree of which we cannot as yet form any conception. it is...

further trial of the Stylograph convinces me it can never take the place of the Polygraph but with travellers, as it is so much more portable. the fetid smell of the copying paper would render a room pestiferous, if filled with presses of such papers.

when I contemplate the immense advances in science, and discoveries in the arts which have been made within the period of my life, I look forward with confidence to equal advances by the present generation; and have no doubt they will consequently be as much wiser than we have been, as we than...

the fact is that one new idea leads to another, that to a 3d and so on thro’ a course of time, until some one, with whom no one of these ideas was original, combines all together, and produces what is justly called a new invention.

Some of his innovations, his theoretical novelties, so absurd in practice were mere anticipations of other men’s ideas. He built a light open carriage after a plan of his own with leather tops which closed at will, and he used it for all purposes of driving & travelling. This carriage was...