Jefferson transgresses on the extreme of stiff gentility or lofty gravity.

Jefferson is a slender man; has rather the air of stiffness in his manner; his clothes seem too small for him; he sits in a lounging manner, on one hip commonly, and with one of his shoulders elevated much above the other; his face has a sunny aspect; his whole figure has a loose, shackling air....

You ask what I think on the expediency of encouraging our states to be commercial? were I to indulge my own theory, I should with them to practice neither commerce nor navigation, but to stand with respect to Europe precisely on the footing of China. we should thus avoid wars, and all our...

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

the English are still our enemies ... the spirit existing there, and rising in America, has a very lowering aspect. to what events it may give birth, I cannot foresee. we are young, and can survive them; but their rotten machine must crush under the trial.

the Count de Moustier will find the affections of the Americans with France, but their habits with England. chained to that country by circumstances, embracing what they loathe, they realize the fable of the living & dead bound together.

of all the cankers of human happiness, none corrodes it with so silent, yet so baneful a tooth, as indolence. body & mind both unemployed, our being becomes a burthen, & every object about us loathsome, even the dearest. idleness begets ennui, ennui the hypochondria, & that a diseased...

Objects of attention for an American ... lighter mechanical arts and manufactures. some of these will be worth a superficial view. but circumstances rendering it impossible that America should become a manufacturing country during the time of any man now living, it would be a waste of attention...

I considered the British as our natural enemies, and as the only nation on earth who wished us ill from the bottom of their souls. and I am satisfied that were our continent to be swallowed up by the ocean, Great Britain would be in a bonfire from one end to the other.

a mind always employed is always happy. this is the true secret, the grand recipe for felicity. the idle are the only wretched. in a world which furnishes so many emploiments which are useful, & so many which are amusing, it is our own fault if we we ever know what ennui is, or if we are ever...