The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 7 (of 9): Being His Autobiography, Correspondence, Reports, Messages, Addresses, and Other Writings, Official and PrivateJefferson, Thomas
Philosophy
The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 7 (of 9): Being His Autobiography, Correspondence, Reports, Messages, Addresses, and Other Writings, Official and Private
Jefferson, Thomas
United States -- Politics and government -- 1775-1783; United States -- Politics and government -- 1783-1865
DEAR SIR,--The sight of your well known hand writing in your favor of
25th February last, gave me great pleasure, as it proved your arm to be
restored, and your pen still manageable. May it continue till you shall
become as perfect a Calvinist as I am in one particular. Poor Calvin's
infirmities, his rheumatism, his gouts and sciatics, made him frequently
cry out, _Mon dieu, jusqu'à quand_. Lord, how long! Prat, once chief
justice of New York, always tormented with infirmities, dreamt that he
was situated on a single rock in the midst of the Atlantic Ocean. He
heard a voice:
"Why mourns the bard, Apollo bids thee rise,
Renounce the dust, and claim thy native skies."
The ladies' visit to Monticello has put my readers in requisition to read
to me Simons' travels in Switzerland. I thought I had some knowledge of
that country before, but I find I had no idea of it. How degenerated are
the Swiss. They might defend their country against France, Austria, and
Russia; neither of whom ought to be suffered to march armies over their
mountains. Those powers have practiced as much tyranny, and immorality,
as even the emperor Napoleon did over them, or over the royalists of
Germany or Italy.
Neither France, Austria, or Spain, ought to have a foot of land in Italy.
All conquerors are alike. Every one of them. _Jura negat sibi lati,
nihil non arrogat armis._ We have nothing but fables concerning Theseus,
Bacchus, and Hercules, and even Sesostris; but I dare say that every
one of them was as tyrannical and immoral as Napoleon. Nebuchadnezzar
is the first great conqueror of whom we have anything like history, and
he was as great as any of them. Alexander and Cæsar were more immoral
than Napoleon. Zingis Khan was as great a conqueror as any of them, and
destroyed as many millions of lives, and thought he had a right to the
whole globe, if he could subdue it.
What are we to think of the crusades in which three millions of lives
at least were probably sacrificed. And what right had St. Louis and
Richard Cœur de Lion to Palestine and Syria more than Alexander to
India, or Napoleon to Egypt and Italy? Right and justice have hard fare
in this world, but there is a power above who is capable and willing to
put all things right in the end; _et pour mettre chacun à sa place dans
l'universe_, and I doubt not he will.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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