Thomas Jefferson, a Character SketchEllis, Edward Sylvester
History
Thomas Jefferson, a Character Sketch
Ellis, Edward Sylvester
Jefferson, Thomas, 1743-1826; Presidents -- United States -- Biography
"He loses the seasons of life for forming in his own country those
friendships which of all others are the most faithful and permanent.
"He returns to his own country a foreigner, unacquainted with the
practices of domestic economy necessary to preserve him from ruin.
"He speaks and writes his native tongue as a foreigner, and is therefore
unqualified to obtain those distinctions which eloquence of the tongue
and pen insures in a free country.
"It appears to me then that an American going to Europe for education
loses in his knowledge, in his morals, in his health, in his habits and
in his happiness."
These utterances of Jefferson apply of course only to boys in the
formative period of their lives, and not to mature students who go
abroad for higher culture.
THE FRENCH REVOLUTION.
Mr. Jefferson always believed the cause of the French Revolution to be
just. Its horrors and excesses were the necessary evils attendant upon
the death of tyranny and the birth of liberty.
Louis the XVI was thoroughly conscientious. At the age of twenty he
ascended the throne, and strove to present an example of morality,
justice and economy. But he had not firmness of will to support a good
minister or to adhere to a good policy.
In the course of events a great demonstration of the French populace
was made against the king. Thousands of persons carrying pikes and other
weapons marched to the Tuileries. For four hours Louis was mobbed. He
then put on a red cap to please his unwelcome visitors, who afterwards
retired.
Long after the "Days of Terror" Jefferson wrote in his autobiography:
"The deed which closed the mortal course of these sovereigns (Louis XVI
and Marie Antoinette), I shall neither approve nor condemn.
"I am not prepared to say that the first magistrate of a nation cannot
commit treason against his country or is not amenable to its punishment.
Nor yet, that where there is no written law, no regulated tribunal,
there is not a law in our hearts and a power in our hands given for
righteous employment in maintaining right and redressing wrong.
"I should have shut the queen up in a convent, putting her where she
could do no harm."
Mr. Jefferson then declared that he would have permitted the King to
reign, believing that with the restraints thrown around him, he would
have made a successful monarch.
SAYINGS OF THOMAS JEFFERSON. From the Life of Jefferson, by Dr. Irelan.
MARRIAGE.
Harmony in the marriage state is the very first object to be aimed at.
Nothing can preserve affections uninterrupted but a firm resolution
never to differ in will, and a determination in each to consider the
love of the other as of more value than any object whatever on which a
wish had been fixed.
How light, in fact, is the sacrifice of any other wish when weighed
against the affections of one with whom we are to pass our whole life!
EDITORS AND NEWSPAPERS.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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