to hand while I was at Monticello. I sincerely condole with you on the
sickly state of your family, and hope this will find them re-established
with the approach of the cold season. As yet, however, we have had no
frost at this place, and it is believed the yellow fever still continues
in Philadelphia, if not in Baltimore. We shall all be happy to see you
here whenever the state of your family admits it. You will have seen by
the newspapers that we have gained ground generally in the elections,
that we have lost ground in not a single district of the United States
except Kent county in Delaware, where a religious dissension occasioned
it. In Jersey the elections are always carried by small majorities,
consequently the issue is affected by the smallest accidents. By the
paper of the last night we have a majority of three in their Council,
and one in their House of Representatives: another says it is only of
one in each House: even the latter is sufficient for every purpose. The
opinion I originally formed has never been changed, that such of the
body of the people as thought themselves federalists, would find that
they were in truth republicans, and would come over to us by degrees;
but that their leaders had gone too far ever to change. Their bitterness
increases with their desperation. They are trying slanders now which
nothing could prompt but a gall which blinds their judgments as well
as their consciences. I shall take no other revenge, than, by a steady
pursuit of economy and peace, and by the establishment of republican
principles in substance and in form, to sink federalism into an abyss
from which there shall be no resurrection for it. I still think our
original idea as to office is best: that is, to depend for the obtaining
a just participation, on deaths, resignations, and delinquencies. This
will least affect the tranquillity of the people, and prevent their
giving in to the suggestion of our enemies, that ours has been a contest
for office, not for principle. This is rather a slow operation, but it
is sure, if we pursue it steadily, which, however, has not been done
with the undeviating resolution I could have wished. To these means of
obtaining a just share in the transaction of the public business, shall
be added one other, to wit, removal for electioneering activity, or open
and industrious opposition to the principles of the present government,
legislative and executive. Every officer of the government may vote at
elections according to his conscience; but we should betray the cause
committed to our care, were we to permit the influence of official
patronage to be used to overthrow that cause. Your present situation
will enable you to judge of prominent offenders in your State, in the
case of the present election. I pray you to seek them, to mark them, to
be quite sure of your ground, that we may commit no error or wrong, and
leave the rest to me. I have been urged to remove Mr. Whittemore, the
surveyor of Gloucester, on grounds of neglect of duty and industrious
opposition. Yet no facts are so distinctly charged as to make the step
sure which we should take in this. Will you take the trouble to satisfy
yourself on this point? I think it not amiss that it should be known
that we are determined to remove officers who are active or open-mouthed
against the government, by which I mean the legislature as well as the
executive. Accept assurances of my sincere friendship and high respect.
Th: Jefferson.
LETTER CCCII.--TO GOVERNOR MONROE, January 13,1803
TO GOVERNOR MONROE.
Washington, January 13,1803.
Dear Sir,
I dropped you a line on the 10th, informing you of a nomination I
had made of you to the Senate, and yesterday I enclosed you their
approbation, not then having time to write. The agitation of the public
mind on occasion of the late suspension of our right of deposite at New
Orleans is extreme. In the western country it is natural, and grounded
on honest motives. In the sea-ports it proceeds from a desire for war,
which increases the mercantile lottery: in the federalists, generally,
and especially those of Congress, the object is to force us into war if
possible, in order to derange our finances, or, if this cannot be done,
to attach the western country to them, as their best friends, and thus
get again into power. Remonstrances, memorials, &c. are now circulating
through the whole of the western country, and signed by the body of
the people. The measures we have been pursuing, being invisible, do
not satisfy their minds. Something sensible, therefore, has become
necessary; and indeed our object of purchasing New Orleans and
the Floridas is a measure liable to assume so many shapes, that no
instructions could be squared to fit them. It was essential then, to
send a minister extraordinary, to be joined with the ordinary one, with
discretionary powers; first, however, well impressed with all our
views, and therefore qualified to meet and modify to these every form
of proposition which could come from the other party. This could be
done only in full and frequent oral communications. Having determined
on this, there could not be two opinions among the republicans as to the
person. You possessed the unlimited confidence of the administration and
of the western people; and generally of the republicans every where; and
were you to refuse to go, no other man can be found who does this. The
measure has already silenced the federalists here. Congress will no
longer be agitated by them: and the country will become calm as fast as
the information extends over it. All eyes, all hopes are now fixed on
you; and were you to decline, the chagrin would be universal, and
would shake under your feet the high ground on which you stand with the
public. Indeed, I know nothing which would produce such a shock. For on
the event of this mission depend the future destinies of this republic.
If we cannot, by a purchase of the country, insure to ourselves a course
of perpetual peace and friendship with all nations, then, as war cannot
be distant, it behoves us immediately to be preparing for that course,
without, however, hastening it; and it may be necessary (on your failure
on the continent) to cross the channel. We shall get entangled in
European politics, and figuring more, be much less happy and prosperous.
This can only be prevented by a successful issue to your present
mission. I am sensible after the measures you have taken for getting
into a different line of business, that it will be a great sacrifice on
your part, and presents from the season and other circumstances serious
difficulties. But some men are born for the public. Nature, by fitting
them for the service of the human race on a broad scale, has stamped
them with the evidences of her destination and their duty.
But I am particularly concerned, that, in the present case, you have
more than one sacrifice to make. To reform the prodigalities of our
predecessors is understood to be peculiarly our duty, and to bring the
government to a simple and economical course. They, in order to increase
expense, debt, taxation, and patronage, tried always how much they could
give. The outfit given to ministers resident to enable them to furnish
their house, but given by no nation to a temporary minister, who is
never expected to take a house or to entertain, but considered on the
footing of a voyageur, they gave to their extraordinary missionaries by
wholesale. In the beginning of our administration, among other articles
of reformation in expense, it was determined not to give an outfit
to missionaries extraordinary, and not to incur the expense with any
minister of sending a frigate to carry or bring him. The Boston happened
to be going to the Mediterranean, and was permitted, therefore, to take
up Mr. Livingston and touch in a port of France. A frigate was denied to
Charles Pinckney, and has been refused to Mr. King for his return. Mr.
Madison’s friendship and mine to you being so well known, the public
will have eagle eyes to watch if we grant you any indulgences out of the
general rule; and on the other hand, the example set in your case will
be more cogent on future ones, and produce greater approbation to our
conduct. The allowance, therefore, will be in this, and all similar
cases, all the expenses of your journey and voyage, taking a ship’s
cabin to yourself, nine thousand dollars a year from your leaving
home till the proceedings of your mission are terminated, and then the
quarter’s salary for the expenses of your return, as prescribed by law.
As to the time of your going, you cannot too much hasten it, as the
moment in France is critical. St. Domingo delays their taking possession
of Louisiana, and they are in the last distress for money for current
purposes. You should arrange your affairs for an absence of a year at
least, perhaps for a long one. It will be necessary for you to stay here
some days on your way to New York. You will receive here what advance
you choose.
Accept assurances of my constant and affectionate attachment.
Th: Jefferson.
LETTER CCCIII.--TO M. DUPONT, February 1, 1803
TO M. DUPONT.
Washington, February 1, 1803.
Dear Sir,
I have to acknowledge the receipt of your favors of August the 16th
and October the 4th. The latter I received with peculiar satisfaction;
because, while it holds up terms which cannot be entirely yielded,
it proposes such as a mutual spirit of accommodation and sacrifice of
opinion may bring to some point of union. While we were preparing on
this subject such modifications of the propositions of your letter of
October the 4th, as we could assent to, an event happened, which obliged
us to adopt measures of urgency. The suspension of the right of deposite
at New Orleans, ceded, to us by our treaty with Spain, threw our whole
country into such a ferment as imminently threatened its peace. This,
however, was believed to be the act of the Intendant, unauthorized
by his government. But it showed the necessity of making effectual
arrangements, to secure the peace of the two countries against the
indiscreet acts of subordinate agents. The urgency of the case, as well
as the public spirit, therefore, induced us to make a more solemn appeal
to the justice and judgment of our neighbors, by sending a minister
extraordinary to impress them with the necessity of some arrangement.
Mr. Monroe has been selected. His good dispositions cannot be doubted.
Multiplied conversations with him, and views of the subject taken in all
the shapes in which it can present itself, have possessed him with our
estimates of every thing relating to it, with a minuteness which no
written communication to Mr. Livingston could ever have attained. These
will prepare them to meet and decide on every form of proposition which
can occur, without awaiting new instructions from hence, which
might draw to an indefinite length a discussion where circumstances
imperiously oblige us to a prompt decision. For the occlusion of the
Mississippi is a state of things in which we cannot exist. He goes,
therefore, joined with Chancellor Livingston, to aid in the issue of a
crisis the most important the United States have ever met since their
independence, and which is to decide their future character and career.
The confidence which the government of France reposes in you, will
undoubtedly give great weight to your information. An equal confidence
on our part, founded on your knowledge of the subject, your just
views of it, your good dispositions towards this country, and my long
experience of your personal faith and friendship, assures me that you
will render between us all the good offices in your power. The interests
of the two countries being absolutely the same as to this matter, your
aid may be conscientiously given. It will often, perhaps, be possible
for you, having a freedom of communication, _omnibus horis_, which
diplomatic gentlemen will be excluded from by forms, to smooth
difficulties by representations and reasonings, which would be received
with more suspicion from them. You will thereby render great good to
both countries. For our circumstances are so imperious as to admit of no
delay as to our course; and the use of the Mississippi so indispensable,
that we cannot hesitate one moment to hazard our existence for its
maintenance. If we fail in this effort to put it beyond the reach of
accident, we see the destinies we have to run, and prepare at once
for them. Not but that we shall still endeavor to go on in peace and
friendship with our neighbors as long as we can, if our rights of
navigation and deposite are respected; but as we foresee that the
caprices of the local officers, and the abuse of those rights by our
boatmen and navigators, which neither government can prevent, will keep
up a state of irritation which cannot long be kept inactive, we should
be criminally improvident not to take at once eventual measures for
strengthening ourselves for the contest. It may be said, if this object
be so all-important to us, why do we not offer such a sum as to insure
its purchase? The answer is simple. We are an agricultural people,
poor in money, and owing great debts. These will be falling due by
instalments for fifteen years to come, and require from us the practice
of a rigorous economy to accomplish their payment: and it is our
principle to pay to a moment whatever we have engaged, and never
to engage what we cannot, and mean not, faithfully to pay. We have
calculated our resources, and find the sum to be moderate which they
would enable us to pay, and we know from late trials that little can be
added to it by borrowing. The country, too, which we wish to purchase,
except the portion already granted, and which must be confirmed to the
private holders, is a barren sand, six hundred miles from east to west
and from thirty to forty and fifty miles from north to south, formed by
deposition of the sands by the Gulf Stream in its circular course round
the Mexican Gulf, and which being spent after performing a semicircle,
has made from its last depositions the sand-bank of East Florida. In
West Florida, indeed, there are on the borders of the rivers some rich
bottoms, formed by the mud brought from the upper country. These bottoms
are all possessed by individuals. But the spaces between river and river
are mere banks of sand: and in East Florida, there are neither rivers
nor consequently any bottoms. We cannot then make any thing by a sale
of the lands to individuals. So that it is peace alone which makes it an
object with us, and which ought to make the cession of it desirable to
France. Whatever power, other than ourselves, holds the country east of
the Mississippi, becomes our natural enemy. Will such a possession do
France as much good, as such an enemy may do her harm? And how long
would it be hers, were such an enemy, situated at its door, added to
Great Britain? I confess, it appears to me as essential to France to
keep at peace with us, as it is to us to keep at peace with her: and
that, if this cannot be secured without some compromise as to the
territory in question, it will be useful for both to make sacrifices to
effect the compromise.
You see, my good friend, with what frankness I communicate with you on
this subject; that I hide nothing from you, and that I am endeavoring to
turn our private friendship to the good of our respective countries.
And can private friendship ever answer a nobler end than by keeping two
nations at peace, who, if this new position which one of them is taking
were rendered innocent, have more points of common interest, and fewer
of collision than any two on earth; who become natural friends, instead
of natural enemies, which this change of position would make them. My
letters of April the 25th, May the 5th, and this present one have been
written, without any disguise, in this view; and while safe in your
hands they can never do any thing but good. But you and I are now at
that time of life when our call to another state of being cannot be
distant, and may be near. Besides, your government is in the habit of
seizing papers without notice. These letters might thus get into hands,
which, like the hornet which extracts poison from the same flower that
yields honey to the bee, might make them the ground of blowing up a
flame between our two countries, and make our friendship and confidence
in each other effect exactly the reverse of what we are aiming at. Being
yourself thoroughly possessed of every idea in them, let me ask from
your friendship an immediate consignment of them to the flames. That
alone can make all safe, and ourselves secure.
I intended to have answered you here, on the subject of your agency in
the transacting what money matters we may have at Paris, and for that
purpose meant to have conferred with Mr. Gallatin. But he has, for two
or three days, been confined to his room, and is not yet able to do
business. If he is out before Mr. Monroe’s departure, I will write an
additional letter on that subject. Be assured that it will be a great
additional satisfaction to me to render services to yourself and sons by
the same acts which shall at the same time promote the public service.
Be so good as to present my respectful salutations to Madame Dupont, and
to accept yourself assurances of my constant and affectionate friendship
and great respect.
Th: Jefferson.
LETTER CCCIV.--TO DOCTOR BENJAMIN RUSH, April 21, 1803
TO DOCTOR BENJAMIN RUSH.
Washington, April 21, 1803.
Dear Sir,
In some of the delightful conversations with you, in the evenings of
1798-99, and which served as an anodyne to the afflictions of the crisis
through which our country was then laboring, the Christian religion was
sometimes our topic: and I then promised you, that, one day or other, I
would give you my views of it. They are the result of a life of inquiry
and reflection, and very different from that anti-Christian system
imputed to me by those who know nothing of my opinions. To the
corruptions of Christianity I am indeed opposed; but not to the genuine
precepts of Jesus himself. I am a Christian, in the only sense in
which he wished any one to be; sincerely attached to his doctrines, in
preference to all others; ascribing to himself every human excellence;
and believing he never claimed any other. At the short intervals since
these conversations, when I could justifiably abstract my mind from
public affairs, the subject has been under my contemplation. But the
more I considered it, the more it expanded beyond the measure of
either my time or information. In the moment of my late departure from
Monticello, I received from Doctor Priestely his little treatise of
‘Socrates and Jesus compared.’ This being a section of the general view
I had taken of the field, it became a subject of reflection while on the
road, and unoccupied otherwise. The result was, to arrange in my mind
a syllabus, or outline of such an estimate of the comparative merits of
Christianity, as I wished to see executed by some one of more leisure
and information for the task, than myself. This I now send you, as
the only discharge of my promise I can probably ever execute. And in
confiding it to you, I know it will not be exposed to the malignant
perversions of those who make every word from me a text for new
misrepresentations and calumnies. I am moreover averse to the
communication of my religious tenets to the public; because it would
countenance the presumption of those who have endeavored to draw them
before that tribunal, and to seduce public opinion to erect itself into
that inquisition over the rights of conscience, which the laws have so
justly proscribed. It behoves every man who values liberty of conscience
for himself, to resist invasions of it in the case of others; or their
case may, by change of circumstances, become his own. It behoves him,
too, in his own case, to give no example of concession, betraying the
common right of independent opinion, by answering questions of faith,
which the laws have left between God and himself. Accept my affectionate
salutations.
Th: Jefferson.
_Syllabus of an Estimate of the Merit of the Doctrines of Jesus,
compared with those of others_.
In a comparative view of the Ethics of the enlightened nations of
antiquity, of the Jews, and of Jesus, no notice should be taken of
the corruptions of reason among the ancients, to wit, the idolatry and
superstition of the vulgar, nor of the corruptions of Christianity by
the learned among its professors.
Let a just view be taken of the moral principles inculcated by the most
esteemed of the sects of ancient philosophy, or of their individuals;
particularly Pythagoras, Socrates, Epicurus, Cicero, Epictetus, Seneca,
Antoninus.
I. Philosophers. 1. Their precepts related chiefly to ourselves, and
the government of those passions which, unrestrained, would disturb our
tranquillity of mind.* In this branch of philosophy they were really
great.
* To explain, I will exhibit the heads of Seneca’s and Cicero’s
philosophical works, the most extensive of any we have received from
the ancients. Of ten heads in Seneca, seven relate to ourselves, viz. de
irâ, consolatio, de tranquillitate, de constantiâ sapientis, de otio
sapientis, de vitâ beatâ, de brevitate vitæ; two relate to others,
de clementiâ, de beneficiis; and one relates to the government of
the world, de pruvidentiâ. Of eleven tracts of Cicero, five respect
ourselves, viz. definibus, Tusculana, academica, paradoxa, de senectute,
one, de officiis, relates partly to ourselves, partly to others; one, de
amicitiâ, relates to others; and four are on different subjects, to wit,
de naturâ deorum, de dimnatione, defato, and somnium Scipionis.
2. In developing our duties to others, they were short and defective.
They embraced, indeed, the circles of kindred and friends, and
inculcated patriotism, or the love of our country in the aggregate, as
a primary obligation: towards our neighbors and countrymen they taught
justice, but scarcely viewed them as within the circle of benevolence.
Still less have they inculcated peace, charity, and love to our
fellow-men, or embraced with benevolence the whole family of mankind.
II. Jews. 1. Their system was Deism; that is, the belief in one only
God. But their ideas of him and of his attributes were degrading and
injurious.
2. Their Ethics were not only imperfect, but often irreconcilable with
the sound dictates of reason and morality, as they respect intercourse
with those around us; and repulsive and anti-social, as respecting other
nations. They needed reformation, therefore, in an eminent degree.
III. Jesus. In this state of things among the Jews, Jesus appeared.
His parentage was obscure; his condition poor; his education null; his
natural endowments great; his life correct and innocent: he was
meek, benevolent, patient, firm, disinterested, and of the sublimest
eloquence.
The disadvantages under which his doctrines appear are remarkable.
1. Like Socrates and Epictetus, he wrote nothing himself.
2. But he had not, like them, a Xenophon or an Arrian to write for
him. I name not Plato, who only used the name of Socrates to cover
the whimsies of his own brain. On the contrary, all the learned of his
country, entrenched in its power and riches, were opposed to him, lest
his labors should undermine their advantages; and the committing to
writing his life and doctrines fell on unlettered and ignorant men; who
wrote, too, from memory, and not till long after the transactions had
passed.
3. According to the ordinary fate of those who attempt to enlighten and
reform mankind, he fell an early victim to the jealousy and combination
of the altar and the throne, at about thirty-three years of age, his
reason having not yet attained the maximum of its energy, nor the
course of his preaching, which was but of three years at most, presented
occasions for developing a complete system of morals.
4. Hence the doctrines which he really delivered were defective as
a whole, and fragments only of what he did deliver have come to us,
mutilated, misstated, and often unintelligible.
5. They have been still more disfigured by the corruptions of
schismatizing followers, who have found an interest in sophisticating
and perverting the simple doctrines he taught, by engrafting on them the
mysticisms of a Grecian sophist, frittering them into subtleties, and
obscuring them with jargon, until they have caused good men to reject
the whole in disgust, and to view Jesus himself as an impostor.
Notwithstanding these disadvantages, a system of morals is presented to
us, which, if filled up in the style and spirit of the rich fragments he
left us, would be the most perfect and sublime that has ever been taught
by man.
The question of his being a member of the God-head, or in direct
communication with it, claimed for him by some of his followers, and
denied by others, is foreign to the present view, which is merely an
estimate of the intrinsic merit of his doctrines.
1. He corrected the Deism of the Jews, confirming them in their belief
of one only God, and giving them juster notions of his attributes and
government.
2. His moral doctrines, relating to kindred and friends, were more pure
and perfect than those of the most correct of the philosophers, and
greatly more so than those of the Jews; and they went far beyond both in
inculcating universal philanthropy, not only to kindred and friends,
to neighbors and countrymen, but to all mankind, gathering all into one
family, under the bonds of love charity, peace, common wants, and common
aids. A developement of this head will evince the peculiar superiority
of the system of Jesus over all others.
3. The precepts of philosophy, and of the Hebrew code, laid hold of
actions only. He pushed his scrutinies into the heart of man; erected
his tribunal in the region of his thoughts, and purified the waters at
the fountain head.
4. He taught, emphatically, the doctrine of a future state, which
was either doubted, or disbelieved by the Jews; and wielded it with
efficacy, as an important incentive, supplementary to the other motives
to moral conduct.
LETTER CCCV.--TO GENERAL GATES, July 11, 1803
TO GENERAL GATES.
Washington, July 11, 1803.
Dear General,