man's character beautiful, not less than a woman's--strength and
sweetness. With his mother's nature, he found delight in every varying
cloud, every rich sunset or sunrise, and in that ever new and ever
wonderful change from new moon to full and from full to new again. How
tender and responsive such a soul becomes! How it warms toward human
nature from its love for the material world!
When Thomas was five years old, he was sent to a school where English
only was taught. The hours of confinement doubtless seemed long to a
child used to wander at will over the fields, for one day, becoming
impatient for school to be dismissed, he went out-of-doors, knelt behind
the house, and repeated the Lord's Prayer, thus hoping to expedite
matters!
At nine he entered the family of Rev. William Douglas, a Scotch
clergyman, where he learned Greek, Latin, and French. So fond did he
become of the classics that he said, years later, if he were obliged to
decide between the pleasure derived from them and the estate left him
by his father, he would have greatly preferred poverty and education.
All these early years at "Shadwell," the Jefferson home,--so named after
his mother's home in England, where she was born,--Thomas had an
especially dear companion in his oldest sister, Jane. Her mind was like
his own, quick and comprehensive, and her especial delight, like his,
was in music. Three things, he said, became a passion with him,
"Mathematics, music, and architecture." Jane had a charming voice, and
her brother became a skilled performer on the violin, often practising
three hours a day in his busy student life.
Peter Jefferson, the strong, athletic Assemblyman, died suddenly when
Thomas was but fourteen, urging, as his dying request, that this boy be
well educated. There was but one other son, and he an infant. The
sweet-tempered Mrs. Jefferson, under forty, was left with eight children
to care for; but she kept her sunny, hopeful heart.
When Thomas was a little more than sixteen, he entered the college of
William and Mary, at Williamsburg. He was a somewhat shy, tall, slight
boy, eager for information, and warm-hearted. It was not surprising that
he made friends with those superior to himself in mental acquirements.
He says, in his Memoirs: "It was my great good-fortune, and what,
perhaps, fixed the destinies of my life, that Dr. William Small of
Scotland was the professor of mathematics, a man profound in most of the
useful branches of science, with a happy talent of communication,
correct and gentlemanly manners, and an enlarged and liberal mind. He,
most happily for me, became soon attached to me, and made me his daily
companion when not engaged in the school; and from his conversation I
got my first views of the expansion of science and of the system of
things in which we are placed. Fortunately, the philosophical chair
became vacant soon after my arrival at college, and he was appointed to
fill it _per interim;_ and he was the first who ever gave in that
college regular lectures in ethics, rhetoric, and belles-lettres. He
returned to Europe in 1762, having previously filled up the measure of
his goodness to me by procuring for me, from his most intimate friend,
George Wythe, a reception as a student of law under his direction, and
introduced me to the acquaintance and familiar table of Governor
Fauquier, the ablest man who had ever filled that office."
The governor, though an accomplished scholar and great patron of
learning, was very fond of card-playing, and of betting in the play. In
this direction his influence became most pernicious to Virginia.
Strangely enough, young Jefferson never knew one card from another, and
never allowed them to be played in his house.
He devoted himself untiringly to his books. He worked fifteen hours a
day, allowing himself only time to run out of town for a mile in the
twilight, before lighting the candles, as necessary exercise. Though,
from the high social position of his mother, he had many acquaintances
at Williamsburg, Thomas went little in society, save to dine with the
prominent men above mentioned. These were a constant stimulant to him. A
great man, or the written life of a great man, becomes the maker of
other great men. The boy had learned early in life one secret of
success; to ally one's self to superior men and women.
Years afterward, he wrote to his eldest grandson, "I had the
good-fortune to become acquainted very early with some characters of
very high standing, and to feel the incessant wish that I could ever
become what they were. Under temptations and difficulties, I would ask
myself, what would Dr. Small, Mr. Wythe, Peyton Randolph do in this
situation? What course in it will insure me their approbation? I am
certain that this mode of deciding on my conduct tended more to
correctness than any reasoning powers I possessed. Knowing the even and
dignified lives they pursued, I could never doubt for a moment which of
two courses would be in character for them. From the circumstances of my
position, I was often thrown into the society of horse-racers,
card-players, fox-hunters, scientific and professional men, and of
dignified men; and many a time have I asked myself in the enthusiastic
moment of the death of a fox, the victory of a favorite horse, the issue
of a question eloquently argued at the bar or in the great council of
the nation, well, which of these kinds of reputation should I
prefer--that of a horse-jockey, a fox-hunter, an orator, or the honest
advocate of my country's rights?"
The very fact that Jefferson thus early in life valued character and
patriotism above everything else was a sure indication of a grand and
successful manhood. We usually build for ourselves the kind of house we
start to build in early years. If it is an abode of pleasure, we live in
the satiety and littleness of soul which such a life brings. If it is an
abode of worship of all that is pure and exalted, we walk among high
ideals, with the angels for ministering spirits, and become a blessing
to ourselves and to mankind.
In these college-days, Jefferson became acquainted with the fun-loving,
brilliant Patrick Henry, forming a friendship that became of great value
to both. After two years in college, where he had obtained a fair
knowledge of French, Spanish, and Italian, besides his Latin and Greek,
he went home to spend the winter in reading law. But other thoughts
continually mingled with Coke. On every page he read the name of a
beautiful girl of whom he had become very fond. She had given him a
watch-paper, which having become spoiled accidentally, the law-student
wrote to his friend John Page, afterward governor of Virginia, "I would
fain ask the favor of Miss Becca Burwell to give me another watch-paper
of her own cutting, which I should esteem much more, though it were a
plain round one, than the nicest in the world, cut by other hands." He
asked advice of Page as to whether he had better go to her home and
tell her what was in his heart. "Inclination tells me to go, receive my
sentence, and be no longer in suspense; but reason says, 'If you go, and
your attempt proves unsuccessful, you will be ten times more wretched
than ever.'"
He battled with Coke all winter and all the next summer,--a young man in
love who can thus bend himself to his work shows a strong will,--going
to Williamsburg in October to attend the General Court, and to meet and
ask Miss Burwell for her heart and hand. Alas! he found her engaged to
another. Possibly, he was "ten times more wretched than ever," but it
was wise to know the worst.
A young man of twenty-one usually makes the best of an unfortunate
matter, remembering that life is all before him, and he must expect
difficulties. The following year, a sister married one of his dearest
friends, Dabney Carr; and the same year, 1765, his pet sister, Jane,
died. To the end of his life, he never forgot this sorrow; and, even in
his extreme old age, said "that often in church some sacred air, which
her sweet voice had made familiar to him in youth, recalled to him sweet
visions of this sister, whom he had loved so well and buried so young."
After five years spent in law studies, rising at five, even in winter,
for his work, he began to practise, with remarkable success. He was not
a gifted speaker, but, having been a close student, his knowledge was
highly valued. Years afterward, an old gentleman who knew Jefferson,
when asked, "What was his power in the court-room?" answered, "He always
took the right side."
Parton says, in his valuable life of Jefferson, "He had most of the
requisites of a great lawyer; industry, so quiet, methodical, and
sustained that it amounted to a gift; learning, multifarious and exact;
skill and rapidity in handling books; the instinct of research, that
leads him who has it to the fact he wants, as surely as the hound scents
the game; a serenity of temper, which neither the inaptitude of
witnesses nor the badgering of counsel could ever disturb; a habit of
getting everything upon paper in such a way that all his stores of
knowledge could be marshalled and brought into action; a ready sympathy
with a client's mind; an intuitive sense of what is due to the opinions,
prejudices, and errors of others; a knowledge of the few avenues by
which alone unwelcome truth can find access to a human mind; and the
power to state a case with the clearness and brevity that often make
argument superfluous."
In 1768, when he was only twenty-five years old, he offered himself as a
candidate for the Virginia Legislature, and was elected. He entered upon
his public life, which lasted for forty years, with the resolution
"never to engage, while in public office, in any kind of enterprise for
the improvement of my fortune;" and he kept his resolution.
Two years after he began to practise law, the house at "Shadwell" was
burned. He was absent from home, and greatly concerned about his
library. When a colored man came to tell him of his loss, Jefferson
inquired eagerly for his books. "Oh," replied the servant, carelessly,
"they were all burnt, but ah! we saved your fiddle!"
A new house was now begun, two miles from the Shadwell home, on a hill
five hundred and eighty feet high, which he called afterwards
"Monticello," the Italian for "Little Mountain." This had long been a
favorite retreat for Jefferson. He and Dabney Carr had come here day
after day, in the summer-time, and made for themselves a rustic seat
under a great oak, where they read law together, and planned the
rose-colored plans of youth. Sweet, indeed, is it that we have such
plans in early years. Those get most out of life who live much in the
ideal; who see roses along every pathway, and hear Nature's music in
every terrific storm.
Jefferson was building the Monticello home with bright visions for its
future. Another face had come into his heart, this time to remain
forever. It was a beautiful face; a woman, with a slight, delicate form,
a mind remarkably trained for the times, and a soul devoted to music.
She had been married, and was a widow at nineteen. Her father was a
wealthy lawyer; her own portion was about forty thousand acres of land
and one hundred and thirty-five slaves. Although Jefferson had less
land, his annual income was about five thousand dollars, from this and
his profession.
Martha Skelton was now twenty-three, and Jefferson nearly twenty-nine.
So attractive a woman had many suitors. The story is told that two
interested gentlemen came one evening to her father's house, with the
purpose of having their future definitely settled. When they arrived,
they heard singing in the drawing-room. They listened, and the voices
were unmistakably those of Jefferson and Martha Skelton. Making up their
minds that "their future was definitely settled," as far as she was
concerned, they took their hats and withdrew.
Jefferson was married to the lady January 1, 1772, and after the wedding
started for Monticello. The snow had fallen lightly, but soon became so
deep that they were obliged to quit the carriage and proceed on
horseback. Arriving late at night, the fires were out and the servants
in bed; but love keeps hearts warm, and darkness and cold were forgotten
in the satisfaction of having won each other. This satisfaction was
never clouded. For years, the home life deepened with its joys and
sorrows. A little girl, Martha, was first born into the home; then Jane,
who died when eighteen months old, and then an only son, who died in
seventeen days. Monticello took on new beauty. Trees were set out and
flower-beds planted. The man who so loved nature made this a restful and
beautiful place for his little group.
The year after Jefferson's marriage, Dabney Carr, the brilliant young
member of the Virginia Assembly, a favorite in every household, eloquent
and lovable, died in his thirtieth year. His wife, for a time, lost her
reason in consequence. Carr was buried at "Shadwell," as Jefferson was
away from home; but, upon his return, the boyish promise was kept, and
the friend was interred under the old oak at Monticello, with these
words on the stone, written by Jefferson:--
"To his Virtue, Good-Sense, Learning, and Friendship,
this stone is dedicated by Thomas Jefferson, who,
of all men living, loved him most."
At once, Mrs. Carr, with her six little children, came to Jefferson's
home, and lived there ever after, he educating the three sons and three
daughters of his widowed sister as though they were his own. Thus true
and tender was he to those whom he loved.
For some years past, Jefferson had been developing under that British
teaching which led America to freedom. When a student of law, he had
listened to Patrick Henry's immortal speech in the debate on the Stamp
Act. "I attended the debate," said Jefferson in his Memoir, "and heard
the splendid display of Mr. Henry's talents as a popular orator. They
were indeed great; such as I have never heard from any other man. He
appeared to me to speak as Homer wrote.... I never heard anything that
deserved to be called by the same name with what flowed from him; and
where he got that torrent of language from is inconceivable. I have
frequently shut my eyes while he spoke, and, when he was done, asked
myself what he had said, without being able to recollect a word of it.
He was no logician. He was truly a great man, however,--one of enlarged
views."
The whole country had become aflame over the burning of the Gaspee, in
March, 1772,--a royal schooner anchored at Providence, R. I. The
schooner came there to watch the commerce of the colonies, and to search
vessels. She made herself generally obnoxious. Having run aground in her
chase of an American packet, a few Rhode Islanders determined to visit
her and burn her. The little company set out in eight boats, muffling
their oars, reaching her after midnight. The Gaspee was taken unawares,
the hands of the crew tied behind them, and the vessel burned.
At once a reward of five thousand dollars was offered for the detection
of any person concerned; but, though everybody knew, nobody would tell.
Word came from England "that the persons concerned in the burning of the
Gaspee schooner, and in the other violences which attended that daring
insult, should be brought to England to be tried." This fired the hearts
of the colonists. The Virginia House of Burgesses appointed a committee
to correspond with other Legislatures on topics which concerned the
common welfare. The royal governor of Virginia had no liking for such
free thought and free speech as this, and dissolved the House, which at
once repaired to a tavern and continued its deliberations.
Soon a convention was called, before which Jefferson's "Summary View of
the Rights of British America" was laid. It was worded as a skilful
lawyer and polished writer knew how to word it; and it stated the case
so plainly that, when it was published, and sent to Great Britain,
Jefferson, to use his own words, "had the honor of having his name
inserted in a long list of proscriptions enrolled in a bill of attainder
commenced in one of the Houses of Parliament, but suppressed by the
hasty step of events." Remoteness from England doubtless saved his life.
Jefferson went up to the Continental Congress at Philadelphia, which
opened May 10, 1775, taking his "Summary View" with him. The delegates
were waiting to see what Virginia had to say in these important days.
She had instructed her men to offer a resolution that "the United
Colonies be free and independent States," which was done by Richard
Henry Lee, on June 7. Four days later, Congress appointed a committee of
five to prepare a Declaration of Independence. Thomas Jefferson, only
thirty-two, one of the youngest members of Congress, was made chairman.
How well he had become fitted to write this immortal document! It was
but a condensation of the "Summary View." He was also, says John T.
Morse, in his life of Jefferson, "a man without an enemy. His abstinence
from any active share in debate had saved him from giving irritation."
The Declaration still exists in Jefferson's clear handwriting. For three
days the paper was hotly debated, "John Adams being the colossus of the
debate." Jefferson did not speak a word, though Franklin cheered him as
he saw him "writhing under the acrimonious criticism of some of its
parts."
When it was adopted, the country was wild with joy. It was publicly read
from a platform in Independence Square. Military companies gathered to
listen to its words, fired salutes, and lighted bonfires in the
evenings. The step, dreaded, yet for years longed for, had been
taken--separation and freedom, or union and slavery. Jefferson came to
that Congress an educated, true-hearted lover of his country; he went
back to Martha Jefferson famous as long as America shall endure. He was
reelected to Congress, but declined to serve, as he wished to do
important work in his own State, in the changing of her laws.
But now, October 8, 1776, came a most tempting offer; that of joint
commissioner with Benjamin Franklin and Silas Deane to represent America
at the court of France. He had always longed for European travel; he was
a fine French scholar, and could make himself most useful to his new
country, but his wife was too frail to undertake the long journey. She
was more to him than the French mission, and he stayed at home.
Born with a belief in human brotherhood and a love for human freedom, he
turned his attention in the Virginia Legislature to the repeal of the
laws of entail and primogeniture, derived from England. He believed the
repeal of these, and the adoption of his bill "for establishing
religious freedom," would, as he said, form a system by which every
fibre would be eradicated of ancient or future aristocracy. "The repeal
of the laws of entail would prevent the accumulation and perpetuation of
wealth in select families.... The abolition of primogeniture, and equal
partition of inheritances, removed the feudal and unnatural distinctions
which made one member of every family rich and all the rest poor.... The
restoration of the rights of conscience relieved the people from
taxation for the support of a religion not theirs."
There was much persecution of Dissenters by the Established Church.
Baptists were often thrown into prison for preaching, as Patrick Henry
declared, "the Gospel of the Saviour to Adam's fallen race." For nine
years the matter of freedom of conscience was wrestled with, before
Virginia could concede to her people the right to worship God as they
pleased.
Jefferson was averse to slavery, worked for the colonization of the
slaves, and in 1778 carried through a bill against their further
importation. He wrote later, in his "Notes on Virginia": "The whole
commerce between master and slave is a perpetual exercise of the most
boisterous passions, the most unremitting despotism, on the one part,
and degrading submissions on the other.... I tremble for my country when
I reflect that God is just; that his justice cannot sleep forever; that,
considering numbers, nature, and natural means only, a revolution of the
wheel of fortune, an exchange of situations, is among possible events;
that it may become probable by supernatural interference! The Almighty
has no attribute which can take side with us in such a contest." When
his State could not bring itself to adopt his plan of freeing the
slaves, he wrote in his autobiography, in 1821, "The day is not distant
when it must bear and adopt it, or worse will follow. Nothing is more
certainly written in the book of fate than that these people are to be
free." How great indeed was the man who could look beyond his own
personal interests for the well-being of the race!
He worked earnestly for common schools and the establishment of a
university in his native State, believing that it is the right and duty
of a nation to make its people intelligent and capable of
self-government.
In June, 1779, Jefferson was made governor of Virginia, to succeed
Patrick Henry, her first governor. The Revolutionary War had been going
forward, with some victories and some defeats. Virginia had given
generously of men, money, and provisions. The war was being transferred
to the South, as its battle-ground. British fleets had laid waste the
Atlantic coast. Benedict Arnold and Cornwallis had ravaged Virginia.
When General Tarlton was ordered to Charlottesville, in 1781, and it
seemed probable that Monticello would fall into his hands, Jefferson
moved his family to a place of safety.
When the British arrived, and found that the governor was not to be
captured, they retired without committing the slightest injury to the
place. This was in return for kindness shown by Jefferson to four
thousand English prisoners, who had been sent from near New York, to be
in camp at Charlottesville, where it seemed cheaper to provide for them.
Jefferson rightly said: "It is for the benefit of mankind to mitigate
the horrors of war as much as possible. The practice, therefore, of
modern nations, of treating captive enemies with politeness and
generosity, is not only delightful in contemplation, but really
interesting to all the world--friends, foes, and neutrals."
Two faithful servants at Monticello, fearful that the silver might be
stolen by the red-coats, concealed it under a floor a few feet from the
ground; Caesar, removing a plank, and slipping through the cavity,
received it from the hands of Martin. The soldiers came just as the last
piece was handed to Caesar; the plank was immediately restored to its
place, and for nearly three days and nights the poor colored man
remained in the dark, without food, guarding his master's treasures.
When a soldier put his gun to the breast of Martin and threatened to
fire unless Jefferson's whereabouts was disclosed, the brave fellow
answered, "Fire away, then!" A man or woman who wins and holds such
loyalty from dependents is no ordinary character.
After holding the office of governor for two years, Jefferson resigned,
feeling that a military man would give greater satisfaction. Such a one
followed him, but with no better success among the half-despairing
patriots, destitute of money and supplies. Jefferson, with his sensitive
spirit, felt keenly the criticisms of some of the people, saying, "They
have inflicted a wound on my spirit which will only be cured by the
all-healing grave." He refused to return to public life, and looked
forward to happy years of quiet study at Monticello.