10. When he came of age in April, 1764, he signalized the event by
planting a beautiful avenue of trees near his house.
11. While studying law he carried on the business of a farmer, and
showed by his example, that the genuine culture of the mind is the best
preparation for the common, as well as the higher, duties of life.
12. When he was elected to the Virginia Assembly, and thus entered upon
the public service, he avowed afterwards to Madison, that "the esteem of
the world was, perhaps, of higher value in his eyes than everything in
it."
13. His marriage was a very happy one. His wife was a beautiful woman,
her countenance being brilliant with color and expression.
14. Six children blessed their marriage, five girls and a boy. Only two
of them, Martha and Mary, lived to mature life.
15. Monticello, the home of Jefferson, was blessed at every period of
his long life with a swarm of merry children whom, although not his own,
he greatly loved.
16. Mrs. Jefferson once said of her husband, who had done a generous
deed for which he had received an ungrateful return, "He is so good
himself that he cannot understand how bad other people may be."
17. In his draft of instructions for Virginia's delegates to the
Congress which was to meet in Philadelphia in September, 1774, he used
some plain language to George III.
18. The stupid, self-willed and conceited monarch did not follow his
advice, and so lost the American Colonies, the brightest jewels in
England's crown.
19. Sixty gentlemen, in silk stockings and pigtails, sitting in a
room of no great size in a plain brick building up a narrow alley in
Philadelphia, composed the Continental Congress.
20. Thomas Jefferson was one of the members most welcome in that
body. He brought with him "a reputation," as John Adams records, "for
literature, science, and a happy talent for composition."
21. As late as Nov. 29,1775, Jefferson clung to the idea of connection
with great Britain.
22. He wrote his kinsman, John Randolph, that there was not a man in the
British Empire who more cordially loved a union with Great Britain than
he did.
23. He said: "It is an immense misfortune to the whole empire to have
such a king at such a time. We are told, and everything proves it true,
that he is the bitterest enemy we have."
24. When the draft of the Declaration was submitted to the Congress
it made eighteen suppressions, six additions and ten alterations; and
nearly every one was an improvement.
25. It should be a comfort to students who have to witness the
corrections of their compositions to know, that this great work of
Jefferson, which has given him immortal fame had to be pruned of its
crudities, redundancies and imprudences.
26. They should be as ready as he was to submit to criticisms and to
profit by them as he did, in their future efforts.
27. Daniel Webster shall tell in his own language the remainder of this
story of Jefferson's life.
28. "In 1781 he published his notes on Virginia, a work which attracted
attention in Europe as well as America, dispelled many misconceptions
respecting this continent, and gave its author a place among men
distinguished for science.
29. "With Dr. Franklin and Mr. Adams, in 1784, he proceeded to France,
in execution of his mission as Minister plenipotentiary, to act in the
negotiation of commercial treaties.