University of Virginia Library

354. ANCESTRY, Equality vs.—

The
foundation on which all [our constitutions] are built, is the natural equality of man, the
denial of every pre-eminence but that annexed
to legal office and, particularly, the denial
of a pre-eminence by birth.—
To General Washington. Washington ed. i, 334. Ford ed., iii, 466.
(A. 1784)