University of Virginia Library

ADDRESSES AT MONTICELLO

THE PRIVATE LIFE OF THOMAS JEFFERSON

By Judge Richard Thomas Walker Duke, Jr., of Charlottesville, Va.

I deem myself peculiarly fortunate in being asked to speak at this time
and at this place and in this presence upon "The Private Life of Thomas
Jefferson."

We are "atmosphered"—to use Goethe's word—during these days with
the thoughts of this great man's work in the founding of the Institution
whose hundredth anniversary we are celebrating. We forget for the moment
the wonderful brilliancy of his statesmanship, the breadth of his philosophy,
the depth of his marvelous intellect. We think of him to-day as the Father
of the University of Virginia.

But I wish to speak to you of him as the tender and solicitous father of
most affectionate children; as the devoted and loving husband; the generous
neighbor; the good citizen; the faithful zealous, kind master of many slaves.
The place where we stand suggests all these things. In plain sight from yon
eastern portico we look down upon his birthplace—upon the fields "where
once his happy childhood played." Here stands the house he builded—
carefully watched over and preserved by its hospitable and patriotic owner.
Everything suggests the man. It is the man of whom I would speak. In the
august presence of the distinguished visitors who face me I am no less fortunate—representing,
as they do, so many peoples and countries. They
may—doubtless will—keep in no long memory the words I may speak, but I
wish them to remember the facts I briefly relate, so that they may be able to
recall those facts and know that, great as he was, Jefferson was no less great
in the beautiful characteristics which make up pure and noble manhood, and
that his private life should deserve the plaudits of mankind no less than his
public career.

And I do this because no man was ever so foully belied; no man more
wilfully and falsely attacked. Some of us believe that the ugly vituperation
of greatness—the besmirching of private character for political purposes—
has well-nigh reached the zenith in these later days; but compared to the
attacks made on Jefferson during his lifetime they are but zephyrs compared
to a whirlwind. His bitter political opponents—and they were of the bitterest
kind—slandered him in every possible way. His domestic life, his relations
with his slaves, were made the target for the slings and arrows of contemptible
penny-a-liners and paltry politicians. These creatures seem to
have had in mind what Sidney Smith was to say at a future period: "Select
for your attack a place where there can be no reply and an opponent who
cannot retaliate and you may slander at will." For Jefferson disdained to
notice the barking of these wretched curs. He was always repugnant to
"provings and fendings of personal character" and, too great to reply, too
highminded to attempt to retaliate, he stood firm in the knowledge that
those who knew him best—his friends, his neighbors, those who loved him—
knew him, and before them he needed no defense. Even when Tommy
Moore—the "Little" man, the licentious verses of whose youth were the
shame of his old age—sang of him in vulgar strains, it is said that when the
lines were read to him he smiled and murmured, "What a pity poetry could
not always be truth and truth ever poetical."

Standing upon this mountain top, the purity of whose air is no purer
than Jefferson's private life, I recall the beginning of his married life, when
in a dark and snowy winter night he brought his young and beautiful bride
to this place. At Blenheim, a few miles away to the southwest, the deep
snow compelled the young couple to abandon their carriage and they rode

eight miles to Monticello. They arrived late at night. The servants had
retired, the fires were out. Too kindly and thoughtful to awaken the sleeping
servants, they went to yonder little office on my left, and soon a fire of
oak and hickory was blazing on the hearth; a bottle of old Madeira was
found on a shelf behind some books; the beloved violin was taken down, and
with song and merry laughter they passed the night until daylight gleamed
through the lattices. Here commenced a romance that ended only when, in
the room just behind me to my left, in the mansion, a pure and gentle spirit
took its flight and a bereaved widower lay fainting by the bedside where lay
the inanimate form of the only woman he ever loved, with a devotion as
holy as it was passionate, and as strong as it was pure.

It was my good fortune to know well that grand old gentleman, Thomas
Jefferson Randolph, Mr. Jefferson's grandson and the staff of his old age,
as he called him. With him I once roamed over this mountainside and went
in every room of this house. Space will not permit me to tell you of the
anecdote after anecdote that this venerable man poured into my all-willing
ears. Standing within a few feet of where I now stand he pointed out the
office of which I have told you and related to me the instance I have just
related. Then in a burst of indignation he remarked to me, "You have
heard the miserable lies the dirty politicians and political enemies have told
of my grandfather, Mr. Jefferson. Let me tell you no better, purer man ever
lived. Neither I nor any one else ever heard him utter an oath, tell a story
he could not have told in the presence of the most refined women, or use a
vulgar expression. He loved but one woman and clave to her and her
memory all his long life, and no father in all the world was more loving or
beloved, more solicitous or careful of his children."

He told me then of the book his daughter—my dear friend, Sarah N.
Randolph—was preparing, to show the beautiful private life of her sire's
grandsire—The Domestic Life of Thomas Jefferson. The copy of this book
he gave my honored father is one of the most prized books in my library.
It should be re-published.

No one can read this book without being convinced of the peculiar
sweetness and beauty of Mr. Jefferson's private life. No man but of the
noblest character could have written those letters contained in this volume,
to his children and friends, and as incident after incident is related in it we
recognize that it reveals indeed a man

It is very pleasant for me to say that all of these slanders against Mr.
Jefferson came from a distance. His neighbors—and some of them were his
bitterest political opponents—never repeated them—never believed any of
them. I have known in my lifetime more than a dozen men who knew Mr.

Jefferson personally. Two men I knew who saw Jefferson and Lafayette
embrace one another at the foot of this lawn. Every one of them said that
no neighbor of Mr. Jefferson believed one word of the vile stories told of
him, but that he was beloved, respected and admired as a high-minded
gentleman, a pure and upright man.

His daughters worshipped him. The grandson of whom I have spoken
could not mention his name save with a reverence as remarkable as it was
touching. When he lay a-dying at Edge Hill, down yonder a mile or two
away, he bade them roll his bed into the drawing-room, through whose
windows Monticello could be plainly seen, and his last earthly gaze was
upon this "Little Mountain," where beside his great ancestor's ashes his
own were soon to rest.

It cannot be amiss at this time to say something of the house in front of
which we now stand and of Mr. Jefferson's life here. The house was commenced
in 1764. It then faced to the east and was very much on the order
of the average Virginia residence. But after Mr. Jefferson's visit to France,
where he was very much struck with the architecture of that country, he remodeled
the house in the style in which we now see it. It has really never
been entirely completed. In his lifetime it was filled with works of art,
paintings, engravings and statuary, and contained the largest private library
in the United States.

Mr. Jefferson's life here was that of the simple Virginia farmer. He
arose early; a book always lay upon the mantelpiece in the dining room, and
if the meals were not on the table he read from this book until called to the
meal. He generally rode over the plantation every fair day, looking carefully
after the overseer as well as the hands. He kept a minute diary of all
the work day by day upon the plantation, and in it records of the direction
of the wind, the thermometer and barometer were carefully set down; the
budding of every plant and tree, the first appearance of any vegetable upon
the table, and a thousand minutiæ which fill us with amazement to note
how a man of his multitudinous affairs could take such minute pains over
things most men would consider trifles. In the afternoon he attended to his
various and varied correspondence. Many of his letters were written with
his left hand, as his right was seriously injured whilst abroad, the wrist being
broken. He had an ingenious arrangement by which the light of the candles
was shed upon his book or paper and shaded from his eyes. His voluminous
correspondence shows that he could never have wasted a single moment,
but that his long life was filled with an industry seldom surpassed. He was
very moderate in his food and drink. He very seldom touched ardent spirits
but was fond of good French wines and had them always on his table, though
he partook of them very sparingly. He was a moderate man in everything
except in that which related to the welfare of the people. To advance that

he was perfectly willing to be called "Radical" or almost any other name
which political opponents chose to give him. He was a man of wonderful
self-restraint, seldom if ever replying to any attack upon him in any way in
the public print, and here at this place which he loved more than any other
place upon earth, he spent the happiest and as he says, the best years of his
life.

As a neighbor Mr. Jefferson was most kind and generous: Always ready
with counsel and often more material aid, his advice was sought by all the
countryside, and freely given. He planned homes, he suggested improvements
in husbandry, and whenever his superbly groomed horse was seen
bearing him through what was then the little hamlet of Charlottesville his
course was often checked by those who wanted to ask his advice or benefit
by his wonderful knowledge.

As a citizen he took part—when at home—in everything that related
to the welfare of the county and State, giving to their small affairs the same
thought and attention he gave to the Nation. He was always on the lookout
for improvements in agriculture. You know he invented the mould
board of the plow—a greater service to humanity, I believe, than even the
great Declaration. He imported rare plants and seeds; he brought the first
seed-rice into America. Nothing was too great for the range of his mind—
nothing too small to be considered, if any good could be found in it.

Of his religious life we can only say that his faith was of the Unitarian
order, though he was never a member of any church. But he contributed
to the building of the first Episcopal Church in Charlottesville, and when
the rector thereof was building himself a house he sent him a handsome
contribution, with a playful letter. He never professed—he lived. The
Searcher of all hearts alone knows what that meant. But surely the faith of
that man is not in vain whose last words were "Lord, now let Thy servant
depart in peace."

He was the soul of hospitality. Colonel Randolph told me that he had
seen as many as sixty horses of visitors in the stables at Monticello at one
time. He was literally eaten out of house and home.

He recognized the evils of slavery, but also its benefits. He desired to
emancipate as far as possible his slaves. As a master he was firm but kindly
and considerate, and his servants loved him with that devotion which the
oldtime slave ever showed to the master who treated him well.

I must hasten to a close. In the time allotted to me I could but briefly
outline the main characteristics of the private life of this great man. I said in
the outset I deemed myself peculiarly fortunate in being asked to do this.
For never more than in this hour of the world's great changes is pure and
upright character more needed in statesmen—and men of private life as well.
Only good men can give us good government; for government is of men.

And never was the force of good example needed more. And after all, the
private virtues are those which are of the Immortals. Kingdoms rise and
fall; governments perish with the peoples that made them; philosophies
change, and the belief of to-day is the mockery of to-morrow. But virtue
and truth and purity; benevolence, integrity and the love of God and of
fellow men—these things are alike of yesterday and of to-morrow—of the
years of the past, the æons of the future; they alone survive when all else
perishes. Of them and through them comes the health of the nations—the
salvation of the world. They have their origin and their destiny alike in the
home of our Father and the bosom of our God.

JEFFERSON AND THE PROBLEMS OF TO-DAY

By Archibald Cary Coolidge, Ph.D., LL.D., of Harvard University

This spot and this occasion recall to the minds of all of us memories
of the man in whose honor we have made this pilgrimage. We are here at
the place that was dearest to him, at the home from which the influence of
his wisdom and his benign presence radiated for so many years over his
fellow countrymen. You have just heard the description of his daily life.
It is, indeed, here that his figure is most distinct to us, that we think of him
in his kindliest aspect, an object of affection as well as of admiration to
millions then and since. It was here that he planned and dreamed and
brought into being the University of Virginia. To us this visit to Monticello
is in itself a source of inspiration. It brings us once more under the
spell of a lofty character and master mind whose influence has not been
confined to one party, but has extended over the whole people and has been
felt even by those who opposed him most, and it has not been effaced by the
lapse of time. Thomas Jefferson still holds his place as one of the guides of
our republican ideals and citizenship. His words are still quoted and the
truths that he expressed are still held sacred.

And if this be so, is it not natural for us when we feel ourselves in the
shadow of his presence to turn to him for counsel and help in dealing with
some of the momentous problems which beset our paths as American citizens?
May we not obtain guidance from his wisdom even under circumstances
which he himself never could have foreseen? At least one may
speculate as to what he would have thought of them, and such fancy need
not be idle. It is true there are dangers in such a course. We must be careful
how we apply any one concrete pronouncement on the part of Jefferson
to an altered situation; what was a wise decision under former conditions is
not necessarily the one that he would now make.

We know, too, that like every mortal he was not always consistent;
that in his long career he was deeply involved in the strife of his times and

that he used terms and expressed opinions which reflect rather the passions
or the prejudices of the moment than the mature judgments of his riper
thought.

Nevertheless, while making all such allowances, we may feel that Jefferson
entertained certain ideals, certain visions, certain fundamental beliefs,
to which we may turn and apply the inspiration we drew from them to
problems of our own times.

Let us look at some of these beliefs.

Would it not be fair to say that the first and foremost article in Jefferson's
political creed was his unshakable faith in democracy and particularly
in American democracy?

We may quibble as we please over the exact meaning of the term
"democracy" but no one can deny that Thomas Jefferson was a democrat
in the best sense of the word and we may well rejoice at the extent that his
ideals have prevailed and are prevailing far and wide.

Rank and title mean little enough to-day. Universal suffrage has been
broadened to include those whom it has always been the privilege of man to
love and to protect but to whom he has never before admitted a right to rule
equal to his own.

Has then democracy triumphed so that we have no fears for the future
save such as may arise from its own excesses?

No one should assert this. Here as elsewhere there is still a long gap
between theory and practice. The power of wealth, inherited and acquired,
still counts for much in the world, the conscienceless capitalist too often is
the successor of the robber baron, and modern economic development with
its tremendous accumulation of capital, its infinite ramifications and its
necessary concentration of authority has seemed to threaten us with a
servitude as real as any which has existed under crown or aristocracy. But
this peril is not new, and provided we maintain our honesty, we can achieve
the new freedom as well as the old. Vigilant as we must be to defend our
heritage against the insidious power of corporate wealth, it is not from that
quarter that the ideals of Jeffersonian democracy are most undermined at
the present moment. Our liberties may be imperilled but the menace has
taken on new forms. For instance we can see that society is in danger of
becoming the slave of its own development. In the endless meshes of the
modern state and of modern industrial and economic conditions the individual
can hardly aspire to be as free as were his ancestors. The "sum of
good government" has increased in a formidable manner since the days
when Jefferson was at the helm of the state. It looks almost as if in the
future the existence of the American citizen from the cradle to the grave will
be regulated by prescriptions. They are perhaps necessary for the welfare
of our wondrously organized system. But we are in danger of paying a

heavy price in the sacrifice of the freedom of the individual citizen which
Jefferson regarded as one of the highest privileges of mankind. If the march
of civilization appears to demand that sacrifice, let us at least trust that it
may not be too complete and refuse to make it save when there is real
necessity. We shall do well to remember that in creating the most perfect
machine, when its parts are human beings, the more scope we can safely
give to each to think, act, and even make mistakes for himself, the more we
do to preserve what has been one of the best characteristics of the American.
Even efficiency may be bought at too high a price.

But slavery to the machine which we ourselves have helped to create
is not the only menace to our liberties. The democracies of free people are
now being compelled to face the threat of a new despotism. Just when it
has seemed that the idea of equal opportunity to all and the right of the
majority to prevail were becoming the acknowledged basis of society for the
whole civilized world, we have witnessed a sudden reaction towards a new
oligarchy. The claim of one class to dominate regardless of the rest has been
set forth from a new quarter in startling form. The red apostles of communism
have declared ruthless war against the whole conception of true democracy
and in order to secure their sectarian triumph they are prepared to shed
torrents of blood and if need be to stamp out civilization itself. They have
established their rule in the largest continuous empire in the world and by
terror they hold to-day under their control a hundred million of their fellow
beings. They have sent their emissaries abroad and they have their followers
in all lands, even in our own, appealing by every argument to the
ignorant, to the dreamer, and to the discontented, to all indeed who have
suffered under our present system of society and can be deluded into imagining
that its overthrow would bring about a millennium.

In combating the infection of such ideas the strong and healthy democratic
beliefs of Jefferson, his confidence in the essential goodness of human
nature if given a free chance to develop, his doctrine of the utmost liberty to
the individual compatible with the welfare of the state, and of the safety
with which error may be tolerated when reason is left free to combat it, offer
us the best grounds on which to take our stand. It is true that society must
defend itself when attacked, that we cannot allow conspiracies to be hatched
in our midst against all we hold most dear, that the right to poison the public
mind is not a God given one. But though alien and sedition bills may be
more necessary now than they were in the early days of the republic, it is
not by blind repression alone any more than it was then that perils can be
conjured. We must avoid panic and reaction and all that savors of persecution
unless we wish to give to whatever revolutionary spirit there is in our
midst a moral force which now it lacks. Against the perils of revolutionary
propaganda and discontent, it is not enough to fall back on mere measures

of repression. The counsels of terror are seldom wise, and the ultra conservative
breeds the revolutionary. While striving to right the many evils that
exist in our own as in every other social system, we must have faith not only
in the virtue of our institutions but in their strength and in the spirit which
they are meant to express. The calm broad vision of the sage of Monticello
is often sadly lacking among us. The excesses and horrors that accompanied
the French Revolution did not shake his trust in popular government
and the progress of humanity. Those of the Russian one would not do so
were he alive to-day.

Turning from our domestic situation to our foreign one, where the
difficulties if of less fundamental magnitude are even more pressing, what
lessons has Jefferson to teach us there? A famous passage from his first
inaugural address comes to our minds: "peace, commerce, and honest friendship
with all nations—entangling alliances with none." Surely, we say, a
wise principle, one well tested in the history of this country and one that it
would be folly to abandon now. But are we so certain of what should be its
present interpretation? Has it been in no way modified or broadened by the
enormous changes that for good and for ill have brought all parts of the
globe so infinitely nearer to one another than they were a century ago? Do
we even know what we mean by "entangling alliances?" Is not an international
convention of any kind, whether it deals with commerce or patents,
or with rules relating to the Red Cross, an entanglement in the sense that it
is a limitation to our complete freedom of isolated action? Has not the
whole development of the last hundred years tended to emphasize the
necessity of coöperation in all good works between nations as well as between
individuals? Is there any reason in the nature of things why such cooperation
should not be beneficial in political affairs as well as in economic
or in sanitary ones, and is an alliance anything but a promise of mutual
coöperation? All these considerations are not to be lightly dismissed in
favor of a literal interpretation of a maxim enunciated in a very different
world.

To many of his contemporaries, Thomas Jefferson seemed what today
would be called a pacifist. At one time he appeared to submit with
tameness to buffets at the hands of both England and France. But he was a
statesman not a mere theorist. His conduct of this country's disputes at
that juncture may not be a brilliant page in his career, but under extreme
difficulties he made no sacrifice of principle and each year that he preserved
peace the country gained in strength. He showed more than once in his
career that when the moment came for decisive action he could be resolute,
and he did not shrink from the gravest responsibilities. As the last resort he
was ready to take up arms if the honor of his country demanded it. Even
expeditions overseas had no terrors for him. By dispatching an American

fleet to wage war on Tripoli he set Christian Europe an example of how to
put an end to the shameful tribute it had been the custom to pay to a nest of
pirates in order to be spared from their depredations.

Everything we know of the character and views of Jefferson makes us
confident that if he had been alive at the time of the Great War he would
have approved of the sending of our soldiers to lay down their lives for their
country and its cause on the battlefields of France. The sympathy which
he felt for the first French republic would have gone out in far larger measure
to the present one and none would have felt more than he that the liberties
of mankind would be menaced by the triumph of military imperialism. He
would have known, too, that our task would not be finished or our burden
be lifted by the close of hostilities, but that we must and shall share in the
vast work of the reconstruction of the world. Duty like charity begins at
home, it does not end there.

We may perhaps doubt just what form of league or association or
brotherhood of peoples Thomas Jefferson would now wish to see established,
a brotherhood in which this country of ours should hold its proper place.
But we cannot doubt that with his whole heart and soul he would have been
devoted to some such ideal of fraternity. The "Parliament of man," the
"federation of the world" would be for him no mere empty phrase. Undismayed
by the cataclysms which we have just witnessed and are still
witnessing, he would put his faith in his fellow creatures, and particularly
in his fellow countrymen. He would believe it to be their proud privilege
to lead rather than to follow in all movements for the common welfare.
While condemning visionary crusades or neglect of our own problems he
would recognize our obligations to struggling humanity at home or abroad.
We who honor his name, let us live true to his spirit. We have proved as a
nation that we could fight for our ideals. Now that peace has come we must
beware "lest we forget, lest we forget."