an essay about thomas jefferson

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Thomas Jefferson

Scholars in general have not taken seriously Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) as a philosopher, perhaps because he never wrote a formal philosophical treatise. Yet Jefferson was a prodigious writer, and his writings were suffuse with philosophical content. Well-acquainted with the philosophical literature of his day and of antiquity, he left behind a rich philosophical legacy in his declarations, presidential messages and addresses, public papers, numerous bills, letters to philosophically minded correspondents, and his only book, Notes on the State of Virginia . Scrutiny of those writings reveals a refined political philosophy as well as a systemic approach to a philosophy of education in partnership with it. Jefferson’s political philosophy and his views on education were undergirded and guided by a consistent and progressive vision of humans, their place in the cosmos, and the good life that owed much to ancient philosophers like Epictetus, Antoninus, and Cicero; to the ethical precepts of Jesus; to coetaneous Scottish empiricists like Francis Hutcheson and Lord Kames; and even to esteemed religionists and philosophically inclined literary figures of the period like Laurence Sterne, Jean Baptiste Massillon, and Miguel Cervantes. In one area, however, he was behindhand: his views on race, the subject of the final section.

1. Life and Writings

2.1 the cosmos, 2.2 nature and society, 3.1 religion and morality, 3.2 the moral sense, 4.1 the “mother principle”, 4.2 the “natural aristoi ”, 4.3 usufruct and constitutional renewal, 4.4 revolution, 5.1 a system of education, 5.2 education and human thriving, primary literature, secondary literature, other internet resources, related entries.

From 1752 to 1757, Jefferson studied under the Scottish clergyman, Rev. William Douglas, “a superficial Latinist” and “less instructed in Greek,” from whom he learned French and the rudiments of Latin and Greek. With the death of his father in 1757, Jefferson earned a substantial inheritance—some £2,400 and some 5,000 acres of land to be divided between him and younger brother, Randolph—and then began to study under Rev. James Maury, “a correct classical scholar” ([Au], p. 4).

From 1760 to 1762, Jefferson attended William and Mary College and there befriended Professor William Small. He wrote in his Autobiography, “It was my great good fortune, and what probably fixed the destinies of my life that Dr. Wm. Small of Scotland was then professor of Mathematics, a man profound in most of the useful branches of science, with a happy talent of communication, correct and gentlemanly manners, & an enlarged & liberal mind.” Small, Jefferson added, had become attached to Jefferson, who became his “daily companion when not engaged in the school.” From Small, Jefferson learned of the “expansion of science & of the system of things in which we are placed” ([Au], pp. 4–5). Small introduced Jefferson to lawyer George Wythe, who “continued to be my faithful and beloved Mentor in youth, and my most affectionate friend through life,” and under whom Jefferson would soon be apprenticed in law—and Wythe introduced Jefferson to Governor Francis Fauquier, governor of Virginia from 1758 till his death ([Au], pp. 4–5). Small and Wythe especially would prove to be cynosures to the young man.

Upon leaving William and Mary (1762) and to the time he began his legal practice (1767), Jefferson, under the tutelage of Wythe ([Au: 5), undertook a rigorous course of study of law, which comprised for him study of not just the standard legal texts of the day but also anything of potential practical significance to advance human affairs. For Jefferson, a lawyer, having a mastery of all things except metempirical subjects and fiction, would be a human encyclopedia of useful knowledge. Advisory letters to John Garland Jefferson (11 June 1790) and to Bernard Moore (30 Aug. 1814) show a lengthy and full course of study, involving physical studies, morality, religion, natural law, politics, history, belle lettres, criticism, rhetoric, and oratory. Thereby, a lawyer would be fully readied for any turn of events in a case. As lawyer, Jefferson’s focus, David Konig notes, was cases involving property—e.g., the legal acquisition of lands and the quieting of titles—and that, adds Konig, shaped his political thinking on the need of the relative equal distribution of property among all male citizens for sound Republican government.

As lawyer, Jefferson took up six pro bono cases of slaves, seeking freedom. In the case of slave Samuel Howell in Howell v. Netherland (Apr. 1770), Jefferson argued, in keeping with sentiments he would include years later in his Declaration of Independence, “Under the law of nature, all men are born free, every one comes into the world with a right to his own person, which includes the liberty of moving and using it at his own will.” The case was awarded to Netherland, before his lawyer, George Wythe, could present his case (Catterall, 90–91).

Jefferson would practice law till August 11, 1774, when he passed his practice to Edmund Randolph at the start of the Revolutionary War.

In 1769, Jefferson gained admittance to the Virginian House of Burgesses. Delegates’ minds were, he said, “circumscribed within narrow limits by an habitual belief that it was our duty to be subordinate to the mother country in all matters of government” ([Au], p. 5). Jefferson’s thinking inclined otherwise. The experience in the House of Delegates substantially shaped his revolutionary spirit.

On February 1, 1770, Jefferson lost most of the books of his first library when a fire razed his house at Shadwell. Of the loss of his books, he wrote to boyhood friend John Page (21 Feb. 1770), “Would to god it had been the money [that the books cost and not the books]; then had it never cost me a sigh!” He was to have two other libraries at Monticello in his life, which, because of his passion for learning, centered on books. When he built his residence at Poplar Forest early in the nineteenth century, he kept there a number of books—focused on philosophy, history, and religion—for his own enjoyment.

Jefferson took as his wife Martha Wayles Skelton on January 1, 1772. In that same year, daughter Martha was born. In 1778, daughter Mary was born.

Upon retirement from law in 1774, Jefferson wrote Summary View of the Rights of British America—“an humble and dutiful address” of complaints addressed to King George III of England. The complaints concerned numerous American rights, contravened, and aimed at “some redress of their injured rights” ([S], 105). Due to its trenchant tone, it earned Jefferson considerable reputation among congressmen as a gifted writer and as a revolutionist.

Jefferson was elected to the Continental Congress in 1775 as its second youngest member. He was soon invited to participate in a committee with John Adams, Roger Sherman, Benjamin Franklin, and Robert Livingston to draft a declaration on American independence. It was decided that Jefferson himself should compose a draft. As John Adams writes to Timothy Pickering (6 Aug. 1822) concerning his reasons for Jefferson being the sole drafter of the document: “Reason 1st. You are a Virginian, and a Virginian ought to appear at the head of this business. Reason 2nd. I am obnoxious, suspected, and unpopular; You are very much otherwise. Reason 3rd. You can write ten times better than I can” (Adams). For over two weeks, Jefferson worked on the Declaration of Independence in an upper-floor apartment at Seventh Street and Market Street in Philadelphia.

The document was intended to be “an expression of the American mind” and was put forth to the “tribunal of the world.” Jefferson’s draft listed certain “sacred & undeniable” truths: that all men are created “equal & independent”; that “from that equal creation,” all have the rights “to the preservation of life, & liberty, & the pursuit of happiness”; that governments, deriving their “just powers from the consent of the governed,” are instituted to secure such rights; and that the people have a right to abolish any government which “becomes destructive of these ends” and to institute a new government, by “laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness” ([D], 19).

Rigorous debate followed. Excisions and changes were made to reduce Jefferson’s draft to three-quarters of its original length, though the basic structure and the argument therein—a tightly structured argument that begins with rights, turns to duties of government, and moves to a justification for revolutionary behavior when citizens’ rights are consistently transgressed by government—was unaltered. Thus, the Declaration contained the rudiments of a political philosophy that would be fleshed out in the decades that followed. The document, not thought to be significant at the time, was approved on July 4, 1776, and it would become one of the most significant political writings ever composed.

Not long after Jefferson finished the Declaration on Independence, he was appointed to a committee to revise the outdated laws of Virginia, as a result of a bill introduced to the General Assembly of Virginia. That was a hefty task, which Jefferson—as part of a committee comprising also Thomas Ludwell Lee, George Mason, Edmund Pendleton, and George Wythe—began in 1776. Of the five, Lee and Mason excused themselves, and revision, comprising 126 bills, was undertaken by Jefferson, Wythe, and Pendleton. Revision was completed in 1779, a period of not quite three years. Notable among the bills Jefferson drafted, were Bill for the More General Diffusion of Knowledge and Bill for Religious Freedom. The latter was passed while Jefferson was in France as Minister Plenipotentiary; the former, requiring educative reforms that demanded a system of public education, did not pass.

From 1779 to 1781, Jefferson began tenure as governor of Virginia. During his governorship, he reformed the curriculum of William and Mary College by “abolishing the Grammar school,” eliminating the professorships in Divinity and Oriental languages, and supplanting them with professorships in Law and Police; Anatomy, Medicine, and Chemistry; and Modern Languages ([Au], p. 5). He also began his only book, Notes on the State of Virginia , in which he described the geography, climate, and people of Virginia and their laws, religions, manners, and commerce, among other things. The book, in general, was well received by his Enlightenment friends and did even more to enhance his reputation as a gifted writer.

Jefferson’s wife Martha died on September 6, 1782. Overwhelmingly distraught, he found some consolation in an invitation to function as Minister to France—he needed to be away from Monticello—which he did from 1784 to 1789. He ended the post at the bidding of George Washington, who asked him to be his Secretary of State—a post he held till 1793. Political disagreements between Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton on political issues resulted in formation of the Republican and Federalist parties—the former, championing small, unobtrusive government and strict constructionism; the latter, larger, strong government and a less strict interpretation of the Constitution. After a brief retirement, he was elected Vice-President of the United States for one term that ended in 1801, and then President of the United States, which lasted two terms. His presidency, which began triumphantly with his conciliatory First Inaugural Address, was highlighted by the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, which doubled the size of the country; the subsequent Lewis and Clark Expedition, which ended in 1806; and the failed Embargo Act of 1807, which aimed, among other things, to punish England during its war with France, by prohibiting exchange of goods. During his tenure as president, his daughter Maria died (1804).

In retirement, Jefferson resumed his domestic life at Monticello, continued as president of the American Philosophical Society (a position he held for nearly 20 years), and began activities that would lead to the birth of the University of Virginia, which opened one year before his death. Irretrievably saddled with debt throughout his retirement, he sold his library, approximately 6,700 books, to Congress in 1815 to pay off some of that debt. He died, as did John Adams, on July 4, 1826. On his obelisk, there was written, upon his request ([E]: 706):

Here was buried Thomas Jefferson Author of the Declaration of American Independence Of the Statute of Virginia for religious freedom & Father of the University of Virginia.

Jefferson wrote prodigiously. He penned some 19,000 letters. He published Notes on the State of Virginia (English version) in 1787. He wrote key declarations such as Summary View of the Rights of British Americans (1774), Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms (1775), and the Declaration of Independence (1776); authored numerous bills; and wrote his Manual of Parliamentary Practice for the Use of the Senate of the United States, a modified copy of which was still in use till 1977. He put together two harmonies, The Philosophy of Jesus (1804)—no copies are known to survive—and The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth (1820), by extracting passages from the New Testament. Last, Jefferson undertook late in life an autobiography (never completed), “for my own ready reference & for the information of my family” ([Au]: 3).

2. Deity, Nature, and Society

Like many other contemporaries he read—e.g., Hutcheson, Kames, Bolingbroke, Tracy, and Hume—Jefferson was an empiricist, and in keeping with Isaac Newton, a dyed-in-the-wool materialist. To John Adams (15 Aug. 1820), he writes, “A single sense may indeed be sometimes decieved, [ 1 ] but rarely: and never all our senses together, with their faculty of reasoning.” Jefferson continues: “‘I feel: therefore I exist.’ I feel bodies which are not myself: there are other existencies then. I call them matter. I feel them changing place. This gives me motion. Where there is an absence of matter, I call it void, or nothing, or immaterial space.” Given matter and motion, everything else, even thinking, is explicable. As all loadstones are magnetic, matter too is merely “an action of a particular organization of matter, formed for that purpose by it’s creator.” Even mind and god are material. “To talk of immaterial existences is to talk of nothings.”

To Massachusetts politician Edward Everett (24 Feb. 1823), Jefferson says that observed particulars are found to be nothing but concretizations of atoms. He cautions, “By analyzing too minutely we often reduce our subject to atoms, of which the mind loses hold.” That suggests a sort of pragmatic atomism— viz ., atoms being merely arbitrary epistemological stopping points in the analysis of matter to keep the mind from entertaining the dizzying thought of dividing without end.

Jefferson, however, was not a metaphysical atomist of the Epicurean sort, but a nominalist like philosopher John Locke (1690). To New Jersey politician Dr. John Manners (22 Feb. 1814), he says:

Nature has, in truth, produced units only through all her works. Classes, orders, genera, species, are not of her works. Her creation is of individuals. No two animals are exactly alike; no two plants, nor even two leaves or blades of grass; no two crystallizations. And if we may venture from what is within the cognizance of such organs as ours, to conclude on that beyond their powers, we must believe that no two particles of matter are of exact resemblance.

Humans categorize out of need, for the “infinitude of units or individuals” outstrips the capacity of memory. There is grouping and subgrouping until there are formed classes, orders, genera, and species. Yet such grouping is man’s doing, not nature’s. [ 2 ] Jefferson begins with biota—the system he questions is the Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus’—and works his way down to “particles of matter.”

In Jefferson’s cosmos, which is Stoic-like in etiology, all events are linked. The hand of deity is manifestly behind the etiological arrangements. Jefferson writes to Adams (11 Apr. 1823):

I hold (without appeal to revelation) that when we take a view of the universe; in it’s parts general or particular, it is impossible for the human mind not to percieve and feel a conviction of design, consummate skill, and indefinite power in every atom of it’s composition. The movements of the heavenly bodies, so exactly held in their courses by the balance of centrifugal and centripetal forces; the structure of our earth itself, with its distribution of lands, waters, and atmosphere; animal and vegetable bodies, each perfectly organized whether as insect, man or mammoth; it is impossible not to believe, that there is in all this, design, cause and effect, up to an ultimate cause, a Fabricator of all things from matter and motion, their preserver and regulator while permitted to exist in their present forms, and their regenerator into new and other forms.

The language of perception is in keeping with his empiricism; the language of feel, with his appropriation of philosophers Destutt de Tracy’s (1818/1827: 164) and Lord Kames’ (1758: 250) epistemology. Appeal to an ultimate cause implies a demiurge, of whose nature little can be known other than its superior intelligence and overall beneficence. [ 3 ] There is nothing here or in any other cosmological letters to suggest that deity privileges human life any more than, in David Hume’s words, “that of an oyster” (1755 [1987]: 583).

Jefferson continues in his 1823 letter to Adams. Deity superintends the cosmos. Some stars disappear; others come to be. Comets, with their “incalculable courses”, deviate from regular orbits and demand “renovation under other laws.” Some species of animal have become extinct. “Were there no restoring power, all existences might extinguish successively, one by one, until all should be reduced to a shapeless chaos.”

What precisely does divine superintendence entail?

William Wilson argues that the “‘cut’ of Jefferson’s mind” demands theism—divine interpositionism. He writes:

Calling him a deist registers great misunderstanding of that mind. But the root of his thinking remained Newtonian, including its belief in an omnipresent divine activity in nature. The God of deism from this point of view would be a complete abstraction. As the statistician reduces a person of flesh and blood to a mere integer, so the deist reduces God to a functionary of no real description who abandons nature to a well-ordered dust. (Wilson 2017, 122)

Holowchak thinks that it is unlikely that divine superintendence—i.e., extinction and restoration—implies supernatural intervention in the natural course of events (e.g., TJ to Francis Adrian Van der Kemp, 25 Sept. 1816, and TJ to Daniel Salmon, 15 Feb. 1808). It is probable, thinks Holowchak, that a natural capacity for restoration exists in certain types of matter in the same way that mind, for Jefferson, is in certain types of matter (2013a). Deity’s superintendence is likely the capacity for pre-established cosmic self-regulation comparable in some sense to the work of a thermostat in regulating the temperature of a building. [ 4 ] Following Lord Bolingbroke whose views from Philosophical Works he “commonplaced” early in life ([LCB]: 40–55), Jefferson believed that to posit that God needed to intervene in cosmic events to keep aright them (e.g., by sending down Jesus to save humanity) was to belie the capacities of deity. God, thought Bolingbroke, and Jefferson’s god owed more to Bolingbroke than to any other thinker, got things right the first time.

How for Jefferson does man leave the state of nature and enter into society? Jefferson appeals to nature in what one scholar calls a “middle landscape” manner (Marx 1964: 104–5). The happiest state for humans is one that seeks a middle ground between what is savage and what is “refined.” Jefferson’s vision, thinks Marx, is Arcadian. Jefferson’s aim, early writings indicate (e.g., TJ to James Madison, 20 Dec. 1787 and [NV]: 290–91), was for America to be a pastoral society that had the freedom of primitivism, because it was neither materialist nor manufacturing and it had an abundancy of land. America, because it was neither primitive nor uncultured, could have the trimmings of cultured societies, without their degenerative excesses.

Jefferson’s natural-law theory is Stoical, not Hobbesian or Rousseauian. For Jefferson, the basal laws of nature that obtain when man is in the state of nature are roughly the self-same laws that obtain in civil society. They are also roughly the same basal laws that obtain between states.

The moral duties which exist between individual and individual in the state of nature, accompany them into a state of society, and the aggregate of the duties of all the individuals composing the society constitutes the duties of that society towards any other; so that between society and society the same moral duties exist as did between individuals composing them, while in an unassociated state, and their maker not having released them from those duties on their forming themselves into a nation ([F]: 423).

The ideological frame that allows for social stability is in the Declaration of Independence, in which Jefferson lists two self-evident truths: the equality of all men and their endowment of unalienable rights.

“Equality” for Jefferson comprises equality of opportunity and moral equality. Equality of opportunity recognizes the differences between persons—e.g., talents, prior social status, education, and wealth—and seeks to level the playing field through republican reforms such as introduction of a bill to secure human rights; elimination of primogeniture, entails, and state-sanctioned religion; periodic constitutional renewal; and and educational reform for the self-sufficiency of the general citizenry. To remedy the unequal distribution of property, Jefferson advocates in his Draft Constitution for Virginia that 50 acres of property go to every male Virginian [ 5 ] ([CV]: 343). Moral equality recognizes that each human deserves equal status in personhood and citizenship, hence again the need of republican reforms of the sort listed above.

Rights are held to obtain, whether or not holders recognize them, and they have a moral dimension apart from their obvious legal dimension. There are, for instance, the moral obligations to obey the law and to recognize and uphold the rights of others. [ 6 ]

Jefferson, mostly following Locke, mentions three unalienable rights in the Declaration of Independence: life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. The right to life constitutes a right to one’s own personhood. The rights to liberty and pursuit of happiness (Locke lists property instead of happiness) entail self-determination through labor, art, industry, and self-governance. Government has no right to control the lives of its citizens or dictate a course of happiness. Therein lies the foundation of Jeffersonian liberalism.

There is also the right to revolution, which entails the right to abolish any tyrannical form of government, given long abuses.

3. Morality

The right to the pursuit of happiness implies too that all persons are free to worship as they choose. Since religion is a matter between a man and his deity (e.g., TJ to Miles King, 26 Sept. 1814), no one owes any account of his faith to another. Moreover, legislature should make “no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” thus building a wall of separation between church and state ([DB]: 510). [ 7 ]

Being personal, religion ought not to be politicized. When the clergy engraft themselves into the “machine of government,” they prove a “very formidable engine against the civil and religious rights of man” (TJ to Jeremiah Moor, 14 Aug. 1800). All people, Jefferson asserts, should follow the example of the Quakers: live without priests, be guided their internal monitor of right and wrong, and eschew matters inaccessible to common sense, for belief can only rightly be shaped by “the assent of the mind to an intelligible proposition” (TJ to John Adams, 22 Aug. 1813).

The true principles of morality are the “mild and simple principles of the Christian philosophy” (TJ to Gerry Elbridge, 29 Mar. 1801)—the principles common to all right-intended religions. Jefferson writes to Thomas Leiper (21 Jan. 1809):

My religious reading has long been confined to the moral branch of religion, which is the same in all religions; while in that branch which consists of dogmas, all differ, all have a different set. The former instructs us how to live well and worthily in society; the latter are made to interest our minds in the support of the teachers who inculcate them. [ 8 ]

Thus, the principles common to all religions are few, exoteric, and the true principles of morality. [ 9 ]

Though chary of sectarian religion due to the empleomania of sectarian clerics and a sharp critic of Christianity in his youth ([NR]), “Christianity,” deterged of its political trappings and metaphysical twaddle, in time became special to Jefferson (e.g., TJ to John Adams, 12 Oct. 1813 and 24 Jan. 1814). He states to Dr. Benjamin Rush (21 Apr. 1803):

I am a Christian, in the only sense [Jesus] wished any one to be; sincerely attached to his doctrines, in preference to all others; ascribing to him every human excellence; & believing he never claimed any other.

Jesus’ teachings make up the greatest moral system, and Jesus is “the greatest of all the [religious] reformers.” [ 10 ] To Benjamin Waterhouse (26 June 1822), Jefferson writes:

The doctrines of Jesus are simple, and tend all to the happiness of man. 1. That there is one only God, and he all perfect. 2. That there is a future state of rewards and punishments. 3. That to love God with all thy heart and thy neighbor as thyself, is the sum of religion.

Consequently, Jesus’ message comprises love of god (being one, pace Calvin, not three), love of mankind, and belief in an afterlife of reward or punishment.

Yet much in the Bible, Jefferson thought, was redundant, hyperbolic, bathetic, absurd, and beyond the bounds of physical possibility (e.g., TJ to John Adams, 28 Oct. 1813). That was confirmed by inspection of a late-in-life “harmony” Jefferson constructed, The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth (1820), in which the virgin birth, miraculous cures, and resurrection were excised. Christ was neither the savior of mankind nor the son of God, but the great moral reformer of the Jewish religion([B]).

Even after he purged the Bible of its corruptions—in his own words, after he plucked, in an oft-used metaphor, the diamonds from the dungheap (TJ to John Adams, 12 Oct. 1813, and TJ to )—to try both to make plain Jesus’ true teachings and to give a credible account of the life of Jesus, Jefferson did not completely follow Jesus’ uncontaminated teachings. He did think love of God was needed for one to be of upstanding virtue, for each could see and feel the existence of deity in the cosmos. Thus, atheists, however ostensibly virtuous, suffered from a defect of moral sensibility. Yet when Jefferson expressed his own view on the branches of morality (true religion), he did not mention belief in an afterlife, as did Jesus. [ 11 ] His 1814 letter to Law (13 June) mentions belief in an afterlife merely as one of the correctives to lack of a moral sense, along with self-interest, the approbation of others upon doing good, and the rewards and punishments of laws. Given that, along with his out-and-out commitment to materialism and given the evidence of four letters that unequivocally express skepticism apropos of an afterlife, [ 12 ] and given that he and his wife wrote about the “eternal separation” they were about to make on her deathbed, it is probable, asserts one scholar, that he did not believe in an afterlife (Holowchak 2019a, pp. 128–2). So, belief in an afterlife, one of the chief teachings of Jesus, was likely not an essential part of morality for Jefferson. In contrast, Charles Sanford, noting that Jefferson appeals to the hereafter in several letters and addresses, offers a small-step argument in defense of belief in an afterlife. “‘The prospects of a future state of retribution for the evil as well as the good done while here’ [are] among the moral forces necessary to motivate individuals to live good lives in society.” He adds: “Jefferson had begun with the conviction that God had created in man a hunger for the rights of equality, freedom, and life and a desire to follow God’s moral law. It was only a small step further to believe that God had also created man with an immortal soul” (152). [ 13 ]

Finally, Jefferson later in life claimed to be a Unitarian. What did “Unitarianism” mean for him?

Jefferson finds the notion of three deities in one inscrutable, and therefore physically impossible. Here he falls back on his naturalism. He allows nothing inconsistent with the laws of nature, gleaned through experience. The sort of Unitarianism Jefferson promotes is not a religious sect, but instead a manner of approaching religion. Of his Unitarianism, Jefferson asserts to John Adams (22 Aug. 1813), “We should all then, like the Quakers, live without an order of priests, moralize for ourselves, follow the oracle of conscience, and say nothing about what no man can understand, nor therefore believe.” To Dr. Thomas Cooper (2 Nov. 1822), Jefferson contrasts Unitarians with sectarian preachers, so Unitarians can be grasped as persons living fully in accordance with the dictates of their moral sense faculty. To Benjamin Waterhouse (8 Jan. 1825), Jefferson states that Unitarianism is “primitive Christianity, in all the simplicity in which it came from the lips of Jesus.” Such letters show plainly that monotheism, incomplexity, and non-sectarianism are dependent issues. Jefferson made purchase of monotheism because it and benevolence were key tenets of Jesus’ uncorrupted teachings. Those two tenets, letters indicate, were the framework of his Unitarianism, or of any right religion.

For Jefferson, morality was not reason-guided, but dictated by a moral sense. Here he followed Scottish empiricists, [ 14 ] such as William Small (Hull 1997: 102–5 and [Au]: 4–5)—the only non-minister at William and Mary College—and Francis Hutcheson and especially Lord Kames. [ 15 ]

To nephew Peter Carr (19 Aug. 1785), Jefferson says that the god-given moral sense, innate and instinctual, is as much a part of a person’s nature as are the senses of hearing and seeing, or as is a leg or arm. Jefferson’s comparisons to hearing and sight invite depiction of the moral sense tied to a bodily organ, like the heart (TJ to Maria Cosway, 12 Oct. 1785). Like strength of limbs, it too is given to persons in a greater or lesser degree, and can be made better or worse through exercise or its neglect.

A letter to daughter Martha (11 Dec. 1783) suggests the moral sense works spontaneously, without any input of reason. The language of “feel” is critical.

If ever you are about to say any thing amiss or to do any thing wrong, consider before hand. You will feel something within you which will tell you it is wrong and ought not to be said or done: this is your conscience, and be sure to obey it. [ 16 ]

One ought to resist the temptation to act viciously in circumstances when vice will not be detected. He tells Carr (19 Aug. 1785) to act always and in all circumstances as if everyone in the world were looking at him. Jefferson bids grandson Thomas Jefferson Randolph (24 Nov. 1808) to appeal to moral exemplars before acting, and he lists Small, Wythe, and Peyton Randolph. “I am certain that this mode of deciding on my conduct, tended more to correctness than any reasoning powers I possessed.” Thus, one can use the moral sense unerringly, or relatively so, if one disregards the intrusions of reason and assumes that all of one’s actions are under the scrutiny of cynosures—i.e., there will be no temptation to act from the pressure of peers. In another letter to Carr (10 Aug. 1787), Jefferson disadvises his nephew to attend lectures on moral philosophy and appeals counterfactually to a ham-handed creator. “He who made us would have been a pitiful bungler if he had made the rules of our moral conduct a matter of science.” Here and elsewhere, [ 17 ] Jefferson is explicit that reason is uninvolved in moral “judgments.”

Not everyone possesses a moral sense. Napoleon, he tells Adams (25 Feb. 1823), is an illustration. To Thomas Law (13 June 1814), Jefferson says that want of the moral sense can somewhat be rectified by education and employment of rational calculation, but such educative remedies are blandishments not aimed to encourage morally correct action, because that is impossible without a moral sense, but to discourage actions with pernicious consequences. In short, one without a moral sense can be induced or shaped to behave as if having a moral sense, though such actions would merely be consistent with morally correct actions, not be morally correct actions.

Finally, the function of reason, he says in his 1787 letter to Carr, is “in some degree” to oversee the exercise of the moral faculty, “but it is a small stock which is required for this”. Reason might function, thinks one scholar, (1) to encourage or reinforce morally correct action, [ 18 ] (2) to keep the moral sense vital and vigorous, (3) to instill the first elements of morality in children through exposure to history, (4) to allow for cultural sensitivity to morally retarded cultures, (5) to continue moral advance through reading history as adults, (6) to help make plain the rights (especially derivative rights) of humans, (7) to form general rules to serve as rough guides human action, [ 19 ] and (8) to encourage moral improvement through breeding for morality (Holowchak 2014b, 177–80). None of those functions, however, directly involves reason in moral “judgments.”

Jefferson also believed, following the lead of many thinkers of his day—e.g., Francis Ferguson, John Millar, Lord Kames (1798 and 1774), William Robertson, Claude Adrien Helvétius, the Marquis de Condorcet, and Anne-Robert-Jacques Turgot—that humans were morally progressing over time (e.g., TJ to John Adams, 11 Jan. 1816, and TJ to P.S. Dupont de Nemours, 24 Apr. 1816). There were, however, periodic glitches—periods of moral stagnation or decline. The belligerence between England and France in Jefferson’s later years was to him evidence of such decline. Still, such moral declinations, considered overall, were temporary setbacks or “retrogradations,” not genuine declinations. In a letter to Adams (1 Aug. 1816), he writes that the Americas will show Europe the path to moral advance.

We are destined to be a barrier against the returns of ignorance and barbarism. Old Europe will have to lean on our shoulders, and to hobble along by our side, under the monkish trammels of priest and kings, as she can.

Thus, moral progress is movement, prompted by embrace of liberty and respect for humans’ rights, toward the ideals of love of deity and love of humanity through beneficence—the ideals taught best by Jesus. [ 20 ]

4. Political Philosophy

In his First Inaugural Address (1801), Jefferson lists the “essential principles of our Government” in 15 doctrines—perhaps his first attempt at a definition of republicanism ([I 1 ]: 494–95).

• Equal and exact justice to all men, irrespective of political or religious persuasion;
• peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, without entangling alliances to any;
• Federal support in the rights of states’ government;
• preservation of constitutional vigor of the Federal government;
• election by the people;
• absolute acquiescence in the decisions of the majority;
• a well-disciplined militia;
• supremacy of the civil over the military authority;
• light taxation;
• ready payment of debts;
• encouragement of agriculture and commerce;
• the diffusion of information and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public reason;
• freedom of the press;
• protection by habeas corpus and trial by juries impartially selected; and
• freedom of religion.

Fifteen years later in a series of letters, Jefferson again grapples with a definition of “republicanism.” To P.S. Dupont de Nemours (24 Apr. 1816), Jefferson lists nine “moral principles” upon which republican government is grounded.

I believe with you that morality, compassion, generosity, are innate elements of the human constitution; that there exists a right independent of force; that a right to property is founded in our natural wants, in the means with which we are endowed to satisfy these wants, and the right to what we acquire by those means without violating the similar rights of other sensible beings; that no one has a right to obstruct another, exercising his faculties innocently for the relief of sensibilities made a part of his nature; that justice is the fundamental law of society; that the majority, oppressing an individual, is guilty of a crime, abuses its strength, and by acting on the law of the strongest breaks up the foundations of society; that action by the citizens in person, in affairs within their reach and competence, and in all others by representatives, chosen immediately, and removable by themselves, constitutes the essence of a republic; that all governments are more or less republican in proportion as this principle enters more or less into their composition; and that a government by representation is capable of extension over a greater surface of country than one of any other form.

Among the nine principles, the seventh

Action by the citizens in person, in affairs within their reach and competence, and in all others by representatives, chosen immediately, and removable by themselves, constitutes the essence of a republic.

comes closest to the essence of republicanism. To John Taylor (28 May 1816), Jefferson attempts a “precise and definite idea” of republicanism:

A government by its citizens in mass, acting directly and personally, according to rules established by the majority.

Every other government is more or less republican, in proportion as it has in this composition more or less of this ingredient of the direct action of the citizens.

To Samuel Kercheval (12 July 1816), Jefferson gives his “mother principle”:

Governments are republican only in proportion as they embody the will of their people, and execute it.

A government is republican in proportion as every member composing it has his equal voice in the direction of its concerns (not indeed in person, which would be impracticable beyond the limits of a city, or small township, but) by representatives chosen by himself, and responsible to him at short periods).

Such writings suggest the following “barebones” definition of “republic” for Jefferson, or a “Jeffersonian republic”:

A government is a Jeffersonian republic if and only if it allows all citizens ample opportunity to participate politically in affairs within their reach and competency; it employs representatives, chosen and recallable by the citizenry and functioning for short periods, for affairs outside citizens’ reach and competency; it functions according to the rules (periodically revisable) established by the majority of the citizens; and it guarantees the equal rights, in person and property, of all citizens.

The definition is barebones for several reasons. First, it does not fully capture the normative essence of Jefferson’s description of what is “proper for all conditions of society” in his letter to Dupont de Nemours. Yet it is not normatively neutral, as it speaks of equality of opportunity for each citizen to participate in government and it guarantees equal rights. Second, the definition ignores the partnership of politics and science, which is part of Jefferson’s conception of a republic. Jefferson insisted on periodic revisions of the Constitution at conventions to accommodate changes in the peoples’ will, when suitably informed. Such changes were not arbitrary, but dictated mostly by advances in science. [ 21 ] Jefferson writes to Samuel Kercheval (12 July 1816), “The laws and constitutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind.” Thus, a republic for Jefferson is essentially progressive and scientific, not static and conservative.

Thus, Jeffersonian republicanism is a schema for government by the people, not any particular system of governing. It is not wedded to any particular constitution—constitutions, Jefferson is clear, are merely provisional representations of the will of the people at the time of their drafting (TJ to George Washington, 7 Nov. 1792)—but to the principle of government representing the will of the people, suitably informed. That is why Jefferson says in his First Inaugural Address that for the will of the majority to be reasonable, it must be rightful ([I 1 ]: 493). [ 22 ] Thus, Jeffersonian republicanism is essentially in partnership with science.

Jefferson’s attempts at defining “republic” and his nine moral principles “proper for all conditions of society” shows that republicanism is a political philosophy. For Jefferson, republican governing is essentially progressive, and being government of and for the people, it aims at involving all citizens to their fullest capacity. Over the centuries, he recognized, human potentiality had been stifled by coercive governments. Instantiation of republican governing, thus, was an attempt to impose the minimal political structure needed to maximize human liberty, free human potentiality, and ensure the political ascendency of the “natural aristoi, ” the talented and virtuous, and not the “artificial aristoi, ” the wealthy and wellborn.

Jefferson’s republicanism was both democratic and meritocratic. It was democratic in that it aimed roughly to have no person disadvantaged at the start of life. That would be the same for Blacks, who were the equals of all others in moral sensibility—hence, their desert of equal rights and equal opportunities. Democratic republicanism demanded recognition of moral equality and equality of opportunity. Yet Jefferson realized that each person’s dreams, intelligence, and talents varied greatly. Thus, Jeffersonian republicanism was also meritocratic in that all persons were allowed to do with their life what they saw fit to do with it, so long as in doing so they did not disallow others the opportunity of doing what they saw fit to do. The most talented and virtuous, he assumed, would naturally strive to exercise fully their talents and virtue through politics and science.

Jefferson recognized two classes of people: laborers and learned (TJ to Peter Carr, 7 Sept. 1814). His distinction, however, was not determined by birth or wealth, as it was by most others of his day, but by merit. To John Adams (28 Oct. 1813), Jefferson writes:

There is a natural aristocracy among men. The grounds of this are virtue and talents.

There is also an artificial aristocracy founded on wealth and birth, without either virtue or talents; for with these it would belong to the first class.

What Jefferson claimed here was that the traditional, centuries-old class distinction, founded on birth or wealth, was in effect politically obsolete. What made men “best” was talent (i.e., skill, ambition, and genius) and virtue.

Jefferson then tells Adams that the natural aristoi comprise “the most precious gift of nature for the instruction, the trust, and government of society.” He adds that that government is best which allows for “a pure selection of these natural aristoi into the offices of government.” Through “instruction, trust, and government,” the natural aristoi will be not only political officials, but also teachers, trustees, and practitioners or patrons of science. [ 23 ]

To ensure that political offices will be held by the natural aristoi , there must be, inter alia , public access to general education and free presses for dissemination of information to the citizenry. With the citizenry generally educated, one has, Jefferson continues to Adams, merely “to leave to the citizens the free election and separation of the aristoi from the pseudo- aristoi, ” and “in general they will elect the real good and wise.” [ 24 ] That is much preferable to the centuries-old method of allowing the wealthy and wellborn to govern at the expense of the people.

For Jefferson, constitutions, unlike the rights of men, are alterable, in conformance to the level of progress of a state. Thus, constitutions are to be replaced, altered, or renewed pursuant to humans’ intellectual, political, and moral progress.

To James Madison (6 Sept. 1789), Jefferson writes:

The question Whether one generation of men has a right to bind another … is a question of such consequences as not only to merit decision, but place also, among the fundamental principles of every government. [ 25 ]

Beginning with the evident proposition—“the earth belongs in usufruct to the living”—Jefferson aims to prove that the deeds of each generation, defined by a nineteen-year period, [ 26 ] ought to be independent (or relatively so) of each other. Moreover, “usufruct” implies that each generation has an obligation to leave behind their property to the subsequent generation at least in the same condition in which it was received. For instance, any debts one incurs while owning some land are not to be inherited by another who obtains possession of that land after the former passes. What applies to individuals applies to any collection of individuals.

To instantiate the principle, there must be a period of adjustment. Present debts will be a matter of honor and expediency; future debts will be constrained by the principle. To constrain future debts, a constitution ought to stipulate that a nation can borrow no more than it can repay in the span of a generation. Temperate borrowing would “bridle the spirit of war,” inflamed much by the neglect of repayment of debts.

Usufruct theoretically fits neatly with Jefferson’s notions of political progress and of periodic constitutional renewal. Concerning the latter, he writes to C.F.W. Dumas (10 Sept. 1787):

No society can make a perpetual constitution, or even a perpetual law. … Every constitution, then, and every law, naturally expires at the end of 19. years. If it be enforced longer, it is an act of force and not of right.

At the end of nineteen years, there will be a constitutional convention, at which defects in laws can be addressed and changes can be made. [ 27 ] Should the principle of usufruct be adopted, republican government would have a built-in mechanism for obviating revolutions. [ 28 ] Without the debts and wars of one generation passed on to the next in a Jeffersonian republic and with that republic’s constitution being renewed each generation to accommodate the needs and advances of the next generation, Jefferson thinks, the stage is set for political progress.

James Madison wrote a lengthy letter several months later (4 Feb. 1790) in reply to Jefferson’s usufruct letter, and politely proffered “some very powerful objections.” Jefferson never answered that letter, though he never renounced generational sovereignty.

Even well-intended governments can still go astray. Jefferson writes in his Declaration of Independence,

Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, & to institute new government, laying it’s foundation on such principles, & organizing it’s powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety & happiness ([D]: 19).

However, long-standing governments ought not to be changed “for light & transient causes,” otherwise one risks supplantation of a corrupt government with another that is equally or more corrupt. Yet

when a long train of abuses & usurpations pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is [citizens’] right, it is their duty to throw off such government, & to provide new guards for their future security ([D]: 19).

In his Summary View of the Rights of British America, Jefferson states that for revolution to occur, there needs to be “many unwarrantable encroachments and usurpations” ([S]: 105). He adds,

Single acts of tyranny may be ascribed to the accidental opinion of a day; but a series of oppressions, begun at a distinguished period, and pursued unalterably through every change of ministers, too plainly prove a deliberate and systematical plan of reducing us to slavery ([S]: 110).

Therefore, a government becomes destructive when its abuses and usurpations are (1) many and long, (2) directed to the same end, and (3) clearly indicative of despotism.

For Jefferson, some amount of turbulence is one of the consequences of liberty. The manure of blood is needed for healthy governing because those governing will tend over time, Jefferson says to William S. Smith (13 Nov. 1787), to govern in their own interests, if not carefully watched. Moreover, those governed will assume mistakenly that rights once granted will be rights always granted. So, rebellion is the mechanism whereby those governing, Jefferson tells James Madison (30 Jan. 1787), are periodically reminded that government in a Jeffersonian republic is of and for the people—that is, that the will of the majority, fittingly educated, is the standard of justice.

The turbulence of which Jefferson speaks in the letters to Smith and Madison are illustrations of rebellion, says Holowchak (2019a, 73–76), not revolution. In contrast, revolution for Jefferson, following his Declaration, is a complex phenomenon. Unlike a rebellion, it is never to be undertaken for slight reasons or because of singular cases of governmental abuse. The difference, for Holowchak, is one of scope, size, and persistency. Rebellions, often violent, are generally quick signals to government concerning abuses, usually parochial. Revolutions, essentially violent, are long-term, well-planned, complex attempts at overthrowing a government, deemed habitually abusive.

One thing is clear. Revolutions or elitist rebellions, for Jefferson, are larger, more persistent, and more complex than rebellions or populist rebellions. To John Adams (4 Sept. 1823), Jefferson writes of the beginning, sustainment, and resolution of revolutions. “The generation which commences a revolution can rarely compleat it. Habituated from their infancy to passive submission of body and mind to their kings and priests, they are not qualified, when called on, to think and provide for themselves, and their inexperience, their ignorance and bigotry make them instruments often, in the hands of the Bonapartes and Iturbides to defeat their own rights and purposes.” Revolutions cannot be expected to establish a sustainable, free government in the first effort.

Moreover, the revolutionary generation is generally suited to begin and sustain the revolution, Jefferson continues in the letter to Adams, but not to resolve it. It is, for Jefferson, incapable of fixing a viable republican constitution. There are, thus, generational responsibilities for a Jeffersonian revolution to succeed. The role of the first generation is inchoation. Subsequent generations must sustain and complete the initial effort to usurp the coercive government. In the final stage, there is implementation of a constitution, reflective of and beholden to the will of the people.

It is because of the complexity and cost, in terms of human lives, that Jefferson maintained that revolutions ought only to be undertaken in cases of extreme, consistent despotism. As he writes in his Declaration ([D]: 19), “When a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them [the people] under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.” Still, he thought that they were “mechanisms” needed in republican governments, for there is a human tendency for those in power to be seduced by that power (TJ to Spencer Roane, 9 Mar. 1821).

5. Philosophy of Education

Jefferson’s views on education fit hand in glove with his political philosophy. [ 29 ] To facilitate a government of and for the people, there must be educational reform to allow for the general education of the citizenry for fullest political participation, to enable citizens to carry on daily affairs without governmental intervention, and to funnel the most talented and virtuous to a first-tier institution like the University of Virginia.

The sources of Jefferson’s views on education were many. From the French, Jefferson learned that education ought to be equalitarian, secular, and philosophically grounded (Arrowood 1930 [1970]: 49–50). He likely studied the works of Condorcet, La Chalotais, Diderot, Charon, and Turgot, and was influenced by men such as Lafayette, Correa de Serra, Cuvier, Buffon, Humboldt, and Say. Moreover, Jefferson corresponded with or read the works of Britons and Americans such as John Adams, Priestley, Locke, Thomas Cooper, Pictet, Stewart, Tichnor, Richard Price, William Small, Wythe, Fauquier, Peyton Randolph, and Patrick Henry (Holowchak 2014a, 69). That education ought to be scientific and useful was emphasized by William Small at William and Mary College as well as his uptake of the empirical philosophers of his day and their disdain of metempirical squabbling.

Jefferson’s educational views are spelled out neatly in four bills proposed to the General Assembly of Virginia (1779), in his Bill for Establishing a System of Public Education (1817), in his Rockfish Gap Report (1818), and in key letters to correspondents—e.g., Carr, Banister, Munford, Adams, Cabell, Burwell, Brazier, and Breckinridge.

When Jefferson, Pendleton, and Wythe undertook the task of revising the laws of Virginia in 1776, Jefferson drafted four significant bills—Bills 79 to 82.

I consider 4 of these bills … as forming a system by which every fibre would be eradicated of ancient or future aristocracy; and a foundation laid for a government truly republican. [ 30 ] ([WTJ5]: 44)

Bill 79 proposed to create wards or hundreds, each of which would have a school for general education in which “reading, writing, and common arithmetic should be taught” ([BG]). Virginia was to be subdivided in twenty-four districts, each of which would have a school for “classical learning, grammar, geography, and the higher branches of numerical arithmetic” ([BG]). Bill 80 proposed to secularize William and Mary College and add to its curriculum by enlarging its “sphere of science” ([BWM]). [ 31 ] Bill 81 proposed to create a public library for Virginia for scholars, elected officials, and inquisitive citizens ([BL]). Bill 82, the only bill that would eventually pass (1786), proposed to disallow state patronage of any particular religion ([BR]; [Au]: 31–44).

Jefferson made it clear (TJ to George Wythe, 13 Aug. 1786) that Bill 79—concerning implementation of wards and ward schools—was “the most important bill of our whole code”, as it was the “foundation … for the preservation of freedom and happiness” in a true republic. It was the key to engendering the sort of reforms needed for Jeffersonian republicanism—reforms aimed at an educated and thriving citizenry.

It is an axiom in my mind that our liberty can never be safe but in the hands of the people themselves, and that too of the people with a certain degree of education,

he says to George Washington (4 Jan. 1786). “Wherever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government,” he writes to philosopher Richard Price (8 Jan. 1789). [ 32 ]

Yet Jefferson’s trust in the people was not unconditional. He never asserted categorically that government for and of the people must, or even can, work. Experience had shown him that governments in which officials were not elected by and beholden to the people did not work—i.e., they were ultimately unresponsive to the needs of the people—and so he often called republicanism an “experiment” or “great experiment” (TJ to John Adams, 28 Feb. 1796, and WTJ5: 484). If citizens’ rights were to be respected and defended and if governors were not to govern in their own best interest but as stewards f the citizenry, all citizens needed a basic education—hence, the indispensability of ward-school education.

Given two classes of citizens, the laborers and the learned, Jefferson recognized two levels of education ([R]: 459–60). The laborers—divided roughly into husbandmen, manufacturers, and craftsmen—needed to conduct business to sustain and improve their domestic affairs. Thus, they needed access to primary education. The learned needed access to college-level (Jefferson’s intermediary grammar schools) and university-level education. To Peter Carr (7 Sept. 1814), Jefferson writes,

It is the duty of [our country’s] functionaries, to provide that every citizen in it should receive an education proportioned to the conditions and pursuits of his life.

Needs are not all personal. People are, for Jefferson, social creatures, republics are progressive, and thus, citizens have political duties. Education is critical. “If the condition of man is to be progressively ameliorated, as we fondly hope and believe,” writes Jefferson to the French revolutionary Marc Antoine Jullien (6 Oct. 1818), “education is to be the chief instrument in effecting it.” To fit and function in a stable, thriving democracy, all citizens are expected to know and assume a participatory role to the best of their capacities.

To promote both fullest political participation and moral progress, Jefferson realized that educational reform had to be systemic. In a letter to Senator Joseph C. Cabell (9 Sept. 1817), Jefferson outlines six features of that system.

• Basic education should be available to all.
• Education should be tax-supported.
• Education should be free from religious dictation.
• The educational system should be controlled at the local level.
• The upper levels of education should feature free inquiry.
• The mentally proficient should be enabled to pursue education to the highest levels at public expense.

Only a system could offer all citizens an education proportioned to their needs: the laborers, a broad, general education; the learned, an education suited to their idiosyncratic needs (Bowers 1943: 243 and Walton 1984: 119). Jefferson gets across that point to academician George Ticknor (25 Nov. 1817) in the manner of Bacon by limning the important truths—“that knowledge is power, that knowledge is safety, and that knowledge is happiness.” That knowledge is useful, data-driven.

Overall, observation showed that human capacities were greatly underdeveloped (TJ to William Green Munford, 17 June 1799). Consequently, education needed to tap into untapped human potential in morally responsible ways.

As well might it be urged that the wild and uncultivated tree, hitherto yielding sour and bitter fruit only, can never be made to yield better; yet we know that the grafting art implants a new tree on the savage stock, producing what is most estimable both in kind and degree. Education, in like manner, engrafts a new man on the native stock, and improves what in his nature was vicious and perverse into qualities of virtue and social worth ([R]: 461).

Human perfectibility, for Jefferson, was a matter of improved efficiency of living, which implied not merely progress in the fields of human health and human productivity through discoveries and labor-saving inventions, but also and especially moral improvement. Moral improvement was much more important than exercise of rationality (e.g., TJ to Maria Cosway, 12 Oct. 1786). Pure rationality was a matter of humans abstracting from reality; moral sensibility was a matter of humans immersed in reality.

Still Jefferson thought courses in morality were unneeded, if not injurious. “I think it lost time to attend lectures in this branch,” Jefferson writes to Carr (10 Aug. 1787), for moral conduct is not a matter of reason. That of course was consistent with the empiricism of his day—e.g., Lord Kames and David Hume. Nonetheless, Jefferson in Notes on the State of Virginia has a role for education in moral development. The first stage of education is not the time to encourage critical engagement with material like the Bible, for human rationality is not sufficiently developed, but instead a time when children should store historical facts to be used critically later in life. While doing so, the “elements of morality” can be instilled. Such elements teach children, says Jefferson in Aristotelian fashion, that

their own greatest happiness … does not depend on their condition in life in which chance has placed them, but is always the result of a good conscience, good health, occupation [i.e., industry], and freedom in all just pursuits ([NV]: 147).

Moral “learning” is, thus, less a matter of ingesting and digesting moral principles to apply to circumstances—there were no inviolable principles for Jefferson, as morality was a matter of sensing the right thing to do in circumstances—but of placing faith in the capacity of one’s moral sense to “decide” the right course of action without the corruptive influence of reason or peer pressure (TJ to Martha Jefferson, 11 Dec. 1783, TJ to Peter Carr, 19 Aug. 1785 and 10 Aug. 1787).

Because of the subordination of rationality to morality, education must be useful. It must engender effective, participatory citizenry and political stability. Jefferson always insisted on the practicality of education, because his take on knowledge was Baconian. [ 33 ] Consider what Jefferson says to scientist and physician Edward Jenner (14 May 1806) on behalf of the “whole human family” for his discovery of a vaccine for small pox.

Medecine has never before produced any single improvement of such ability. Harvey’s discovery of the circulation of the blood was a beautiful addition to our knowledge of the animal economy, but on a review of the practice of medicine before & since that epoch, I do not see any great amelioration which has been derived from that discovery, you have erased from the Calendar of human afflictions one of it’s greatest. Yours is the comfortable reflection that mankind can never forget that you have lived.

Yet every scientific discovery is potentially fruitful. “No discovery is barren; it always serves as a step to something else” (TJ to Robert Patterson, 17 Apr. 1803).

“Useful” for Jefferson was broad and with normative implications. [ 34 ] A complete education for Jefferson would produce men who were

in all ways useful to society—useful because intelligent, cultured, well-informed, technically competent, moral (this particularly), capable of earning a living, happy, and fitted for political and social leadership (Martin: 37).

Useful implied socially and politically active. Male citizens of greatest virtue and greatest genius would contribute by participation in science and in the most politically prominent positions. Lesser citizens would contribute more modestly and mostly at local levels through, for illustration, jury duty, participation in militia, and voting for and overseeing elected representatives.

Finally, education for Jefferson was a way of living. Its aim was to give persons the tools they would need to make them socially and politically involved, free, self-sufficient, and happy. As Karl Lehmann (201–2) notes:

To Thomas Jefferson, school would never be a ‘finishing’ agency. From each stage, man would have to move on in a never ending process of self-education…. The narrow professional who had but a technical knowledge of his little vocational area was a curse to him. Education had to be broad in order to assure the freedom and happiness of man.

Jefferson’s views on race have been the focus of considerable discussion in the secondary literature. [ 35 ] Those views, which would be considered today as racist, were likely influenced by the views of the leading naturalists of his day. In that regard, he was the product, not ahead, of his time.

Most of the discussion of Jefferson’s views on Blacks concerns his Notes on the State of Virginia. In Query XIV, Jefferson writes, “In memory [Blacks] are equal to the whites” ([NV]: 139). “In reason,” Jefferson says, “[Blacks are] much inferior [to Whites], as I think one could scarcely be found capable of tracing and comprehending the investigations of Euclid” ([NV]: 139). He adds, “Never yet could I find that a black had uttered a thought above the level of plain narration” ([NV]: 140). “In imagination [Blacks] are dull, tasteless, and anomalous,” and that is evident in their art. In music, Blacks have accurate ears “for tune and time,” are generally more gifted than Whites, and are capable of a “small catch,” as illustrated by their talent with the “Banjar,” a guitar-like instrument “brought … from Africa.” “Whether they will be equal to the composition of a more extensive run of melody, or of complicated harmony, is yet to be proved.” Despite their misery, which “is often the parent of the most affecting touches of poetry,” they have “no poetry” ([NV]: 40–41 and 288n10).

Inferiority of mind and imagination, he adds, is also confirmed, in Jefferson’s estimation, by “the improvement of the blacks in body and mind, in the first instance of their mixture with the whites,” and that “has been observed by every one, and proves that their inferiority is not the effect merely of their condition of life” ([NV]: 141). Here he may be referencing “observations” in scientific texts of his day in his library.

In morality, Jefferson admits, Blacks are the equals of all others.

We find among them numerous instances of the most rigid integrity, and as many as among their better instructed masters, of benevolence, gratitude, and unshaken fidelity.

What he takes to be their “disposition to theft,” Jefferson explains thus: “The man, in whose favour no laws of property exist, probably feels himself less bound to respect those made in favour of others.” Might not a slave “justifiably take a little from one, who has taken all from him” ([NV]: 142).

All such conclusions, Jefferson says, are provisional: They have the confirmation of observation, but Blacks as well as “red men” hitherto have not been the subjects of natural history.

The opinion, that they are inferior in the faculties of reason and imagination, must be hazarded with great diffidence. To justify a general conclusion, requires many observations, even where the subject may be submitted to the Anatomical knife, to Optical glasses, to analysis by fire or by solvents. How much more then where it is a faculty, not a substance, we are examining; where it eludes the research of all the senses; where the conditions of its existence are various and variously combined; where the effects of those which are present or absent bid defiance to calculation; let me add too, as a circumstance of great tenderness, where our conclusion would degrade a whole race of men from the rank in the scale of beings which their Creator may perhaps have given them. To our reproach it must be said, that though for a century and a half we have had under our eyes the races of black and of red men, they have never yet been viewed by us as subjects of natural history. I advance it therefore as a suspicion only, that the blacks … are inferior to the whites in the endowments both of body and mind ([NV]: 143).

Though he stated that Blacks and Native Americans had not been the subjects of natural history, there was a large body of literature by leading naturalists of his day—e.g., Swedish biologist Carl Linnaeus ([1758] 1808), Oliver Goldsmith ([1774] 1823), and “Georges” Cuvier ([1817] 1831)—to which Jefferson had access and which he doubtless assimilated. That literature viewed Blacks and Native Americans as inferior to white Europeans, and the overall tendency was to associate darker skin with increased inferiority. [ 36 ] Prominent philosophers like David Hume (1755 [1987]: 208n10), Adam Smith (1759 [1982]: 208), and C.F. de Volney in (1802 [2010]: 68) also asserted the inferiority of Blacks and Native Americans.

This smattering of the “science” of Jefferson’s time shows that some of the most esteemed scientists held that Blacks and Native Americans, considering each as a race or subspecies of humans, were regarded as inferior or defective. [ 37 ] Jefferson owned and was informed by most of that literature, since he tended to be aware of recent developments in all of the sciences. Thus Jefferson’s “observations” were tainted by the “observations” or prejudgments of the authorities of his day. Despite his view of them as inferior, he recognized Blacks, as moral equals of all others, had the same rights as all other men. He writes to Bishop Grégoire (25 Feb. 1809):

Whatever be [Blacks’] degree of talent it is no measure of their rights. Because Sir Isaac Newton was superior to others in understanding, he was not therefore lord of the person or property of others.

Nonetheless, Jefferson’s view of Native Americans was inconsistent with those naturalists who viewed them too as a race inferior to Europeans, and that requires some explanation. In Query XIV of his Notes on the State of Virginia , Jefferson offers a brief analysis of Native Americans as a race. Not having had the “advantages” of exposure to European culture that Blacks have had, still Native Americans “often carve figures on their pipes not destitute of design and merit” ([NV]: 140). Their carvings and drawings “prove the existence of a germ in their minds which only wants cultivation.” [ 38 ] He continues,

They astonish you with strokes of the most sublime oratory; such as prove their reason and sentiment strong, their imagination glowing and elevated. ([NV]: 140)

One may wonder how much “advantage” Jefferson imagines Blacks should demonstrate on account of their exposure to the “culture” of their oppressors while enslaved. But Jefferson maintains that though “most of [the Blacks in America] have been confined to tillage, to their own homes, and their own society” and have had little direct exposure to sciences and the arts,

many have been so situated, that they might have availed themselves of the conversation of their masters; many have been brought up to the handicraft arts, and from that circumstance have always been associated with the whites. Some have been liberally educated, and all have lived in countries where the arts and sciences are cultivated to a considerable degree, and have had before their eyes samples of the best works from abroad ([NV]: 139–40).

Thus, Jefferson’s assessment of Blacks differs from his assessment of Native Americans. It is unclear whether that difference is natural or nurtural. The intimation in Notes on the State of Virginia and in a letter to Edmund Coles (25 Aug. 1814) is natural, though in other letters (e.g., TJ tp Benjamin Banneker, 30 Aug. 1791, and TJ to Bishop Grégoire, 25 Feb. 1809), the suggestion is nurtural, though deficiencies are so pronounced that there can be no rapid change of situation. With Native Americans, the scenario is otherwise.

There is also a sentiment commonly expressed in the secondary literature (e.g., Risjord 2002: 50–1, and Holowchak 2012, 243–48) that Jefferson had a personal, or political, interest in defending Native Americans that he did not have for Blacks. Buffon—perhaps the greatest naturalist of his day—argued that since the continent of North America was colder and wetter than that of Europe, [ 39 ] its biota, Native Americans included, were inferior ([NV]: 48). Consequently, “the savage” was feeble, glabrous, passionless, and compared to Europeans, was sexually less potent, less sensitive, and more timid, among other things ([NV]: 58). Abbé Raynal said more. What was true of Native Americans would eventually prove true of any Europeans transplanted in America ([NV]: 64). Jefferson put considerable effort into refuting Buffon and Raynal ([NV]: 60–64), which he did, as most scholars concede (e.g., Peden 1954: xxiii), with remarkable success, though his aim was further, open discussion more than it was refutation ([NV]: 54).

One thing seems clear, however. His mistaken views of Blacks and his views of Native Americans shaped his political thinking. Jefferson’s political vision was of an American nation that was wedded to liberty, happiness, and mostly agrarian living, that instantiated irenic republican governance, and that would in time serve as a model for other parts of the globe (Holowchak 2017b, 131–51). That vision, for success, required in his eyes the fullest cultivation of genius and morality in the youthful nation (McCoy 1980: 136). Native Americans, it seems, passed on both accounts. Blacks, however, were to him wanting in genius. Thus, only Native Americans could be integrated into the fledgling nation, which held the prospect of covering, as an “empire for liberty,” the North American continent (TJ to James Madison, 27 Apr. 1809) and perhaps even the South American continent (TJ to James Madison, 24 Nov. 1801). In Jefferson’s view, Blacks could not be integrated, for any admixture of black blood with white blood would taint the offspring, and thereby threaten the success of Jefferson’s republican experiment. So, every slave would eventually have to be “removed beyond the reach of mixture” ([NV]: 137–38 and 143). Thus, he thought everyone would be best served if Blacks were educated, emancipated, and expatriated; so too would Whites.

Jefferson’s views on race of course have been roundly refuted by modern science, which shows that race biologically is an empty category.

What, however, of Jefferson’s views and actions on the elimination of slavery?

We do know that Jefferson consistently spoke out loudly against the institution of slavery and that, as lawyer and politician, he worked hard toward its eradication. He, for instance, undertook six pro bono cases on behalf of slaves, seeking freedom, and never defended the rights of a slaveholder. He crafted spirited declamations of slavery in his Summary View ([S] 115–16), initial draft of the Declaration of Independence ([Au] 22), his Notes on the State of Virginia ([NV]: 162–63), and in several letters.

Nonetheless, he did little in retirement, when he could have tried to do more.

Yet as he matured, Jefferson did little to advance the issue, because he believed that that effort might be more harmful than beneficial. The time, he consistently said, was not right. As early as 1805 (TJ to William Burwell, Jan. 28), he expresses skepticism concerning the eradication of slavery.

There are many virtuous men who would make any sacrifices to effect it, many equally virtuous who persuade themselves either that the thing is not wrong, or that it cannot be remedied, and very many with whom interest is morality [i.e., those who recognize its immorality, but think sympathy is equivalent to action]. The older we grow, the larger we are disposed to believe the last part to be.

To Edward Coles (25 Aug. 1814), he writes of the “general silence” on slavery as indicative of public apathy among younger generations.

I have overlived the generation with which mutual labors & perils begat mutual confidence and influence. This enterprise [abolition of slavery] is for the young; for those who can follow it up, and bear it through to its consummation.

He even castigates Coles when the latter considers emancipation of his own slaves—a precipitous act.

The laws do not permit us to turn them loose, if that were for their good: and to commute them for other property is to commit them to those whose usage of them we cannot control. I hope then, my dear sir, you will reconcile yourself to your country and its unfortunate condition.

Jefferson’s mistaken views on Blacks and his refusal upon retirement to do more to eliminate the institution of slavery have prompted considerable critical discussion in the secondary literature (see fn. 38). On the one hand, most see Jefferson as racist. McColley (1964), Cohen (1969), Miller (1977), and Dawidoff (1993) argue that Jefferson’s racial views were hypocritical rationalizations for his slaveholding and large living. Finkelman (1994), O’Brien (1996), and Magnis (1999) state that Jefferson was driven by a profound hatred of Blacks. On the other hand, Levy (1963), Mayer (2001), Burstein (2005), and Holowchak (2013b and 2020a) argue that though Jefferson held false views concerning Blacks, it is anachronistic to call him a racist, as ignorance concerning racial differences by commoners and scientists was at the time rife. Jefferson, ultimately, was a product of the ignorance and prejudgments of his time.

• WTJ1: The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Being his Autobiography, Correspondence, Reports, Messages, Addresses, and Other Writings, Official and Private: Published by the Order of the Joint Committee of Congress on the Library, from the Original Manuscripts, Deposited in the Department of State , 9 vols., H.A. Washington (ed.), Washington: Taylor & Maury, 1853–54.
• WTJ2: The Works of Thomas Jefferson , 12 vols., P.L. Ford (ed.), New York: Putnam, 1902.
• WTJ3: The Writings of Thomas Jefferson , Definitive Edition , 20 vols., A.A. Lipscomb and A.E. Bergh (ed.), Washington: Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association, 1907.
• WTJ4: The Papers of Thomas Jefferson , 42 Vols. (to date), J. Boyd et al. (ed.), Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1950–present.
• WTJ5: Thomas Jefferson: Writings , M.D. Peterson (ed.), New York: Library of America, 1984.
• WTJ6: Early History of the University of Virginia , J.W. Randolph (ed.), Richmond, VA: C.H. Wynne, 1856.

Specific Works

• [An] The Anas, in Thomas Jefferson, The Complete Anas of Thomas Jefferson , Franklin B. Sawvel (ed.), New York: The Round Table Press, 1903.
• [Au] Autobiography, in WTJ5: 1–101.
• [BG] Bill 79: Bill for the More General Diffusion of Knowledge, 1779, in WTJ5: 365–73. [ BG available online ]
• [BL] Bill 81: A Bill for Establishing a Public Library, 1779, WTJ4: 544–45. [ BL available online ]
• [BP] Bill for Establishing a System of Public Education, 1817, in WTJ6: 413–27.
• [BR] Bill 82: Bill for Establishing Religious Freedom, 1779, in WTJ5: 346–48. [ BR available online ]
• [BWM] Bill 80: A Bill for Amending the Constitution of the College of William and Mary, and Substituting More Certain Revenues for Its Support, 1779, WTJ4: 535–43. [ BWM available online ]
• [CV] Draft Constitution for Virginia, 1776, in WTJ5: 336–45.
• [D] Declaration of Independence, 1776, in WTJ5: 19–24.
• [DB] Letter to Danbury Baptist Association, 1802, in WTJ5: 510.
• [DP] Draft Declaration and Protest of the Commonwealth of Virginia, in WTJ5: 482–86.
• [E] Epitaph, in WTJ5: 706.
• [F] Opinion on the French Treaties, 1793, in WTJ5: 442–43. [ [F] available online ]
• [I 1 ] Inaugural Address, 1801, in WTJ5: 492–96. [ I 1 available online ]
• [I 2 ] Second Inaugural Address, 1805, in WTJ5: 518–23.
• [J] Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth , 1820, in WTJ4, Second Series, vol. 1, pp. 125–314.
• [K] Draft of the Kentucky Resolutions, in WTJ5: 449–56.
• [L] Letters, in WTJ1, WTJ2, WTJ3, WTJ4 or WTJ5: 711–1517.
• [M] Memorandum: Services to My Country, in WTJ5: 702–4.
• [NV] Notes on the State of Virginia , 1785, in Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson’s Notes on the State of Virginia , William Peden (ed.), Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1954.
• [R] Rockfish Gap Report, 1818, in WTJ5: 457–73. [ [R] available online ]
• [S] Summary View of the Rights of British America, 1774, in WTJ5: 103–22.
• [TJ] Travel Journals, in WTJ5: 623–58.
• Adams, J., “John Adams to Timothy Pickering, 6 August 1822,” Founders Online, National Archives, accessed September 29, 2019, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/99-02-02-7674.
• Arrowood, C.F., 1930 [1970], Thomas Jefferson and Education in a Republic , New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc..
• Binger, C., 1970, Thomas Jefferson: A Well-Tempered Mind , New York: W.W. Norton & Co.
• Bolingbroke, H., 1752, Reflections concerning Innate Moral Principles , London: S. Blandon.
• Bowers, C., 1943, “Jefferson and the Freedom of the Human Spirit”, Ethics , 53(4): 237–45.
• Burstein, A., 2005, Jefferson’s Secrets , New York: Basic Books.
• Catterall, Helen Tunnicliff, ed., 1968, Judicial Cases Concerning American Slavery and the Negro, Vol. 1, New York: Octagon Books, Inc.
• Chinard, G., 1929, Thomas Jefferson: The Apostle of Americanism , Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan Press, 1962.
• Cohen, W., 1969, “Thomas Jefferson and the Problem of Slavery”, Journal of American History , 3: 503–26.
• Cunningham, N.E., 1987, In Pursuit of Reason: The Life of Thomas Jefferson , Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.
• Cuvier, G., 1817, The Animal Kingdom, Arranged in Conformity with Its Organization , vol. 1, H. M’Murtrie (trans.), New York: G & C & H Carvill, 1831.
• Dawidoff, R., 1993, “The Jeffersonian Option”, Political Theory , 21(3): 434–52.
• Destutt de Tracy, A.L.C., 1818/1827, Éléments d’Ideologie , vol. 5, Bruxelles: Courcier.
• Dixon, R., 2013, “Thomas Jefferson: A Lawyer’s Path to a Legal Philosophy”, in Holowchak 2013d: 15–39.
• Erikson, E., 1974, Dimensions of a New Reality: Jefferson Lectures 1973, New York: W.W. Norton & Company.
• Ferguson, A., 1767, An Essay on the History of Civil Society , London.
• Finkelman, P., 1994, “Thomas Jefferson and Antislavery: The Myth Goes On”, The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography , 102(2): 193–228.
• Gaustad, E.S., 1984, “Religion”, in Peterson 1984: 277–93.
• Gish, D., and D. Klinghard, 2017, Thomas Jefferson and the Science of Republican Government: A Political Biography of Notes on the State of Virginia , Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Goldsmith, O., 1774, An History of the Earth, and Animated Nature , 8 vols., Philadelphia: Edward Poole, 1823.
• Greene, J.C., 1958, “Science and the Public in the Age of Jefferson”, Isis , 49(1): 13–25.
• Gutzman, K.R.C., 2017, Thomas Jefferson, Revolutionary: A Radical’s Struggle to Remake America , New York: St. Martin’s Press
• Helo, A., 2013, Thomas Jefferson’s Ethics and the Politics of Human Progress , Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Helvétius, C.A., 1810, Treatise on Man: His Intellectual Faculties and his Education , W. Hooper, M.D. (trans.), London: Albion Press.
• Holowchak, M.A., 2012, Dutiful Correspondent: Philosophical Essays on Thomas Jefferson, Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.
• –––, 2013, Framing a Legend: Uncovering the Distorted History of Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings , Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books.
• –––, 2014a, Thomas Jefferson’s Philosophy of Education: A Utopian Dream , London: Taylor & Francis.
• –––, 2014b, Thomas Jefferson: Uncovering His Unique Philosophy and Vision , Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books.
• –––, 2017a, Thomas Jefferson, Moralist , McFarland & Co., Inc., Jefferson, NC.
• –––, 2017b, Jefferson’s Political Philosophy and the Metaphysics of Utopia , Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill.
• –––, 2019a, The Cavernous Mind of Thomas Jefferson, An American Savant , Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars.
• –––, 2019b, Thomas Jefferson: Psychobiography of an American Lion , Hauppauge, NY: Nova Science Publishers.
• –––, 2019c, Jefferson’s Bible: Text with Introduction and Critical Commentary , Berlin: DeGruyter, 2019.
• –––, 2020a, Rethinking Thomas Jefferson’s Views on Race and Slavery: “God’s justice can not sleep forever,” Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars.
• Hull, G., 1997, “William Small 1734–1775: No Publications, Much Influence”, Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine , 90(2): 102–5.
• Hume, D., 1755 [1987], Essays: Moral, Political, and Literary , Eugene F. Miller (ed.), New York: Liberty Fund, 1987.
• Hutcheson, F., 1726, Inquiry into the Original of our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue , Wolfgang Leidhold (ed.), Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2004. [ Hutcheson 1758 available on line ]
• James, M., 2012, “Race”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2012 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = < https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2012/entries/race/ >.
• Jordan, W., 1969, White over Black: American Attitudes toward the Negro, 1550–1812 , Baltimore: Penguin Books.
• Kames, Lord (Henry Home), 1758, Essays on the Principles of Morality and Natural Religion , London, 2 nd edition.
• –––, 1774, Sketches of the History of Man , vol. 3, Edinburgh, 1813.
• –––, 1798, The Gentleman Farmer, being an Attempt to Improve Agriculture by Subjecting It to the Test of Rational Principles , Edinburgh, 4 th edition.
• Kukla, John, 2007, Mr. Jefferson’s Women, New York: Vintage Books.
• Lehmann, K., 1965, Thomas Jefferson: American Humanist , Charlottesville, VA: University of Virginia Press, 1994.
• Levy, L., 1963, Jefferson and Civil Liberties: The Darker Side , Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
• Linné, C. (Linnaeus), 1808, A General System of Nature , vol. 1, William Turton (trans.), London: Lackington, Allen, and Co., 1858.
• Locke, J., 1690 [1964], Essay concerning Human Understanding , A.D. Woozley (ed.), New York: New American Library.
• Magnis, N., 1999, “Thomas Jefferson and Slavery: An Analysis of His Racist Thinking as Revealed by His Writings and Political Behavior”, Journal of Black Studies , 29(4): 491–509.
• Malone, Dumas, 1948, Jefferson the Virginian , Boston: Little, Brown and Company.
• –––, 1951, Jefferson and the Rights of Man , Boston: Little, Brown and Company.
• –––, 1962, Jefferson and the Ordeal of Liberty , Boston: Little, Brown and Company.
• –––, 1970, Jefferson the President: First Term, 1801–1805 , Boston: Little, Brown and Company.
• –––, 1974, Jefferson the President: Second Term, 1805–1809 , Boston: Little, Brown and Company.
• –––, 1981, The Sage of Monticello , Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia.
• Martin, E.T., 1952, Thomas Jefferson: Scientist , New York: H. Schuman.
• Marx, L., 1964, The Machine in the Garden: Technology and the Pastoral Ideal in America , New York: Oxford University Press.
• Mayer, D.N., 2001, “The Thomas Jefferson-Sally Hemings Myth and the Politicization of American History: Individual Views of David N. Mayer concurring with the Majority Report of the Scholars Commission on the Jefferson-Hemings Matter”, < available online >.
• McColley, R., 1964, Slavery in Jeffersonian Virginia , Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
• McCoy, D., 1980, The Elusive Republic: Political Economy in Jeffersonian America , Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
• Merkel, W.G., 2012, “A Founding Father on Trial: Jefferson’s Rights Talk and the Problem of Slavery during the Revolutionary Period”, Rutgers Law Review , 64(3): 595–663.
• Millar, J., 1806, The Origins of the Distinction of Ranks: Or, An Inquiry into the Circumstances which Give Riser to Influence and Authority, in the Different Members of Society , Edinburgh, 4 th edition.
• Miller, J.C., 1977, The Wolf by the Ears: Thomas Jefferson and Slavery , Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press.
• Montesquieu, 1758, The Spirit of Laws , Thomas Nugent (trans.), London, 3 rd edition.
• Neem, J., 2013, “Developing Freedom: Thomas Jefferson, the State, and Human Capability”, Studies in American Political Development , 27(1): 36–50.
• O’Brien, C.C., 1996, The Long Affair: Thomas Jefferson and the French Revolution, 1785–1800 , Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Onuf, P.S. (ed.), 1993, Jeffersonian Legacies , Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia.
• –––, 2007, Mind of Thomas Jefferson , Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press.
• Peden, W., 1954, “Introduction”, Notes on the State of Virginia , in Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson’s Notes on the State of Virginia , William Peden (ed.), Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press: xi–xxv.
• Peterson, M.D., 1960, The Jefferson Image in the American Mind, London: Oxford University Press.
• –––, 1965, “Thomas Jefferson and the National Purpose”, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society , 105(6): 517–20.
• –––, 1970, Thomas Jefferson & the New Nation:A Biography, London: Oxford University Press.
• ––– (ed.), 1984, Thomas Jefferson: A Reference Biography , New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons.
• Risjord, N.K., 2002, Thomas Jefferson , Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
• Robertson, W., 1777/1855, The History of the Discovery and Settlement of America , New York: Harper & Brothers.
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• Scherr, A., 2016, Thomas Jefferson’s Image of New England: Nationalism versus Sectionalism in the Young Republic, Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishers.
• Sheridan, E.R., 1983, “Introduction”, in Jefferson’s Extracts from the Gospels , Dickinson W. Adams (ed.), Princeton: Princeton University Press: 3–42.
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• Sloan, H., 1993, “‘The Earth belongs in Usufruct to the Living,’” in Onuf 1993: 281–315.
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• Temperly, H., 1997, “Jefferson and Slavery: A Study in Moral Perplexity”, Reason and Republicanism: Thomas Jefferson’s Legacy of Liberty , G.L. McDowell and S.L. Noble (ed.), Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, pp. 85–99.
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• Wilson, William, 2017, “The Myth of Jefferson’s Deism,” The Elusive Thomas Jefferson: Essays on the Man Behind the Myths, ed. M. Andrew Holowchak and Brian W. Dotts, Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 118–129.

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Thomas Jefferson

By: History.com Editors

Updated: March 22, 2022 | Original: October 29, 2009

Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), author of the Declaration of Independence and the third U.S. president, was a leading figure in America’s early development. During the American Revolutionary War (1775-83), Jefferson served in the Virginia legislature and the Continental Congress and was governor of Virginia. He later served as U.S. minister to France and U.S. secretary of state and was vice president under John Adams (1735-1826). 

Jefferson, a Democratic-Republican who thought the national government should have a limited role in citizens’ lives, was elected president in 1800. During his two terms in office (1801-1809), the U.S. purchased the Louisiana Territory and Lewis and Clark explored the vast new acquisition. Although Jefferson promoted individual liberty, he also enslaved over six hundred people throughout his life. After leaving office, he retired to his Virginia plantation, Monticello, and helped found the University of Virginia.

Thomas Jefferson’s Early Years

Thomas Jefferson was born on April 13, 1743, at Shadwell, a plantation on a large tract of land near present-day Charlottesville, Virginia . His father, Peter Jefferson (1707/08-57), was a successful planter and surveyor and his mother, Jane Randolph Jefferson (1720-76), came from a prominent Virginia family. Thomas was their third child and eldest son; he had six sisters and one surviving brother.

Did you know? In 1815, Jefferson sold his 6,700-volume personal library to Congress for $23,950 to replace books lost when the British burned the U.S. Capitol, which housed the Library of Congress, during the War of 1812. Jefferson's books formed the foundation of the rebuilt Library of Congress's collections.

In 1762, Jefferson graduated from the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, where he reportedly enjoyed studying for 15 hours, then practicing violin for several more hours on a daily basis. He went on to study law under the tutelage of respected Virginia attorney George Wythe (there were no official law schools in America at the time, and Wythe’s other pupils included future Chief Justice John Marshall and statesman Henry Clay ). 

Jefferson began working as a lawyer in 1767. As a member of colonial Virginia’s House of Burgesses from 1769 to 1775, Jefferson, who was known for his reserved manner, gained recognition for penning a pamphlet, “A Summary View of the Rights of British America” (1774), which declared that the British Parliament had no right to exercise authority over the American colonies .

Marriage and Monticello

After his father died when Jefferson was a teen, the future president inherited the Shadwell property. In 1768, Jefferson began clearing a mountaintop on the land in preparation for the elegant brick mansion he would construct there called Monticello (“little mountain” in Italian). Jefferson, who had a keen interest in architecture and gardening, designed the home and its elaborate gardens himself. 

Over the course of his life, he remodeled and expanded Monticello and filled it with art, fine furnishings and interesting gadgets and architectural details. He kept records of everything that happened at the 5,000-acre plantation, including daily weather reports, a gardening journal and notes about his slaves and animals.

On January 1, 1772, Jefferson married Martha Wayles Skelton (1748-82), a young widow. The couple moved to Monticello and eventually had six children; only two of their daughters—Martha (1772-1836) and Mary (1778-1804)—survived into adulthood. In 1782, Jefferson’s wife Martha died at age 33 following complications from childbirth. Jefferson was distraught and never remarried. However, it is believed he fathered more children with one of his enslaved women, Sally Hemings (1773-1835), who was also his wife’s half-sister .

Slavery was a contradictory issue in Jefferson’s life. Although he was an advocate for individual liberty and at one point promoted a plan for the gradual emancipation of slaves in America, he enslaved people throughout his life. Additionally, while he wrote in the Declaration of Independence that “all men are created equal,” he believed African Americans were biologically inferior to whites and thought the two races could not coexist peacefully in freedom. Jefferson inherited some 175 enslaved people from his father and father-in-law and owned an estimated 600 slaves over the course of his life. He freed only a small number of them in his will; the majority were sold following his death.

Thomas Jefferson and the American Revolution

In 1775, with the American Revolutionary War recently underway, Jefferson was selected as a delegate to the Second Continental Congress. Although not known as a great public speaker, he was a gifted writer and at age 33, was asked to draft the Declaration of Independence (before he began writing, Jefferson discussed the document’s contents with a five-member drafting committee that included John Adams and Benjamin Franklin ). The Declaration of Independence , which explained why the 13 colonies wanted to be free of British rule and also detailed the importance of individual rights and freedoms, was adopted on July 4, 1776.

In the fall of 1776, Jefferson resigned from the Continental Congress and was re-elected to the Virginia House of Delegates (formerly the House of Burgesses). He considered the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, which he authored in the late 1770s and which Virginia lawmakers eventually passed in 1786, to be one of the significant achievements of his career. It was a forerunner to the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution , which protects people’s right to worship as they choose.

From 1779 to 1781, Jefferson served as governor of Virginia, and from 1783 to 1784, did a second stint in Congress (then officially known, since 1781, as the Congress of the Confederation). In 1785, he succeeded Benjamin Franklin (1706-90) as U.S. minister to France. Jefferson’s duties in Europe meant he could not attend the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in the summer of 1787; however, he was kept informed of the proceedings to draft a new national constitution and later advocated for including a bill of rights and presidential term limits.

Jefferson's Path to the Presidency

After returning to America in the fall of 1789, Jefferson accepted an appointment from President George Washington (1732-99) to become the new nation’s first secretary of state. In this post, Jefferson clashed with U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton (1755/57-1804) over foreign policy and their differing interpretations of the U.S. Constitution. In the early 1790s, Jefferson, who favored strong state and local government, co-founded the Democratic-Republican Party to oppose Hamilton’s Federalist Party , which advocated for a strong national government with broad powers over the economy.

In the presidential election of 1796, Jefferson ran against John Adams and received the second-highest amount of votes, which, according to the law at the time, made him vice president.

Jefferson ran against Adams again in the presidential election of 1800, which turned into a bitter battle between the Federalists and Democratic-Republicans. Jefferson defeated Adams; however, due to a flaw in the electoral system, Jefferson tied with fellow Democratic-Republican Aaron Burr (1756-1836). The House of Representatives broke the tie and voted Jefferson into office. In order to avoid a repeat of this situation, Congress proposed the Twelfth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which required separate voting for president and vice president. The amendment was ratified in 1804.

Jefferson Becomes Third U.S. President

Jefferson was sworn into office on March 4, 1801; he was the first presidential inauguration held in Washington, D.C. ( George Washington was inaugurated in New York in 1789; in 1793, he was sworn into office in Philadelphia, as was his successor, John Adams, in 1797.) Instead of riding in a horse-drawn carriage, Jefferson broke with tradition and walked to and from the ceremony.

One of the most significant achievements of Jefferson’s first administration was the purchase of the Louisiana Territory from France for $15 million in 1803. At more than 820,000 square miles, the Louisiana Purchase (which included lands extending between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains and the Gulf of Mexico to present-day Canada) effectively doubled the size of the United States. Jefferson then commissioned explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark to explore the uncharted land, plus the area beyond, out to the Pacific Ocean. (At the time, most Americans lived within 50 miles of the Atlantic Ocean.)  Lewis and Clark’s expedition , known today as the Corps of Discovery, lasted from 1804 to 1806 and provided valuable information about the geography, American Indian tribes and animal and plant life of the western part of the continent.

In 1804, Jefferson ran for re-election and defeated Federalist candidate Charles Pinckney (1746-1825) of South Carolina with more than 70 percent of the popular vote and an electoral count of 162-14. During his second term, Jefferson focused on trying to keep America out of Europe’s Napoleonic Wars (1803-15). However, after Great Britain and France, who were at war, both began harassing American merchant ships, Jefferson implemented the Embargo Act of 1807. 

The act, which closed U.S. ports to foreign trade, proved unpopular with Americans and hurt the U.S. economy. It was repealed in 1809 and, despite the president’s attempts to maintain neutrality, the U.S. ended up going to war against Britain in the War of 1812. Jefferson chose not to run for a third term in 1808 and was succeeded in office by James Madison (1751-1836), a fellow Virginian and former U.S. secretary of state.

Thomas Jefferson’s Later Years and Death

Jefferson spent his post-presidential years at Monticello, where he continued to pursue his many interests, including architecture, music, reading and gardening. He also helped found the University of Virginia, which held its first classes in 1825. Jefferson was involved with designing the school’s buildings and curriculum and ensured that unlike other American colleges at the time, the school had no religious affiliation or religious requirements for its students.

Jefferson died at age 83 at Monticello on July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence. Coincidentally, John Adams, Jefferson’s friend, former rival and fellow signer of the Declaration of Independence, died the same day . Jefferson was buried at Monticello. However, due to the significant debt the former president had accumulated during his life, his mansion, furnishing and enslaved people were sold at auction following his death. Monticello was eventually acquired by a nonprofit organization, which opened it to the public in 1954.

Jefferson remains an American icon. His face appears on the U.S. nickel and is carved into stone at Mount Rushmore . The Jefferson Memorial, near the National Mall in Washington, D.C., was dedicated on April 13, 1943, the 200th anniversary of Jefferson’s birth.

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The Papers of Thomas Jefferson

The definitive scholarly edition of the correspondence and other papers of Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), first secretary of state and third president of the United States, principal author of the Declaration of Independence and the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, founder of the University of Virginia.

The Papers of Thomas Jefferson editorial project at Princeton University is preparing a comprehensive scholarly edition of documents written or received by Thomas Jefferson. The edition’s publisher is Princeton University Press. Content of the volumes is also available in digital format within the Rotunda imprint of the University of Virginia Press and through Founders Online of the National Archives. Volume 1, with documents from the period 1760–1776, appeared in 1950, and Volume 47, covering a part of the year 1805, will be published in 2023.  

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U.S. Presidents / Thomas Jefferson

1743 - 1826

Thomas jefferson.

…some honest men fear that a republican government can not be strong, that this Government is not strong enough; but would the honest patriot…abandon a government which has so far kept us free and firm…? I trust not. I believe this, on the contrary, the strongest Government on earth. First Inaugural Address

Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, spent his childhood roaming the woods and studying his books on a remote plantation in the Virginia Piedmont. Thanks to the prosperity of his father, Jefferson had an excellent education. After years in boarding school, where he excelled in classical languages, Jefferson enrolled in William and Mary College in his home state of Virginia, taking classes in science, mathematics, rhetoric, philosophy, and literature. He also studied law, and by the time he was admitted to the Virginia bar in April 1767, many considered him to have one of the nation's best legal minds.

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Miller Center of Public Affairs, University of Virginia. “Thomas Jefferson.” Accessed May 14, 2024. https://millercenter.org/president/jefferson.

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Professor Peter Onuf is the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation Professor of History at the University of Virginia.

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Essays on Thomas Jefferson

What makes a good thomas jefferson essay topic.

When it comes to writing an essay on Thomas Jefferson, the topic you choose can make all the difference. A good essay topic will engage the reader, showcase your knowledge and critical thinking skills, and provide a unique perspective on the subject matter. So, What Makes a Good Thomas Jefferson essay topic? Here are some recommendations on how to brainstorm and choose an essay topic, what to consider, and What Makes a Good essay topic.

When brainstorming essay topics on Thomas Jefferson, it's essential to consider the aspects of his life, achievements, and impact that interest you the most. Are you passionate about his role as a founding father, his contributions to the Declaration of Independence, his presidency, or his views on democracy and individual rights? Start by making a list of these interests and then consider how you can develop them into a unique and engaging essay topic.

When choosing a Thomas Jefferson essay topic, it's important to consider the relevance and significance of the subject matter. Is the topic you're considering relevant to current events, debates, or scholarly discussions? Will it provide a fresh perspective or shed new light on a lesser-known aspect of Jefferson's life and legacy? A good essay topic should be thought-provoking, relevant, and contribute to the existing body of knowledge on Thomas Jefferson.

A good Thomas Jefferson essay topic should also be specific and focused. Rather than choosing a broad and generic topic, consider narrowing down your focus to a specific aspect of Jefferson's life, work, or impact. For example, instead of writing a general essay on Thomas Jefferson's presidency, you could focus on a specific policy or event during his time in office, such as the Louisiana Purchase or the Embargo Act of 1807.

In addition to these considerations, a good essay topic on Thomas Jefferson should also be well-researched and supported by credible sources. Before finalizing your topic, make sure that there is enough scholarly literature, primary sources, and reliable information available to support your arguments and analysis.

Best Thomas Jefferson Essay Topics

Looking for inspiration for your Thomas Jefferson essay? Here are some creative and stand-out essay topics that go beyond the ordinary and offer a fresh perspective on the life and legacy of this influential figure:

• Thomas Jefferson's views on education and the founding of the University of Virginia
• The role of Thomas Jefferson in shaping American democracy and individual rights
• Thomas Jefferson's complex relationship with slavery and his legacy as a slave owner
• The impact of Thomas Jefferson's foreign policy on the United States' global standing
• Thomas Jefferson's contributions to the field of architecture and his influence on American design
• The legacy of Thomas Jefferson's Declaration of Independence and its relevance in modern society
• The political philosophy of Thomas Jefferson and its influence on American politics
• Thomas Jefferson's role in the Lewis and Clark Expedition and the exploration of the American West
• The personal and public life of Thomas Jefferson: a study in contradictions
• Thomas Jefferson's interest in science, technology, and innovation
• The relationship between Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton: conflict and cooperation
• Thomas Jefferson's vision for the future of America and its relevance today
• The impact of Thomas Jefferson's agricultural innovations on American farming practices
• Thomas Jefferson's role as a diplomat and ambassador to France
• The legacy of Thomas Jefferson's writings and correspondence
• Thomas Jefferson's influence on American literature and the arts
• The portrayal of Thomas Jefferson in popular culture and historical memory
• Thomas Jefferson's legacy as a champion of religious freedom and separation of church and state
• The impact of Thomas Jefferson's presidency on the expansion of the United States
• Thomas Jefferson's vision for the relationship between government and the governed

These essay topics offer a wide range of opportunities to explore different aspects of Thomas Jefferson's life, work, and impact from a fresh and unique perspective.

Thomas Jefferson essay topics Prompts

Looking for some creative prompts to spark your imagination and inspire your Thomas Jefferson essay? Here are five engaging and thought-provoking prompts to get you started:

• Imagine you are having a conversation with Thomas Jefferson. What questions would you ask him, and what topics would you want to discuss?
• Write a letter to Thomas Jefferson, sharing your thoughts on his contributions to American democracy and individual rights.
• Create a fictional dialogue between Thomas Jefferson and another historical figure, exploring their differing views on a specific issue or event.
• Imagine you are a reporter covering a significant moment in Thomas Jefferson's life or presidency. Write a news article or feature story capturing the essence of the event.
• Choose a specific aspect of Thomas Jefferson's life or legacy and create a multimedia presentation (such as a podcast, video, or digital exhibition) to showcase its significance and relevance today.

These prompts are designed to encourage creative and critical thinking, as well as provide an opportunity to engage with Thomas Jefferson's life and legacy in a dynamic and interactive way. Have fun exploring these prompts and discovering new insights into the world of Thomas Jefferson.

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Declaration of independence by thomas jefferson: critical analysis, benjamin banneker's argument against slavery, thomas jefferson and alexander hamilton: anti-federalist and federalist, thomas jefferson vs. alexander hamilton, hamilton and jefferson's disagreement on federal government power, federalists vs. constructionists: jefferson & madison era, benjamin banneker – a revolutionary figure in american history, benjamin banneker's letter to thomas jefferson: ethos, pathos, logos, thomas jefferson: a hero of vote-based system, the key arguments of jefferson for independence and the declaration of independence from great britain, review of the declaration of independence by thomas jefferson, time after victory: thomas jefferson vs alexander hamilton, thomas jefferson: founding father and president, thomas jefferson’s maligned actions, thomas jefferson’s racial views: a complicated legacy, the challenges of thomas jefferson, the declaration of independence: diction analysis, relevant topics.

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The Papers of Thomas Jefferson

Miniature of Thomas Jefferson, 1788 by John Trumbull. Courtesy Monticello.

Princeton University and the Thomas Jefferson Foundation at Monticello

Additional information at: https://jeffersonpapers.princeton.edu/

The Rotunda site contains a searchable database of all thirty-six volumes published through 2009 into one searchable online resource. In addition, it includes the first four volumes of the Retirement Series sponsored by the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, which documents the time between Jefferson’s return to private life and his death in 1826. The Retirement Series is creating the definitive edition of Thomas Jefferson’s letters and papers covering the period from 1809 to 1826 in both letterpress and digital form. More information is available at https://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/project-description and via Rotunda at http://rotunda.upress.virginia.edu/founders/TSJN.html

The Jefferson Papers are also part of Founders Online at founders.archives.gov

A comprehensive edition of the papers of Thomas Jefferson (1743 – 1826), third President of the United States. Jefferson was a lawyer, delegate to the Virginia House of Burgesses, and landowner, before beginning his political career in 1775. At age 33, he was the principal author of the Declaration of Independence. At the beginning of the American Revolution he served in the Continental Congress representing Virginia and then served as a wartime Governor of Virginia (1779–1781). Just after the war ended, from mid-1784 Jefferson served as a diplomat, stationed in Paris. Under President Washington, Jefferson was the first United States Secretary of State (1790–1793) and was elected Vice President in 1796. Elected president in 1800, he oversaw the purchase of the vast Louisiana Territory from France (1803), and sent the Lewis and Clark Expedition (1804–1806) to explore the new west. He was the founder of the University of Virginia. The NHPRC also supported a microfilm edition of Jefferson’s Papers at the University of Virginia, 1732-1828. Ten reels.

Forty-three completed volumes of a planned 60-volume edition.

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Thomas jefferson: an essay or introductory lecture...dialects of the english language, 1825, 1825.

or Introductory Lecture

towards facilitating instruction in the Anglo-Saxon and Modern dialects of the English Language.

for the use of the University of Virginia

Printed by order of the Board of Visitors

The importance of the Anglo-Saxon dialect towards a perfect understanding of the English language seems not to have been duly estimated by those charged with the education of youth; and yet it is unquestionably the basis of our present tongue. it was a full-formed language, it’s frame and construction, it’s declensions of nouns and verbs, and it’s syntax were peculiar to the Northern languages, and fundamentally different from those of the South. it was the language of all England, properly so called, from the Saxon possession of that country in the 6 th century to the time of Henry III, in the 13 th and was spoken pure and unmixed with any other, altho’ the Romans had been in possession of that country for nearly five centuries from the time of Julius Cæsar, yet it was a military possession chiefly, by their souldiery alone, and with dispositions intermutually jealous and unamicable. they seem to have aimed at no lasting settlements there, and to have had little familiar mixture with the native Britons. in this state of connection there would probably be little incorporation of the Roman into the native language, and on their subsequent evacuation of the island, it’s traces would soon be lost altogether. and, had it been otherwise, these innovations would have been carried with the Natives themselves when driven into Wales by the invasion and entire occupation of the rest of the Southern portion of the island by the Anglo-Saxons. the language of these last became that of the country, from that time forth, for nearly seven centuries; and so little attention was paid among them to the Latin, that it was known to a few individuals only, as a matter of science, and without any chance of transfusion into the vulgar language. we may safely repeat the affirmation therefore that the pure Anglo-Saxon constitutes at this day the basis of our language. that it was sufficiently copious for the purposes of society in the existing conditions of arts and manners, reason alone would satisfy us from the necessity of the case. it’s copiousness too was much favored by the latitude it allowed of combining primitive words so as to produce any modification of idea desired in this characteristic it was equal to the Greek. but it is more specially proved by the actual fact of the books they have left us in the various branches of history geography, religion, law, and poetry. and altho’, since the Norman conquest it has recieved vast additions and embellishments from the Latin, Greek, French & Italian languages, yet these are but engraftments on it’s idiomatic stem. it’s original structure & Syntax remain the same, and can be but imperfectly understood by the mere Latin scholar. hence the necessity of making the A-Saxon a regular branch of Academic education. in the 16 th and 17 th centuries it was assiduously cultivated by a host of learned men. the names Lambard, Parker, Spelman. Wheeloc, Wilkins, Gibson, Hickes, Thwaites, Somner, Benson, Mareschal, Elstob, deserve to be ever remembered with gratitude for the Anglo-Saxon works which they have given us through the press, the only certain means of preserving and promulgating them. for a century past this study has been too much neglected. the reason of this neglect, and it’s remedy, shall be the subject of some explanatory Observations. these will respect I. Alphabet. II. Orthography. III. Pronuntiation. IV. Grammar.

I. The Alphabet.

The Anglo-Saxon alphabet, as known to us in it’s printed forms, consists of 26. characters, about the half of which are Roman, the others of forms peculiarly Saxon. these, mixed with the others, give an aspect to the whole rugged, uncouth and appalling to an eye accustomed to the roundness and symmetry of the Roman character. this is a first discouragement to the English student. next, the task of learning a new alphabet, and the time and application necessary to render it easy and familiar to the Reader, often decides the doubting learner against an enterprise so apparently irksome.

The earliest remains extant of Saxon writing are said to be of the 7 th century; and the latest of the 13 th . the black letter seems to have been introduced by William the conqueror, whose laws are written in Norman French, and in that letter. the full alphabet of Roman character was first used about the beginning of the 16 th century. but the expression of the same sounds by a different character did not change these sounds, nor the language which they constituted; did not make the language of Alfred a different one from that of Piers Ploughman, of Chaucer, Douglas, Spencer, and Shakespear, any more than the 2 d revolution, which substituted the Roman for the English black letter made theirs a different language from that of Pope and Bolingbroke; or the writings of Shakespear, printed in black letter different from the same as now done in Roman type. the life of Alfred written in Latin, and in Roman character by Asser, was reprinted by Archbishop Parker in A-S. letters. but it is Latin still, altho’ the words are represented by characters different from those of Asser’s original. and the extracts given us by D r Hickes from the Greek Septuagint, in A-S. characters, is Greek still, altho’ the Greek sounds are represented by other types. here then I ask, why should not this Roman character, with which we are all familiar, be substituted now for the A-S. by printing in the former the works already edited in the latter type? and also the M.S.S. still inedited? this may be done letter for letter, and would remove entirely the first discouraging obstacle to the general study of the A-Saxon.

II. Orthography

In the period during which the A-S. alphabet was in use, reading and writing were rare arts. the highest dignitaries of the church subscribed their marks, not knowing how to write their names. Alfred himself was taught to read in his 36 th year only, or as some editions of Asser say, in his 39 th speaking of learning in his preface to the Pastoral of Gregory, Asser says ‘swa clean hi was oth-fallen on Angalkin that swithe few wereon behinan Humber the hior thenung cuthon understandan on English, oth furthon an errand y-write of Latin on English areckon. and I ween that not many beyondan Humber nay aren; swa few hior weron that I furthon ane on lepne nay may y-thinkan be-Suthan Thames tha tha I to ric fang.’ or as literally translated into later English by Archbishop Parker, ‘so clean it was fallen amongst the English nation, that very few were on this side Humber which their service could understand in English, or else furthermore an epistle from Latin into English to declare. and I ween that not many beyond Humber were not. so few of them were, that I also one only may not remember by South Thamise when as I to reign undertook.’ in this benighted state, so profoundly illiterate, few read at all, and fewer wrote; and the writer having no examples of orthography to recur to, thinking them indeed not important, had for his guide, his own ideas only of the power of the letters, unpractised & indistinct as they might be. he brought together therefore those letters which he supposed must enter into the composition of the sound he meant to express, and was not even particular in arranging them in the order in which the sounds composing the word followed each other. thus birds were spelt brides , grass gaers, run yrnam, cart crætt, fresh fersh. they seemed to suppose too that a final vowel was necessary to give sound to the consonant preceding it, and they used for that purpose any vowel indifferently. a son , was suna, sune, sunu; mæra, mære, mæro, mæru. fines, limites; ge, ye, y, i, are various spellings of the same prefix. the final e mute in English is a remain of this, as in give , love , curse.

The vowels were used indiscriminately also for every vowel sound. thus the

of this promiscuous use of the vowels we have also abundant remains still in English. for according to the powers given to our letters we often use them indifferently for the same sound as in bulw a rk, ass e rt, st i r, w o rk, l u rk, m y rtle. the single word many , in A-S. was spelt, as D r Hickes has observed in 20. different ways, to wit, mænigeo, mænio, mæniu, menio, meniu, mænigo, mænego, manige, menigo, manegeo, mæanegeo, menegeo, mænygeo, menigeo, manegu, mænigu, menegu, menego, menigu, manigo . to prove indeed that every one spelt according to his own notions, without regard to any standard, we have only to compare different editions of the same composition. take for example Alfred’s preface to Gregory’s Pastoral before cited, as published in different editions.

This unsettled orthography renders it necessary to swell the volume of the dictionaries by giving to each word as many places in order of the Alphabet as there are different modes of spelling it; and in proportion as this is omitted, the difficulty of finding the words increases on the student.

Since then it is apparent that the A-S. writers had established no particular standard of orthography, but each one followed arbitrarily his own mode of combining the letters, we are surely at liberty equally to adopt any mode which, establishing uniformity, may be more consonant with the power of the letters, and with the orthography of the present dialect, as established by usage. the latter attention has the advantage of exhibiting more evidently the legitimate parentage of the two dialects

III. Pronunciation.

To determine what that was among the A-S. our means are as defective as to determine the long agitated question What was the original pronunciation of the Greek & Latin languages. the presumption is certainly strong that in Greece and Italy, the countries occupied by those languages, their pronuntiation has been handed down, by tradition, more nearly that it can be known to other countries: and the rather as there has been no particular point of time at which those antient languages were changed into the modern ones occupying the same grounds. they have been gradually worn down to their present forms by time, and changes of modes and circumstances. in like manner there has been no particular point of time at which the Anglo-Saxon has been changed into it’s present English form. the languages of Europe have generally, in like manner, undergone a gradual metamorphosis, some of them in name as well as in form. we should presume therefore that in those counties of Great Britain which were occupied earliest, longest and latest by the Saxon immigrants, the pronuntiation of their language has been handed down more nearly than elsewhere; and should be searched for in the provincial dialects of those counties. but the fact is that these counties have divaricated in their dialects, so that it would be difficult to decide among them which is the most genuine. under these doubts therefore we may as well take the pronuntiation now in general use as the legitimate standard, and that from which it is most promotive of our object to infer the A-S. pronuntiation. it is indeed the forlorn hope of all aim at their probable pronuntiation; for were we to regard the powers of the letters only, no human organ could articulate their uncouth jumble. we will suppose therefore the power of the letters to have been generally the same in A-S. as now in English; and to produce the same sounds we will combine them, as nearly as may be, conformably with the present English orthography. this is indeed a most irregular and equivocal standard; but a conformity with it will bring the two dialects nearer together in sound and semblance, and facilitate the transition from the one to the other more auspiciously than a rigorous adherence to any uniform system of orthography which speculation might suggest.

I will state some instances only (referring to D r Hickes for more) of the unskilful and inconsistent uses of the letters by the Anglo-Saxons, in proof of the necessity of changing them, to produce, to a modern reader, the very sounds which we suppose them to have intended by their confused combinations. their vowels, promiscuously used, as before observed, must all be freely changed to those used in corresponding words in English orthography.

and finally, in the words of D r Hickes ‘ demum quomodo Anglo-Saxonicae voces factae sunt Anglicae mutando literas ejusdem organi, asperando lenes, et leniendo asperas, vocales, diphthongos, et interdum consonantes leviter mutando, auferendo initales et finales syllabas, præsertim terminationem modi infinitivi, praterea adolendo, transponendo, et interponendo literas, et voces quoque syncopando, exemplis docendum est. ’

IV. Grammar.

Some observations on A-S. grammar may show how much easier that also may be rendered to the English student. D r Hickes may certainly be considered as the father of this branch of modern learning. he has been the great Restorer of the A-S. dialect from the oblivion into which it was fast falling. his labors in it were great, and his learning not less than his labors. his Grammar may be said to be the only one we yet possess: for that edited at Oxford in 1711. is but an extract from Hickes, and the principal merit of mrs Elstob’s is that it is written in English, without any thing original in it. some others have been written, taken also and almost entirely from Hickes. in his time there was too exclusive a prejudice in favor of the Greek and Latin languages. they were considered as the standards of perfection, and the endeavor generally was to force other languages to a conformity with these models. but nothing can be more radically unlike than the frames of the antient languages, Southern and Northern, of the Greek and Latin languages from those of the Gothic family. of this last are the A-S. and English; and had D r Hickes, instead of keeping his eye fixed on the Gr. & Lat. languages, as his standard, viewed the A-S. in it’s conformity with the English only, he would greatly have enlarged the advantages for which we are already so much indebted to him. his labors however have advanced us so far on the right road, and a correct pursuit of it will be a just homage to him.

A Noun is to be considered under it’s accidents of genders, cases & numbers. the word gender is, in nature, synonimous with Sex. to all the subjects of the animal kingdom Nature has given Sex, and that is two–fold only, male or female, masculine or feminine. vegetable and mineral subjects have no distinction of sex, consequently are of no gender. words, like other inanimate things, have no sex, are of no gender. yet in the construction of the Gr. and Lat. languages, and of the modern ones of the same family, their adjectives being varied in termination, and made distinctive of animal sex, in conformity with the nouns or names of animal subjects, the two real genders, which nature has established, are distinguished in their languages. but, not stopping here, they have, by usage, thrown a number of unsexual subjects into the sexual classes, leaving the residuary mass to a 3 d class, which grammarians call Neutral, that is to say, of no gender or sex; and some Latin grammarians have so far lost sight of the real and natural genders as to ascribe to that language 7. genders, the Masculine, feminine, neutral, gender common to two, common to three, the doubtful and the Epicene; than which nothing can be more arbitrary, and nothing more useless. but the languages of the Anglo-Saxons and English is based on principles totally different from those of the Gr. & Lat. and is constructed on laws peculiar and idiomatic to itself. it’s adjectives have no changes of termination on account of gender, number or case . each has a single one applicable to every noun, whether it be the name of a thing having sex, or not. to ascribe gender to nouns in such a case would be to embarras the learner with unmeaning and useless distinctions. it will be said e.g. that a priest is of one gender, and a priestess of another, a poet of one, a poetess another E t c and that therefore the words designating them must be of different genders. I say, not at all. because altho’ the thing designated may have sex, the word designating it, like other inanimate things has no sex, no gender. in Latin we well know that the thing may be of one gender and the word designating it of another. see Martial 7. Epis, 17 the ascription of gender to it is artificial and arbitrary, and, in English & A-S. absolutely useless. Lowthe therefore among the most correct of our English grammarians, has justly said that in the Nouns of the English language, there is no other distinction of gender but that of nature, it’s adjectives admitting no change but of the degrees of comparison. we must guard against the conclusion of D r Hickes that the change of termination in the A-S. adjectives, as god, gode for example, is an indication of gender, this, like others of his examples of inflection is only an instance of unsettled orthography. in the languages acknoleged to ascribe genders to their words, as Gr. Lat, Italian, Spanish, French, their dictionaries indicate the gender of every noun; but the A-S. and English dictionaries give no such indication; a proof of the general sense that gender makes no part of the character of the noun. we may safely therefore dismiss the learning of genders from our language, whether in it’s antient or modern form.

2. our law of Cases is different. they exist in nature, according to the difference of accident they announce. no language can be without them, & it is an error to say that the Greek is without an ablative. it’s ablative indeed is always like it’s dative; but were that sufficient to deny it’s existence, we might equally say that the Latins had no ablative plural, because in all nouns, of every declension, their ablative plural is the same with the dative. it would be to say that to go to a place, or from a place, means the same thing. the grammarians of Port-Royal therefore have justly restored the Ablative to Greek Nouns. our Cases are generally distinguished by the aid of the prepositions of , to , by , from or with , but sometimes also by change of termination. but these changes are not so general or difficult as to require, or to be capable of a distribution into declensions. yet D r Hickes, having in view the 5. declensions of the Latin, and 10. of the Greek languages, has given 6. and Thwaytes 7. to the A-S. the whole of them however are comprehended under the 3. single Canons following.

1. the datives and ablatives plural of all nouns end in um .

2. of the other cases, some nouns inflect their Genitive singular only, and some their Nominative, accusative and Vocative plural also in s , as in English

3. Others, preserving the primitive form in their Nom. and Voc. singular, inflect all the other cases & numbers in en .

3. Numbers.

Every language, as I presume, has so formed it’s Nouns and Verbs as to distinguish the action of a single and a plurality of subjects, and all, as far as I know, have been * p. 17 contented with the simple distinction of singular and plural, except the Greeks, who have interposed between them a Dual number, so distinctly formed by actual changes of termination and inflection, as to leave no doubt of it’s real distinction from the other numbers. but they do not uniformly use their dual for it’s appropriate purpose. the number 2. is often expressed plurally, and sometimes by a dual noun and plural verb. D r Hickes supposes that A-S. to have a dual number also, not going thro’ the whole vocabulary of nouns and verbs, as in Greek, but confined to two particular pronouns, i.e. wit , and yit , which he translates we two, and ye two. but Benson renders wit by nos , and does not give yit at all. and is it worth while to embarras grammar with an extra distinction for two or three , or half a dozen words? and why may not wit , we two, & yit , ye two, by considered plural, as well as we three, or we four? as duo, ambo, with the Latins? we may surely say then that neither the A-S. nor English has a dual number.

4. Verbs, moods.

To the verbs in A-S. D r Hickes gives 6. moods. the Greeks, besides the 4. general moods, Indicative, Subjunctive, Imperative and Infinitive have really an Optative mood, distinguished from the others by actual differences of termination. and some Latin grammarians, besides the optative, have added, in that language, a Potential mood; neither of them distinguished by differences of termination or inflection. they have therefore been disallowed by later and sounder grammarians; and we may, in like manner, disembarras our A-S. and English from the Optatives and Potentials of D r Hickes.

Supines and Gerunds.

He thinks too that the A-S. verb has supines & gerunds, among it’s variations; accidents certainly peculiar to Latin verbs only. he considers lufian , to love, as the infinitive, and to lufian , a supine. the exclusion therefore of the preposition to , makes with him the infinitive, while we have ever considered it as the essential sign of that mood. and what all grammarians have hitherto called the infinitive, he considers as a supine or gerund. his examples are given in A-S. and Latin, but I will add the equivalent Greek and English for illustration.

I ask then if απoλεςαι, ϑεραπευειν, δoυναι , are supines or gerunds? why then should to for-spillan, to healan, to a-drivan, to sellen , or, to destroy, to heal, to cure, to drive, to give, be necessarily supines or gerunds? the fact is only that the Latins express by these inflections, peculiar to themselves, what other languages do by their infinitives.

From these aberrations, into which our great Anglo-Saxon leader D r Hickes has been seduced by too much regard to the structure of the Greek & Latin languages and too little to their radical difference from that of the Gothic family, we have to recall our footsteps into the right way, and we shall find our path rendered smoother, plainer, and more direct to the object of profiting of the light which each dialect throws on the other. and this even as to the English language, appears to have been the opinion of Waltus the best of our English Grammarians who, in the preface to his English grammar, says ‘ omnes ad Latinæ linguæ normam [. . .] ne nostram Anglicanam nimium exigentes multa inutilia præcepta de nominum casitus, generibus et declinationibus, [. . .] verborum temporibus, modis et conjugationibus, de nominum item et verborum regimine, a lüsque similibus tradiderunt, qu [. . .] lingua nostra sunt prorsus aliena, adeoque confusionem potius et obscuritatem periunt, quam explicationi inservient. ’

Having removed then this cumbrous scaffolding, erected by too much learning, and obscuring, instead of enlightening our Anglo-Saxon structure, I will proceed to give a Specimen of the manner in which I think might be advantageously edited any future republications of the A-S. writings which we already possess in print, or any MSS. which may hereafter be given to us through the medium of the press.

I take my Specimen from Thwaite’s Heptateuch, beginning with 1 st chapter of Genesis. I give in one column the A-S. text, in the Roman character, preserving letter for letter the orthography of the Saxon original. in another column the same text in the Roman character also, spelt with a combined regard to the power of the letters, to English orthography, and English pronunciation. I interline a version verbally exact, placing every English word under it’s A-S. root, without regard to the change of acceptation it has undergone in time. as e.g. ‘the earth was idle and empty’ 1. Gen. 2. instead of the modern words ‘without form and void’ and the ‘ αορατος και ακαταςκευαςος ’ of the LXX. leaving to the ingenuity of the reader to trace the history of the change. in rendering the A-S. into the corresponding English word, I have considered as English not only what is found in the oldest English writers, in glossaries and dictionaries, but in the Provincial dialects also, and in common parlance of unlettered people, who have preserved more of the antient language than those whose style has been polished by education. Grammar too is disregarded, my principal object being to manifest the identity of the two languages. this version is rendered more uncouth by the circumstances that 1. the ordo verborum of the A-S. is not exactly the same as the English. 2. they used much oftener the noun without the article. 3. they frequently use their oblique cases without a preposition prefixed, the English very rarely. in this verbal versions these omissions are to be understood.

The A-S. writings, in this familiar form are evidently nothing but old English; and we may join conscientiously in the exhortation of Archbishop Parker, in his preface to Asser ‘ omnes qui in regni institutis addiscendis elaboraverint, cohortabor ut exiguo labore, seu pene nullo , hujus sibi linquæ cognitionem acquirant. ’

As we are possessed in America of the printed editions of A-S. writings, they furnish a fit occasion for this country to make some return to the older nations for the science for which we are indebted to them. and in this task I hope an honorable part will in time be borne by our University, for which, at an hour of life too late for any thing elaborate, I hazard these imperfect hints, for consideration chiefly on a subject on which I pretend not to be profound. the publication of the inedited MSS. which exist in the libraries of G. Britain only, must depend on the learned of that nation. their means of science are great. they have done much, and much is yet expected from them. nor will they disappoint us. our means are as yet small. but the widow’s mite was piously given, and kindly accepted. how much would contribute to the happiness of these two nations a brotherly emulation in doing good to each other, rather than the mutual vituperations so unwisely and unjustifiably sometimes indulged in by both. and this too by men on both sides of the water, who think themselves of a superior order of understanding, and some of whom are truly of an elevation far above the ordinary stature of the human mind. no two people on earth can so much help, or hurt each other. let us then yoke ourselves jointly to the same car of mutual happiness, and vie in common efforts to do each other all the good we can. to reflect on each other the lights of mutual science particularly, and the kind affections of kindred blood. be it our task, in the case under consideration, to reform and republish, in forms more advantageous, what we already possess, and theirs to add to the common stock the inedited treasures which have been too long buried in their despositories.

P.S. January 1825. In the year 1818. by authority of the legislature of Virginia, a plan for the establishment of an University was prepared and proposed to them. in that plan the Anglo-Saxon language was comprehended as a part of the circle of instruction to be given to the Students; and the preceding pages were then committed to writing for the use of the University. I pretend not to be an Anglo-Saxon scholar. from an early period of my studies indeed, I have been sensible of the importance of making it a part of the regular education of our youth; and at different times, as leisure permitted, I applied myself to the study of it, with some degree of attention. but my life has been too busy in pursuits of another character to have made much proficiency in this. the leading idea which very soon impressed itself on my mind, and which has continued to prevail through the whole of my observations on the language, was, that it was nothing more than the old English of a period of some ages earlier than that of Piers Ploughman, and under this view my cultivation of it has been continued. it was apparent to me that the labors of D r Hickes, and other very learned men, have been employed in a very unfortunate direction, in endeavors to give it the complicated structure of the Greek and Latin languages. I have just now recieved a copy of a new work, by mr Bosworth on the Elements of Anglo-Saxon grammar, & it quotes two other works, by Turner and Jamieson, both of great erudition, but not yet known here. mr Bosworth’s is indeed a treasure of that venerable learning. it proves the assiduity with which he has cultivated it, the profound knolege in it which he has attained, and that he has advanced far beyond all former grammarians in the science of it’s structure. yet, I own, I was disappointed on finding that in proportion as he has advanced on, and beyond, the footsteps of his predecessors, he has the more embarrassed the language with rules and distinctions in imitation of the grammars of Greek and Latin, has led it still further from it’s genuine type of old English, and increased it’s difficulties by the multitude and variety of new and minute rules with which he has charged it. I had the less expected this from observations made early in the work, on ‘th total disregard of the A-Saxons of any settled rules of orthography, their confounding the letters, using them indifferently for each other, and especially the vowels and diphthongs [pa. 46.] on the frequent transpositions of their letters, and the variety of ways of writing the same word by different A-S. authors,’ giving, as examples, six ways of spelling the word ‘youth,’ and the twenty ways of spelling ‘many;’ observing that, in the Comparative degree, the last syllable er , was spelt with all the vowels indifferently, so also the syllable est , of the Superlative degree, and so the Participial terminations of end , and ed , [pa.54.] adding many other examples of an use entirely promiscuous of the vowels, and much so of the consonants. and in pa. 249. he says ‘it must be evident that learning was not so common in the Saxon æra as at the present time. our ancestors, having few opportunities of literary acquirements, could not have determined upon fixed rules for orthography, any more than illiterate persons in the present day, who, having been employed in manual labor, could avail themselves of the facilities which were offered. hence arose the differences observable in spelling the same words in Saxon.’ and again in a note, pa. 253. he says ‘those changes in Saxon, which are denominated dialects, appear in reality only to be the alterations observed in the progress of the language, as it gradually flowed from the Saxon, varying, or casting off many of it’s inflections, till it settled in the form of the present English. this progressive transformation of the Anglo Saxon into our present form of speech will be evident by the following examples, taken from the translations of the most learned men of the age to which they are referred.’ and he proceeds to give specimens of the Pater nosters of the years 890. 930. 1130. 1160. 1180. 1250. 1260. 1380. 1430. 1500. 1526. 1537. 1541. 1556. 1611. that is, from the time of Alfred to that of Shakespear. these obviously prove the gradual changes of the language from the A-S. form, to that of the present English, and that there was no particular point of time at which the A-S. was superceded by the English dialect; for dialects we may truly call them, of the same language, separated by lines of time instead of space. and these specimens prove also that the language of Alfred was, no more than that of Piers Ploughman, a different one from that we now speak. in like manner the language of France, cotemporary with our Anglo-Saxon, was as different from modern French, as the A-S. from modern English; and their Romanumrusticum, or Romain-rustique, as it was called, has changed insensibly, as our A-S. to the form now spoken. yet so much of the fundamental idiom remains the same in both, that to read and understand the elder dialect, they need but a Glossary for words lost by disuse. I will make one more quotation from mr Bosworth. because it confirms what I have said of the scholastic bias of our early authors to place our old language in the line of Latin and Greek. ‘Hickes, says he, page 213. note 2. indisputably one of the most learned of those who can be said to have examined, with a critical eye, our Saxon literature, influenced by the desire of reducing everything to some classical standard, a prejudice not uncommon in the age in which he wrote, endeavors, with greater zeal than success, to shew that the writers whom he was recommending to the world [the A-S. poets] observed the legitimate rules of Latin prosody, and measured their feet by syllabic quantity.’ Notwithstanding these proofs that our Author was fully aware of the unsettled and uncertain orthography of the A-Saxons, and his particular observations, pa. 53. 54. that ‘the final letters of words are often omitted,’ and ‘that the different letters suffer very frequent changes of position,’ he proceeds, in conformity with preceding authorities, which indeed support him, to make genders, cases, and declensions of nouns to depend on their terminating vowel, pa. 80. 81. 82. 83. 94. the formations of different parts of verbs to depend on the collocation of the letters [pa. 143.] and other formations [pa. 181.] and even regimen [pa. 202.] to depend on the final syllable. and this leads to such an infinitude of minute rules and observances, as are beyond the power of any human memory to retain. if indeed this be the true genius of the A-S. language, then it’s difficulties go beyond it’s worth, and render a knolege of it no longer a compensation for the time and labor it’s acquisition will require: and in that case, I would recommend it’s abandonment in our University, as an unattainable and unprofitable pursuit. but if, as I believe, we may consider it as merely an antiquated form of our present language, if we may throw aside the learned difficulties which mask it’s real character, liberate it from these foreign shackles, and proceed to apply ourselves to it with little more preparation than to Piers Ploughman, Douglas, or Chaucer, then I am persuaded it’s acquisition will require little time or labor, and will richly repay us by the intimate insight it will give us into the genuine structure powers, and meanings of the language we now read and speak. we shall then read Shakespear and Milton with a superior degree of intelligence and delight, heightened by the new and delicate shades of meaning developed to us by a knolege of the original sense of the same words. this rejection of the learned labors of our A-S. Doctors may be considered perhaps as a rebellion against science. my hope however is that it may prove a revolution. two great works indeed will be wanting to effect all it’s advantages. 1. a Grammar on the simple principles of the English grammar, analogising the idiom, the rules and principles of the one and the other, eliciting their common origin, the identity of their structure, laws and composition, and their total unlikeness to the genius of the Greek and Latin. 2. a Dictionary, on the plan of Stephens or Scapula, in which the A-S. roots should be arranged alphabetically, and the derivatives from each root, Saxon and English, entered under it in their proper order and connection. such works as these, with new editions of the Saxon writings, on the plan I venture to propose, would shew that the A-S. is really old English, little more difficult to understand than works we possess, and read & still call English. they would recruit and renovate the vigour of the English language, too much impaired by the neglect of it’s antient constitution and dialects, & would remove, for the Student, the principal difficulties of ascending to the source of the English language, the main object of what has been here proposed.

Observations on Anglo-Saxon grammar

Pronuntiation. Different nations use different alphabets for expressing the sounds of their languages; and nations which use the same alphabet assign very different powers to the same characters. hence, to enable persons to learn the language of other countries, grammars are composed explaining to what letters and combinations of them, in their own language, the letters and combinations of them in another are equivalent. the pronuntiation of the living languages is deposited in records of this kind, as doubtless was that of the Greek and Latin languages, now considered as dead. these evidences of their pronuntiation however being lost, we resort to the countries in which these languages were once spoken, and where they have been insensibly altered to what is now spoken there; and we presume that, the same alphabetical characters being still preserved there, the powers assigned to them are those handed down by tradition, with some changes no doubt, but yet tolerably correct in the main: and that the present pronunciation of those characters by the inhabitants of the same country is better evidence of their antient power than any other to be obtained at this day. hence it is presumed that the pronuntiation of the Greek and Roman characters, now practised by the modern Greeks & Italians, is nearer probably to that of the antient Greeks and Romans than the sounds assigned to the same characters by any other nation.   The Anglo-Saxon is also become a dead language. it’s alphabet is preserved; but if any written evidences exist of the powers assigned to it’s different characters, it is unknown to me. on the contrary I believe that the expressions of the sounds of their language by alphabetical characters had not been long and generally enough practised to settle an uniform power in each letter or combination of letters. this I infer from their infinitely diversified modes of spelling the same word. for example the word many is found spelt in 20. different manners. to supply evidence therefore of the pronuntiation of their words, we should, I think, resort to the pronuntiation of the corresponding words in Modern English. for as the Anglo-Saxon was insensibly changed into the present English language, it is probable the English have the pronuntiation, as well as the words, by tradition. indeed I consider the actual pronunciation of a word by the English as better evidence of it’s pronuntiation by their Anglo-Saxon ancestors than the multiform representation of it by letters which they have left us. the following examples will give an idea of the appeal I make to English pronunciation for the power of the Saxon letters, and sound of the Saxon words.

those, I think, who have leisure and knolege of the subject, could not render it a greater service than by new editions of the Saxon writings still extant digested under four columns, whereof the 1 st should present the text in the Saxon character and original loose orthography; the 2 d the same text in Saxon characters reformed to Modern English orthography as nearly as allowable; the 3 d the same text in the English character and orthography; the 4 th an English version, as literally expressed, both as to words and their arrangement as any indulgences of grammar, or of obsolete, or provincial terms, would tolerate. I will exhibit the following passage from Alfred’s Orosius. L. 1. pa. 23. as a specimen.

the dissimilitude between Saxon and English is more in appearance than reality. it consists chiefly in the difference of character and orthography. suppress that, (as is done in the 3 d column,) represent the sounds by the English character and orthography, and it is immediately seen to be, not a different language, but the same in an earlier stage of it’s progression. and such editions of the Saxon writers, by removing the obstructions of character and false spelling, enabling us to give habitual and true, instead of uncouth and false sounds to words, would promote the study of the English language, by facilitating it’s examination in it’s mother state, and making us sensible of delicacies and beauties in it unfelt but by the few who have had the courage, through piles of rubbish, to seek a radical acquaintance with it.

Declensions of Nouns.

One of the simplifications of the study of the Anglo-Saxon which would result from a reformation of it’s orthography to the present English standard, would be a reduction in the number of the declensions of nouns heretofore assigned to it. the Anglo-Saxons seem to have thought some vowel final necessary to give sound to the preceding consonant, altho’ that vowel was not itself to be sounded; and nothing being less fixed than the power of their vowels and diphthongs, they have used all the vowels indiscriminately for this purpose. thus

notwithstanding these various orthographies, all, I presume, represent the same sound and probably that still retained by the English. for I can more easily suppose that an unlettered people used various modes of spelling the same word, than that they had so many different words to express the same thing. the e final of the English is a relique of the Anglo-Saxon practice of ending a word with a final vowel. a difference of orthography therefore, and still less a mere difference of final vowel is not sufficient to characterise a different declension of nouns. I should deem an unequivocal change in the sound necessary to constitute an inflexion; and a difference in the inflections necessary to form a class of nouns into a different declension. on these principles I should reduce Thwaite’s seven declensions to four, as follows.

I st declension, being Thwaite’s 5 th and 6 th

II d declension, comprehending Thwaite’s 3 d and 4 th

III d declension comprehending Thwaite’s 1 st and 7 th

IV th declension, being Thwaite’s 2 d

In stating the declensions here the 1 st column presents the Anglo-Saxon orthography, the varieties of which have been deemed sufficient to constitute inflections & declensions. the 2 d column presents a reformed orthography, supposed equivalent to the other as to sound, and consequently shewing that a variety in spelling where there is a sameness of sound, does not constitute an inflection, or change of declination.

the four declensions, reformed to an uniform orthography, would stand thus.

In this scheme then

It may be said that this is a bold proposition, amounting to a change of the language. but not so at all. what constitutes a language is a system of articulated sounds, to each of which and idea is attached. the artificial representation of these sounds on paper is a distinct thing. surely there were languages before the invention of letters; and there are now languages never yet expressed in letters. to express the sounds of a language perfectly, every letter of it’s alphabet should have but a single power, and those letters only should be used whose powers successively pronounced would produce the sound required. the Italian orthography is more nearly in this state than any other with which I am acquainted; the French & English the farthest from it. would a reformation of the orthography of the latter languages change them? if the French word aimoient , for example, were spelt émé, according to the French, or ama, according to the English power of those letters, would the word be changed? or if the English word cough were spelt cof , would that change the word? and how much more reasonable is it to reform the orthography of an illiterate people, among whom the use of letters was so rare that no particular mode of spelling had yet been settled, no uniform power given to their letters, every one being left free to express the words of the language by such combinations of letters as seemed to him to come near their sound. how little they were agreed as to the powers of their own letters, & how differently & awkwardly they combined them to produce the same sound needs no better example than that furnished by Doctor Hickes of the short and simple sound of many being endeavored to be represented by 20. different combinations of letters; to wit, in English characters, maenigo, maenio, mæniu, menio, meniu, mænigo, mænego, manige, menigo, manegeo, mænegeo, menegeo, mænygeo, menigeo, manegu, mænigu, menegu, menego, menigu, manigo . now would it change the word to banish all these, and give it, in their books, the orthography of many , in which they have all ended? and their correction in type is no more than every reader is obliged to make in his mind as he reads along; for it is impracticable for our organs to pronounce all the letters which their bungling spellers have huddled together. no one would attempt to give to each of these 20. methods of spelling many the distinct and different sounds which their different combinations of letters would call for. this would be to make 20. words where these surely was but one. he would probably reduce them all, wherever he met with them, to the single and simple sound of many , which all of them aimed to produce. this then is what I would wish to have done to the reader’s hand, in order to facilitate and encourage his undertaking. for remove the obstacles of uncouth spelling & unfamiliar characters, and there would be little more difficulty in understanding an Anglo-Saxon writer, than Burn’s poems. so as to the form of the characters of their Alphabet. that may be changed without affecting the language. it is not very long since the forms of the English and French characters were changed from the black letter to the Roman; yet the languages were not affected. nor are they by the difference between the printed and written characters now in use. the followings note written by Aelfric is not the less Latin because expressed in Anglo-Saxon characters. ‘ Ezo Ælfpicur renipri hunc Libnum in monarzenio Bapdonio ex dedi Bnihzpoldo Pneporizo .’ Hickes. Gram. Island. 158. we may say truly then that the Anglo-Saxon language would still be the same, were it written in the characters now used in English, and it’s orthography conformed to that of the English; & certainly the acquisition of it to the English student would be greatly facilitated by such an operation.

of the form in which the Anglo-Saxon writings still extant might be advantageously published, for facilitating to the English student the knolege of the Anglo-Saxon Dialect.

Genesis Chap. I.

1. On anginne gesceop , God heofenan and earthan.

2. seo corthe sothlice wæs ydel & æmtig, & thoestru wæron ofer thære niwelnisse bradnisse & Godes gast wæs geferod ofer wæteru.

1.   the prefixes ge, ye, y, i. being equivalent, I shall use the y- for them all.

3. God cwæth the ge-weorthe lesht; & leoht wearth ge-worht.

4. God geseah tha thæt hit god wæs, & he to-dælde that leoht fram tham theostrum.

5. and het that leoht dæg, & tha theostra niht. tha wæs ge-worden æfen & morgen an dæg.

6. God cwæth tha eft, gewurthe nu fæstnis tomiddes tham wæterum, and totwæme tha wæteru fram tham wæterum.

2   twam signifies twain

7. and God geworhte tha fæstnisse, & totwæmde tha wæteru the wæron under thære fæstnisse fram tham the wæron bufan thære fæstnisse; hit wæs tha swa gedon.

8. and God het tha fæstnisse heofenan, and was tha geworden æfen & morgen other dæg.

9. God tha sothlice cwæth, beon gegaderode tha wæteru the sind under theare heofenan, and æteowigedrignis; hit wæs tha swa gedon.

10. and God gecigde tha drignisse eorthan and thæra wætera gegaderunga he het sæs. God geseah tha that hit god wæs.

11. and cwæth, spritte seo eorthe growende gærs and sæd wircende, and æppelbære treow wæstm wircende æfter his cinne; thæs sæd sig on him silfum ofer eorthan. hit wæs tha swa ge-don.

12. and seo eorthe fortha-teah growende wirte and sæd berende be hire cinne, and treow westm wireende & gehwile sæd hæbbende æfter his hiwe. god geseah tha that hit god wæs.

3   teon producere. fortha-teon. forth-bring. see post v.20. teon forth also II.9. fortha-teah.

13. and wæs geuroden æfen & mergen the thridda dæg.

14. God cwæth tha sothlice, beo nu leoht on thære heofenan fæstnisse, and todælon dæg & nihte, & beon to tacnum & to tidum & to dagum & to gearum.

4   fastness. firmament

15. and hig scinon on thære heofenan fæstnisse and alihton tha eorthan. hit wæs tha swa geworden.

16. and God geworhte twa micele leoht, that mare leoht to thæs dæges lihtinge, and that læsse leoht to thære nihte lihtings; & steorran he geworhte.

17. and gesette hig on thære heofenan that hig scinon over eorthan.

18. and gimdon thæs dæges thære nihte, & todældon leoht and theostra. God geseah tha that hit god wæs.

19. and wæs geworden æfen & mergen se feortha dæg.

20. God cwæth eac swilce, teon nu tha wæteru forth swimmede cynn cucu on life, & fleogende cinn ofer eorthan under thære heofenan fæstnisse.

5.   eac-swilc. also.

21. and God gesceop tha tha micelan hwalas, & eall libbende fiscinn & stirrigendlice, the tha wæteru tugon forth on heora hiwum, and eall fleogende cinn æfter heora cinne. God geseah tha that hit good wæs.

5.b.   shope. Bailey. for shaped.

6.   Verstegan. tuge. to draw out, to lead. toga. ductor. Ben.

7.   hiwe. colour. Versteg. Benson. it means also a hive, house, family.

22. and bletsode hig thus cwethende, weaxath & beoth gemenigfilde, & gefillath thære sæ wæteru, and tha fugelas beon gemenigfilde ofer eorthan.

23. and tha wæs geworden æfen and mergen se fifta dæg.

24. God cwæth eacswilc, læde seo eorthe forth cuce nitena on heora cinne, and creopende cinn, and deor æfter heora hiwum. hit wæs tha swa geworden.

8   nitena, neat cattle.

9   deer. probably this was then the generic name for all the ferae, or wild quadrupeds.

25. and God geworhte thære eorthan deor æfter hira hiwum, & tha nitenu and eall creopende cynn on heora cynne. God geseah tha that hit god wæs.

26. and cwæth, Uton, wircean man to andlicnisse, and to ure gelicnisse, and he sig ofer tha fixas, & ofer tha fugelas, & ofer tha deor, and ofer ealle gesceafte, and ofer ealle tha creopende se stirath on eorthan.

10.   Uton,

27. God gesceop tha man to his andlicnisse, to Godes andlicnisse he gesceop hine, werhades & wifhades he gesceop hig.

28. and God hig bletsode and cwæth, wexath and beoth gemenigfilde, and gefillath tha eorthan and gewildath hig, & habbath on eowrum gewealde thære sæ fixas and thære lyfte fugelas & ealle nytenu the stiriath ofer eorthan.

29. God cwæth tha, Efne, Ie for-geaf eow eall gærs & wyrta sæd berende ofer eorthan, and ealle treowa tha the habbath sæd on him silfon heora agenes cynnes, that hig beon eow to mete.

11   efne, verily. adv. Bailey. lo!

30.and eallum nytenum & eallum fugelcynne and eallum tham the stiriath on eorthan, on tham the us libbende lif. that hig habbon him to gereordienne. it wæs tha swa gedon.

31. and God y-saw ealle tha thing the he geworhte, and hig wæron swithe gode. was tha geworden æfen and mergen se sixta dæg.

Chapter. II.

1. Eornostlice tha wæron fullfremode heofenas and eorthe, and all heora frætewung.

1.   earnestly, industriously. Bailey.

2. and God tha gefilde on thone seofethan dæg hys weore the he geworhte. and he gereste hine on thone seofethan dæg fram eallon tham weorce the he gefremode.

3. and God gebletsode thone seofethan dæg, and hine gehalgode, for thon the he on thone dæg geswac his weorcas the he gesceop to wirceanne.

4. thas sind thære heofenan & thære earthan cneornisse tha tha hig gesceopene wæron, on tham dæge the God geworhte heofenan & eorthan.

2.   cneornisse, generation. cneoresse. family. kin

5. and ælcne telgor on eorthan ær tham the he uppa-sprunge on eorthan, and eall gærs & wyrta ealles eardes ær than the hig uppa-spritton. God sothlice ne sende nanne ren ofer eorthan tha git: and man næs the tha eorthan worhte.

3   tilia, tiligea, agricola. a tiller.

4   eard, earth. earban, herb. qu. d. forb?

6. Ac an wyll a-sprang of thære eorthan wætriende ealre thære eorthan brodnysse.

7. God gesceop eornostlice man of thære eorthan lame, and onableow on hys ansine lifes orthunge; & se man wæs geworht on libbendre sawle.

5.   orth. breath.

6   winsum, pleasant. Benson. wynsum, winning. Verstegan.

7   from. a, ab. from. frum, beginning. frymthe beginning

8. God tha aplantode wynsumnisse orcerd fram frimthe. on tham he gelogode thone man the he geworhte.

9. God tha fortha-teah of thære moldan ælces cynnes treow fæger on gesihthe, and to brucenne winsum, eke-swilie lifes treow o-middan neorxena wange, and treow ingehydes godes & yfeles.

8   wang. a field. Bailey.

10. and that flood eode of stowe thære winsumnisse to wætrienne neorxena-wang, that flod ys thanon to-dæled on feower ean.

9.   the syntax of this is not obvious.

11. an ea of tham hatte Fifon. se gæth on-butan that land the is ge-haten Evilath, thærthær gold wixt.

12. and thæs landes gold is golda selost thar beoth eac gemette tha gimstanas, dellium & honychinus.

13. thære othre ea nama ys Gion. seo ys eac gehaten Nylus. seo imbæth eall thæra Silhearwena land.

14. thære thriddan ea nama ys Tigris. seo gæth on-gean tha Assirisean. sefeorthe ea ys gehaten Eufrates.

15. God ge-nam tha thone man, & ge-logode hine on neorxena-wange, that he thær wircean sceolde and thær begiman.

16. and bebead him thuss cwethende, of ælcum treowe thises orcerdes thu most etan.

17. sothlice of tham treowe in-ge-hides godes & yfeles ne et thu. on swa whilcum dæge swa thu ets of tham treowe, thu scealt death sweltan.

10.   swelter.

18. God cwæth eacswilce, nis na god thisum men ana to wunienne. Uton. wircean him sumne fultum to his gelicnisse.

11.   to wun, to dwell. Bailey. Verstegan.

19. God sothlice gelædde tha nitenu the he of eorthan gesceop & thære lyftefugolas to Adam, that he fore-sceawode hu he hig ge-cigde. Sothlice æle libbende nyten swa swæ Adam hit gecigde swa ys hys nama.

20. and Adam tha genamode ealle nytenu heora namum, and ealle fugelas, and ealle wild-deor. Adam sothlice ne gemette tha git nanne fultum his gelican.

21. tha sende God slæp on Adam, and tha tha he slep, tha genam he an ribb of his sidan, and gefilde mid flæsce thær thær that ribb wæs.

12.   nam. Bailey. Verst.

22. and geworhte that ribb the he genam of Adame to anum wifemen, and gelædde hig to Adame.

23. Adam tha cwæth, this ys nu ban of minum banum and flæsc of minum flæsc. theos bith geciged fæmne for tham the heo ys of were genumen.

24. for tham for-læt se man fæder and moder, & getheot hine to his wife, and hig beoth butu on anum flæsce.

25. he wæron tha butu nacode, Adam and his wif; and him thæs ne sccamode.

1. Eacswilce seo Næddre wæs geappre thonne ealle tha othre nytenu the God geworhte ofer eorthan; and se næddre cwæth to tham wife, hwi forbead God eow that ge ne æton of ælcum treowe binnan paradisum?

2. that wif andwirde, of thæra treowa wæstme the synd o-middan neorxena wange.

3. God be-bead us that we ne æton, ne we that treow ne hrepodon, thy læs the we swulton.

13   ripan, repan, to reap. repodon, repedon, reaped.

4. tha cwæth se næddre eft to tham wife, ne beo ge nates-whon deade theah the ge of tham treowe eton.

5. ac God wat sothlice that eowre eagan beoth geopenode on swa hwilcum dæge swa ge etath of tham treowe; and ge beoth thonne Englum-gelice witende ægther ge god ge yfel.

2.   ægther, uterque, both.

6. tha geseah that wif that thæt treow wæs god to etanne be than the hire thuhte, and wlitig on eagum, and lustbære on gesihthe, and genam tha of thæs treowes fæstme, and geæt and sealde hire were.

7. and heora begra eagan wurdon geopenode, hig on-eneowon tha that hig nacode wæron, & siwodon ficleaf and worhton him wædbrec.

4   weed-breech. breech-weeds. wede, vestes, garments. we still say ‘widow’s weeds. Bail.

8. eft tha tha God com, hig gehirdon hys stemne thær he 5. eode on neorxena wange ofer mid-dæg. tha be-hidde Adam hyne and his wif eacswa dide fram Godes gesihthe on middan tham treowe neorxena-wanges.

5.   eode, yode, went. Bailey.

9. God clipode tha Adam and cwæth, Adam hwar eart thu?

6   cleped, called. Bail.

10. he cwæth, thine stemne ic gehirde, 7. leof, on neorxena wange, and ic on-dred me for tham the ic eom nacod, and ic be-hidde me.

7.   leof, dilectus, beloved.

11. God cwæth, hwa sæde the that thu nacod wære, gif thu ne æte of tham treowe the ic bebead that thu of ne æte?

12. Adam cwæth, thæt wif that thu me for-geofe to geferan sealde me of tham treowe, & ic æte.

13. God cwæth to tham wife, hwi didest thu that? heo cwæth, seo næddre bepæhte me and ic æt.

14. God cwæth to thære næddron, for than the thu this dydest thy byst awinged betwix eallum nitenum and wild-deorum. thu gæst on thinum breoste and etst tha eorthan eallum dagum thines lifes.

8   werian, lacessere. worry. Bailey. also execrare, curse.

15. Ic sette feond rædene betweox the and tham wife, and thinum of springe and hire of springe. heo to-bryt thin heafod, and thu syrwst ongean hyre ho.

9   feond, inimicus. ræd, consilium. 9. feond-ræden, enmity.

10   sorge, sorrow. sorgian, to sorrow. g. for w.

16. to tham wife cwæth God eacswilce, Ic gemenigfilde thine yrmtha and thine ge-eacnunga. on sarnysse thu a-cents cild, and thu bist under 11. weres anwealde. and he ge-wild thee.

11.   were, man. Bailey.

17. to Adame he cwæth, for than the thu ge-hirdest thines wifes sterane, and thu æte of tham treowe the ic the bebead that thu he æte, ys seo eorthe awirged on thinum weorce. on geswincum thy ætst of thære eorthan eallum dagum thines lifes.

12.   swink, labor. Bailey. Chaucer. Spencer.

18. thornas and bremelas he asprit the, & thu ytst thære earthan wyrta.

19. on swate thines and wlitan thu briest thines hlafes, oth that thu ge-wende to eorthan of thære the thu genumen wære, for than the thu eart dust, and to duste wyrst.

13   weorthan, esse, fieri. Thwaite’s gram.14.

20. tha ge-sceop Adam naman his wife Eva, that is life, for than the heo is ealra libbendra modor.

21. God worhte eac Adame and his wife fellen e-reaf, and ge-scridde hi.

14   reaf, spoils. felt reeve, felt-spoils skin-spoils. garments.

22. and cwæth. nu Adam can yfel and god swa swa ure sum. the leas he a-strecce his hand. nime eacswilce of lifes treowe, and ete and libbe on ecnisse.

15   everness. Bailey.

23. a-dræfde hine tha of neorzena-wange, that he tha eorthan worhte, and him theron tilode of thære he ge-numan wæs.

24. tha the he adræfed wæs of Neorxena-wanges myrthe tha ge-sette God æt tham in-fære Engla hyrd-rædene and fyren swurd, to g e-hældenne thone weg to tham lifes treowe.

16   hyrde, custos, guard. ræden, regimen governor. hyrd: ræden, guardian.

1. Sothelice Adam ge-strynde Cain be Evan his gemæccan, and thus cwæth , thisne man me seald Drihten.

1.   ge-streona, to beget. strain. Anglice a bread. Bailey. Chauc. Spenc. y-strained begat, or bred. 2. make, a wife, Chaucer. a match, a consort. Spenc. Bailey.

2. Eft he ge-strynde Abel. Abel wæs sceop-hyrde, and Cain eortha-tilia.

3. tha wæs hit geworden æfter manegum dagum that Cain brohte Drihtne lac of eorthan tilingum.

3.   lac. lace, lacum. a lay in common parlance means a fixthire.

4. and Abel brohte to lace tha frum-cennedan of his heorde. tha be-seah Drihten to Abele and to his lacum.

5. and ne be-seah to Caine ne to his lacum. tha wæreth Cain un-ge-metlice yrre.

5   ire, is not from ira Lat. as our Dictionaries say, but is the A-S. yr, or yrre. at the date of this translation Latin was known to few, & no derivations recieved from it.

6. and Drihten cwæth to him, hwi eart thu yrre?

7. gif thu goddest, sona hit bith the mid gode for-golden; Gif thu thonne yfel dest, sona hit bith the mid yfele for-golden.

6   geld, paid. Spelm. Gloss. compensatio. Benson.

8. tha cwæth Cain to Abele his brether. Uton, gan ut; tha hi utagane wæron, tha yrsode Cain with his brother Abel and ofsloh hine.

9. tha cwæth Drihten to Caine, hwær is Abel thine brothor? tha answarode he and cwæth, Ic nat. segst thu sceolde ic minne brothor healdon?

10. tha cwæth Drihten to Caine. whæt dydest thu? thines brother blod clypath up to me of eorthan.

11. witodlice thu byst a-wyrged ofer earthan, for than the seo eorthe on-feng thines brother blodes, the thu mid thinum handum agute.

12. thonne thu tilast thin on eorthan, ne sylth heo the nane wæstmas. thy færsth worigende and bist flyma geond ealle eorthan.

13. witodlice Cain cwæth to Drihtne, min unriht-wisnysse is mare thonne ic forgifenysse wyrthe sy.

14. nu to dæg thu me a-flymst, and ic me be-hyde fram thinre ansine, and ic worige and beo aflymed geond ealle eorthan; eale thæra the me ge-mett me of-slyth.

15. tha cwæth Drihten to Caine, ne byth hit na swa, ac ælc thæra the of-slith Cain, on-fehth seofon-feald wite. and God him sealde tacn, thæt nan thæra the hine ge-mette, hine ne of-sloge.

7.   on-fehth. payeth. Wilkins’ Glossary

8   wite, punishment, penalty. Bailey.

16. Cain eode fram Drihtnes ansyne, and he wunode flyma on tham eastdeale thæs landes the is ge-nemned Eden.

17. witodlice Cain nam wif. be thære he ge-strynde Enoch; and he ge-timbrode ceastre, and nemned hi be his suna naman Enoch.

9   Ceastre, chester. oppidum, castrum, Bede’s Sax. Chron. Verstegan.

18. sothlice Enoch ge-strynde Irad, and Irad ge-strynde Mauiahel and Mauiahel ge-strynde Matusael, and Matusael ge-strynde Lamech.

19. witodlice Lamech nam twa wif. other wæs genemned Ada, and other Sella.

20. tha a-cende Ada Jabal; the wæs fæder thare the wunodon on ge-teldum and hirda.

21. his brothor hatte Jubal; the wæs fæder herpera thæra the organan macodan.

22. be Sellan he ge-strynde Tubalcain; se wæs egther ge-goldsmith, ge-irensmith, and ane dohtor, seo hatte Noema.

23. Lamech cwæth tha to his wivum, Ada & Sella, ge-hyrath myne stemne, Lamech wife, hlystath mine spæce; for than the ic of-sloh weron min wunde, & iungling on minum handam;

24. seofonfeald wracu ge-sealde for Cain. and hund seofontig seofonfeald for Lamech.

25. Eft Adam ge-strynde sunu, thone he nemde Seth, and thus cwæth Drihten me sealde thisne sunu for Abel the Cain of-sloh.

26. Seth ge-strynde sunu and nemde hine Enos; se Enos ærest on-clypian Drihtnes naman.

1. this is seo boc Adames mægrace. on thone dæg the God ge-sceop man, to Godes ge-licnesse he ge-worhte hine.

1   mage-race, kin-race. mage, kin. Mag. bote, fine for killing a relation. Verst. Bailey. Spelman Gloss.

2. wer and wif he gesceop hii, and ge-bletsode hi, and het his naman Adam on tham dæge the hi ge-sceopene wæron.

3. Adam sothlice leofode honteonti geare and thritte geare and gestrinde sunu to his ge-licnesse, and anlycnisse, and het hine Seth.

4. tha wæron Adames dages siththen he ge-strind Seth viii. hund yeara, and he ge-strinde sunu and dohtra.

5. wæs tha ge-worden eal the time the Adam leofode nigon hund geara and xxx geare, and he tha forthferde.

6. Seth wæs hund wintre and five, tha he ge-strynde Enos.

7. he lyfed siththan he ge-strinde Enos viii hund geare and seofon geare, and gestrynde sunu and dohtra

8. wæron tha gewordene ealle Sethes dagas, ix hund geare and xii geare and he forthferde.

9. Enos sothlice leofode hund nygontyg geare, and he ge-strynde Cainan.

2.   to the numbers 70. 80. 90. 100. 120. the A-S. prefixed the syllable hund without any meaning

10. Æfter thes up-springe he leofode viii. hund geare and xv. geare, and gestrinde suna and dohtra.

11. wæron tha ge-wordene ealle Enoses dagas ix hund geare and V. geare, and he forthferde.

12. Cainan lyfode hund-seofontig geare, and ge-strinde Malaleel.

13. he lefeode siththan he ge-strinde Malaleel viii. hund wintre, and æfter tham he ge-strinde suna and dohtra.

14. and he forthferde tha he wæs nigon hund wintre and tyn wintre.

15. witodlice Malelehel ge-strinde Jared tha he wæs fif and sixtig wintre.

16. and siththan he ge-strinde suna & dohtra.

17. and he forthferde tha he was eahta hund wintre and fif hund-nigontig wintre.

18. Jared ge-strinde Enoch tha he wæs fif and sixtig wintre.

19. and æfter tham the he ge-strinde suna and dohtra.

20. and he forthferde tha he wæs nigon hund wintre and fif and sixtig wintre.

21. Enoch ge-strinde Mathusalem tha he wæs fif and sixtig wintre.

22. and siththan he ge-strinde suna & dohtra.

23. and he wæs on thisum life threo hund wintre and fif and sixtig wintre.

24. and he ferde mid Gode; and hine nan man siththan ne ge-seah; for tham the Drihten hine nam mid sawle and mid lichaman.

25. witodlice Matusalam ge-strinde Lamech, tha he wæs seofon and hund-eahtatig wintre.

26. and æfter tham he gestrinde suna and dohtra.

27. and he forthferde tha he wæs nigon hund wintre and nigon and sixtig wintre.

28. Lamech ge-strinde sunu tha he wæs an hund wintra, & two and hund-eahtatig wintre.

29. and nemde hine Noe and thus cwæth be-him. thes man us afrefrath fram urum weorcum, and fram urum ge-swince on tham lande the Drihten wirigde.

30. æfter tham the he ge-strinde suna & dohtra.

31. and he forthferde tha he wæs seofon hund wintre and seofon and hund-seofontig wintre.

32. Noe sothlice tha tha he wæs fif hund geara tha ge-strinde he thri suna, Sem, and Cham and Jafeth.

1. Men wurdon tha ge-menigfilde ofer eorthan, and dohtra ge-strindon.

2. tha ge-sawon Godes bearn that wæron gode men manna dohtra, that hig wæron wlitige, and namon him wif of eallum tham tha the hig ge-curon.

1.   bairn. children. Scotch

2.   ye-curon. qu. ge-ceosan. chuse.

3. and God cwæth tha ne thurh-wunath na min gast on menn on ec-nisse, for than the he is flæsc

3   thoro-wuneth, thoro-dwelleth.

4. Entas wæron eacswilce ofer eorthan on tham dagun. æfter them the Godes bearn tymdon with manna dohtra and hig cendon. tha sindemihtige fram worulde and hlisfulleweras.

4   teamed, paired as teams of oxen.

5.   kindle, to breed. Bailey.

6.   hlisa, fama. hlist. auditus. listful, from to listen, listened, heard of, famous.

5. tha ge-seah God that micel yfelnys manna wæs over eorthan, and eall ge-thanc manna heortena wæs ge-wendon on yfel on eallum timan.

7.   ie. thoughts of man’s hearts.

6. Gode tha of-thuhte that he man ge-worhte ofer eorthan. he wolde tha warnian onær; and wæs gehrepod mid heortan sarnisse withinnan

8   these words are not in the original text. their meaning is not obvious.

7. and cwæth, Ic a-dilige thone mannan the ic ge-sceop fram thære eorthan ansine, from tham men oth tha nytenu, fram tham slincendum oth tha fugelas. me of-thincth sothlice that Ic hig worthe.

10   slincan to creep. to sneak. Johnson’s dict.

11   to queme, to please, to favor. Ch. Spenc. Bailey

12   giftan, to give, favor.

9. thas sind Noes cneornissa. Noe wæs riht-wis wer, and ful-fremed on his mægthum. mid God he ferde.

13.a.   nearness, family, kin, relation

13.b.   full-framed, strong, perfect.

14.   mæg, meagth, mata. kin, generation. Verstegan mægbote, penalty for killing a relation. Lambert.

10. and ge-strinde thri suna, Sem, and Cham, and Jafetth.

11. tha wæs eall seo eorthe ge-wemmed æt-foran Gode, and a-fylled mid un-riht-wisnysse.

15.   wem, blemish, fault. Chaucer. Bail. Johnson.

12. tha ge-seah God that seo eorthe wæs ge-wemmed, for than the ælc flæsc ge-wemde his weg ofer eorthan.

13. and God cwæth tha to Noe, ge-endung ealles flæsces com ætforan me. seo eorthe ys a-fylled mid unrihtwisnysse fram heora ansine, and ic for-do hig mid thære eorthan samod.

16   for-do. for is here. a prefix, as in for-bid for-fet E t c. meaning to undo, destroy.

17.   same. self. itself.

14. wirc the nu ænne arc of a-heawenum bordum, and thu wircst wununge binnan tham arce, and clæmst withinnan and withutan mid tyrwan.

18.   wuning. dwelling.

19   clæmst, clammiest, make clammy. daub. Bailey. Johnson.

15. and thu wircst hine thus. threo hund fæthma bith se are on lenge, and fiftig fæthma on bræde, and thrittig on heahnisse.

20   thirle. a hole. Bail-Johns. [. . .] insw. Chaucer.

16. thu wircst thæreon eh-thirl, and thu ge-tihst his heahnisse to gædere on useweardum to anre fæthme duru thu setst be thære sidan with-neothan and thu macast threo fleringa binna tham arce.

17. efne , Ic ge-bringe flodes wæteru ofer earthan, that Ic of-sled eall flæsc on tham the ys lifes gast under heofenum, and ealle tha thing the on eorthan synd, beoth for-numene.

21.   verily. B.S.

22.   numene, name, taken. for is a prefix.

18. Ic sette min wedd to the, and thu gæst into tham arce, and thine suna, thin wif and thinra sunuwif mid the.

23   wedd a covenant, a pledge. Ch. Benson. hence to wed

19. and of eallum nyterum, ealles flæsces, twegen ye-macan thy lætst into tham arce mid the, that hig libban magon.

24   qu? macan to make. maca. par, socius, conjux Benson. make, a mate, husband, wife. Chauc.

20. eac, of fugelum be heora cinne, and of eallum orf-cinne, and of eallum creopendum cinne, twam and twam faran in mid the that hi magon libban.

25   orf-cattle. orf-gild. Bailey Spelm. Gloss.

21. thu nimst witodlice of eallum metlum the to mete magon into the, that hig beon æghther ge-the ge-him to big-leofan.

26.   thu nimest, i.e. nimest thu, take [. . .]

27.   as a verb, to eat.

22. Noe sothlice dide ealle tha thing the him God be-bead.

1. and God cwæth to him, gang into tham arce, and eall thin hiwræden. the ic ge-seah sothlice rihtwisne æt-foran meon thissere mægthe.

1.   hive, a house. rede, council or family. house council, house family. house hold.

2.   mæthe, generation. Verst. tribe.

2. nim into the of eallum clænum nitenum seofen and seofen ægthres ge-cyndes, and of tham unclænum twam and twam.

3. and of fugel-cinne seofen and seofen ægthres ge-cindes, that sæd si ge-healden ofer ealre eorthan bradnisse.

4. Ic sothelice sende ren nu ymbe seofon niht over eorthan feowertig daga and feowertig nihta togædere, and ic a-dilegie ealle the e-dwiste the ic ge-worhte ofer eorthan bradnisse.

3   adilgean, abolere. Bens. but deluge is certainly of that root.

4   e-dwiste. qu. dust, dirt, earth?

5. Noe tha dide ealle tha thing the him God be-bead.

6. and he wæs tha six hund geara on ylde tha tha thæs flodes wæteru ythedon ofer eorthan.

7. hwæt tha Noe eode into tham arce, and his thri suna and his wif, and his suna wif, for thæs flodes wæterum.

5.   eode, yode, went.

8. eac swilce tha nitenu of eallum cinne, and of eallum fufelcynne,

9. comon to Noe into tham arce, swa swa God be-bead.

10. tha on tham eahtogan dæge, tha tha hig inne wæron, and God hig be-locen hæfde withutan. tha y-thode that flod ofer eorthan.

6.   see verse 16 ‘and the Lord shut him in.’

11. on tham othrum monthe, on thone seofenteothan dæg thæs monthes, tha a-sprungon ealle wyll-springas thære micelan niwelnisse, and thære heofenan wæter-theotan wæron ge-openode.

7   well then signified a fountain. missing from this draft, was on previous draft

8   in one. i.e. together.

9   in the A-S. the 13 th to the 16 th verses are omitted being repetitions of the 7 th to the 9 th

10   swithe greatly. Bailey, and swither v19. being the verb of swithe, we might say in English, swithered swithe, enlarged greatly.

18. and y-thedon swythe, and y-fyldon thære eorthan bradnisse. witodlice se arc wæs ge-ferud ofer tha wæteru.

19. and that wæter swithrode swithe ofer tha eorthan. wurdon tha behelede ealle tha hehstan duna under ealre heofenan.

20. and that wæter wæs fiftyne fæthma deop ofer tha hehstan duna.

21. wearth tha for-numen eall flæsc the ofer eorthan styrode.

11   niman, numan, nyman, to take. for-numan, for-taken, over-taken, destroyed.

23. manna and fugela nytena & creopendra, and ælc thing the lif hæfde wearth a-dyd on tham deopan flode, buton tham anum the binnan tham arc wæron.

24. thæt flod stod tha swa an hund daga and fiftig daga.

Chap. VIII.

1. and God tha ge-munde Noes fare, and thæra nyfena the him mid wæron, and asende tha winde ofer eorthan, and tha wætera wurdon gewanode.

2. and tha wil-springas thære miclan niwelnisse wurdon for-dytte, and thære heofenan wæter-theotan, and se ren wearth for-boden.

3. tha wætera tha ge-cirdon of thære eorthan on-gean-farende, and begunnon to wanigenne æfter other healf-hund daga.

1   i.e. a hundred and a half. or 150.

4. tha ætstod se arc on tham seofethan monthe, ofer tha muntas Armenies landes.

5. and tha wætera to-eodon and wanedon oth thæne teothan month, and on tham teothan monthe ateowodon thæra munta cnollas.

6. tha æfter feowertigum dagum undyde Noe his ehthirl the he on tham arce ge-macode.

7. and a-sende ut ænne 3. hremn; se hrem fleah tha ut, and nolde eft ongean-cirran, ær than the tha wæteru adruwedon ofer eorthan.

3   hrem, hremn, hrefn, corvus, a raven.

4.   culver, a pigeon. Bai. Johnson.

8. he a-sende tha eft ut ane culfran, that heo sceowode gif tha wætera tha git geswicon ofer thære eorthan bradnisse.

5   ge-swican, asswicen, swican. ge. & a. are here prefixes, and c sounds ch , as in civic , church. a-swichan, asswage abate. Bailey derives asswage from ad. & suadere. but in Aelfric’s time there were no Latin derivations. that language being them known to very few in England. there is no relation of meaning between asswage and suadere; nor are d. and g. convertible letters in derivations. Johnson derives assuage from A-S. swæs, suavis. but the derivation aswichan, cessare, desistere, is much more probable.

9. heo tha fleah ut, and ne mihte findan hwær heo hire fot a-sette, for than the tha wætera wæron ofer ealle eorthan; and he ge-cirde on-gean to Noe and he ge-nam hig into tham arce.

10. he abad tha git othre seofon dagas, and a-sende ut eft culfran.

11. heo com tha on æfnunge eft to Noe, & brohte an twig of anum ele-beame mid grenum-leafum on hire muthe. tha under-geat Noe that tha wætera wæron a-druwode ofer eorthan.

6.   under-geat. qu. g. for w. under-wat wat, wot Bailey Johnson. wate. Chaucer. under-wat then is to understand. to know.

12. andabad swa theah seofon dagas, and a-sende ut culfran. seo ne ge-cirde on-gean him.

13. thage-openode Noe thæs arces hrof, and beheold ut, and ge-seah that thære eorthan bradnis wæs a-druwod.

15. God tha spræc to Noe thus cwæthende,

16. gang ut of tham arce, and thin wif, thine suna and hira wif, and eall that thær inne ys mid the.

17. læd ut mid the ofer eorthan, and weaxe ge and beoth ge-menigf i lde ofer eorthan.

18. Noe tha ut-eode of tham arce, and hig ealle ofer eorthan.

20. and he arærde an weofod Gode, and ge-nam of eallum tham clænan nytenum and clænum fugelum, and ge-offrode Gode lac on tham weofode.

6.b.   lay is still used for wages, hire.

21. God tha under-feng his lac thære wynsumnysse bræth, and cwæth him to, Nelle ic nates-hwon a-wirgean tha eorthan heonon forth for mannum. and-git and ge-thoht menniscre heortan syndon forth healde to yfele fram iugothe. eornostlice ne of-slea ic heonon forth mid wætere ælc thing cuces, swa swa ic dyde, eallum dagum thære eorthan.

7.   fang is a tooth or claw. fangan, to take.

8   winsom breath, sweet flavor.

9   and-git intellectus qu. g. for w. and-wit.

10.   cuces, i.e. quickes living, as in the phrase the quick and the dead.

22. sæd and ge-rip, cile and hæte, sumor and winter, dæg and niht ne ge-swicath.

1. God bletsode tha Noe and his suna, and cwæth him to, Weahxath and beoth ge-menigfilde, and a-fyllath tha eorthan.

2. and beo eower ege and oga ofer ealle nitenu and fugelas, and ofer ealle tha thing the on eorthan stiriath, ealle sæ-fixas sindon eowrum handum be-tæhte. 2.

1   cge, oge, age, g, for w. awe, terror. ege-leas. aweless, in English it is translated ‘fear and dread,’ in the LXX. T [. . .] s.

2.   be-tæhte, be-taht. part, pas be-tæcan tradere. tæcan to take.

3. and eall that the styrath and leofath, beoth eow to mete, swa swa growende wyrta ic be-tæhte ealle eow.

4. buton tham anum that ge flæsc mid blode ne eton.

5. eower blod ic of-gange æt eallum wild-deorum, and eac æt tham men. of thæs weres handa, and his brothor handa ic of-gange thæs mannes lif.

6. swa hwa swa a-git mannes blod, his blod bith agoten. witodelice to Godes an-licenisse ys se man ge-worht.

7. weaxe ge nu and beoth ge-menigfylde, and gath ofer eorthan and ge-fyllath hig.

8. God cwæth eft to Noe and to his sunum,

9. Efne, nu ic sette min wedd to eow and to eorum of-springe.

3   wedd, wed, pledge, covenant. Chaucer.

10. and to eallum tham libbendum nytenum the of tham arce eodon.

11. thæt ic nates-hwon nelle heonon-forth eall flæsc a-dydan mid flodes wæterum; na heonon forth ne bith flod to sencende tha eorthan.

4   a-die, kill.

12. this bith that tacn mines weddes, that ic do betwux me and eow, and eallum libbendum nytenum on ecum mægthum.

5   mægthum. see VII.1.

13. thæt ys that ic sette minne ren-bogan on wolcnum; and he bith tacn mines weddes betwux me and thære eorthan.

14. thonne ic ofer-teo heofenan mid wolcnum, thonne æteowth min boga on tham wolcnum.

6   teon, ducere. ofer-teon, obducere over-draw

15. and ic beo ge-mindig mines weddes with eow. that heonon forth ne bith flod to a-diligenne eall flæsc.

7   ecan, eke, ever, everlasting.

16. bith thonne min ren-boga on tham wolcnum, and ic hine ge-seo, and beo ge-mindig thæs ecan weddes, the ge-sett ys betwux Gode and eallum libbendum flæsce the ofer eorthan ys.

17. this bith that tacn mines weddes the ic ge-sette betwux me and eallum flæsce ofer eorthan.

18. Wæron tha Noes suna the of tham arce eodon, Sem, and Cham, and Jafeth, and Cham witodlice ys fæder thære Cananeiscre theode.

8   theod nation. Verstegan.

19. and of thisum thrim Noes sunum ys to-sawen eall mancynn ofer eorthan.

20. Noe tha yrthling began to wincenne that land, and ge-sette him win-eard

9   yrthling, agricultor, arator. erian, arare. erend, arans. to are. Chau. to plough. Bailey derives to are from arare. but it was in use with the A-S before they had borrowed any thing from the Latins.

The Anglo-Saxons often used their active verbs in a passive sense, so that “warrian” means to be warned—and wolde tha warrian onær means here “and wished then to have been warned before”—and Justly so—for God, repenting of what he had done, not having forseen the consequences, might well wish to have been warned to them—

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Thomas Jefferson University apologizes for viral mispronunciations of nursing graduates' names at graduation

Thomas Jefferson University is apologizing after the names of some graduates from the nursing program were unrecognizably pronounced at their commencement, as seen in videos from the ceremony that have since gone viral.

The mispronunciations at the Jefferson College of Nursing commencement ceremony, which occurred May 9, according to the university's website , were attributed to the phonetic spellings written on the speaker's cards, the school said in a statement on X Friday.

For example, graduate Sarah Virginia Brennan's name was pronounced "Sayer Oo-voon Geen-goo Bree-none," according to a video from the ceremony. Maeve Elizabeth was pronounced "May-vee Lee Zu-beth." A Stephanie's first name was pronounced "Eff-uni," and a Jessica, "Jay-sic-u."

At one point, the speaker mispronounced “Thomas” as “Tom-mu-may” — before the graduate can be heard correcting the pronunciation.

"The leadership and faculty of Thomas Jefferson University extend our sincerest apologies for the mispronunciations of the names of several of our graduating nursing students during our recent commencement ceremony," the university said in the statement. "This ceremony is a celebration of the significant achievements of our students, and each graduate deserves to have their name honored correctly on this pivotal day."

Graduates seemingly walked across the stage in alphabetical order. A nearly five-minute video of the speaker announcing graduates with last names that start with "B" or "C" had more than 370,000 views by Friday afternoon. Another video, seemingly taken from the crowd at the ceremony, has received more than 2.4 million views, 230,000 likes and 2,000 comments.

"I can honestly say ... The Grads will never forget this moment ...," one commenter said.

"This can’t be real. If so SNL needs to re-create this," another added.

"Sarah was like … do you mean me?" a TikTok user wrote, with several crying-laughing emoji.

The ceremony saw a change in speaker once the last names reached "L," and the original announcer apologized to the crowd, as seen in another video of the ceremony shared to TikTok.

"And my apologies for the phonetic spelling or pronunciation of the names that was on the cards. I would have been better just reading from the book. My apologies, graduates," they said.

The university reiterated the cause of the errors, stating, "the mispronunciations occurred due to the way phonetic spellings were presented on the speaker's cards, which was noted when the presenter apologized during the ceremony."

"This unfortunate error does not reflect the immense respect we have for our graduates and the value we place on their hard-earned accomplishments," the statement concluded.

Thomas Jefferson University, located in Philadelphia, has three more commencement ceremonies scheduled, set for May 21 and 22.

Maddie Ellis is a weekend editor at TODAY Digital.

Thomas Jefferson's Monticello

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A guide for excellent online collections of Jefferson's writings and manuscripts.

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Memoirs from Monticello's Enslaved Community

Read first-person accounts from several people enslaved at Monticello

ADDRESS: 931 Thomas Jefferson Parkway Charlottesville, VA 22902 GENERAL INFORMATION: (434) 984-9800

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‘Sally & Tom’ Frees Sally Hemings From Being a Mere Footnote

Suzan-Lori Parks’s play is the latest work by a Black writer seeking to prioritize Hemings’s life and perspective to make her fully dimensional.

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By Salamishah Tillet

Sally Hemings might be a household name these days, but we still know so little about the relationship between Hemings and Thomas Jefferson . Yet, Hemings endures as a figure of endless fascination: American writers aspire to tell her story, and there remains a yearning for a deeper understanding of the enslaved woman who left no firsthand accounts of her inner thoughts.

In “Sally & Tom,” Suzan Lori-Parks is the latest writer trying to fill in the gaps in order to present Hemings as a multidimensional character — and, in the process, rescue her personhood onstage. “We don’t know what happened,” Sheria Irving, who portrays Hemings in the play, told me, adding that Parks is “building on this factual account.” (The play has been a hit for the Public Theater and runs there through June 2.)

She continued: “We do not have to reimagine, we can really imagine what it is for a 14-year-old to be looked at by a 41-year-old, and not just looked at but to engage in sexual exploitation with this man.”

Parks’s fidelity to the history means she doesn’t alter Hemings’s fate. Instead, she experiments with the storytelling by plotting “Sally & Tom” as a backstager, or a play within a play, in which the main character, Luce (also played by Irving), is an African American dramatist who is writing a play about the relationship between Hemings and Jefferson. Luce is playing Hemings in her own play, which is called “The Pursuit of Happiness.”

In fact, each cast member plays two parts: Luce’s partner, Mike (Gabriel Ebert), is playing Tom in the production, and Alano Miller plays both Hemings’s older brother, James, and Kwame, a Hollywood actor who has returned to his old theater company. When the historical story and the present-day one collide, they often reveal the sometimes comical and often complicated reality that can arise when mounting a show dealing with race relations in the American theater today.

This doubling allows for Parks’s two-part critique. First, Luce’s focus on Hemings counters those Jefferson historians who have tried to erase her legacy. Also, Luce’s battle to control the ending of her play highlights the pressures that Black playwrights sometimes face in commercial theater: the white gatekeepers, producers and actors, who are less interested in a Black writer’s artistic freedom and more interested in controlling the narrative, claiming it will make the work more palatable to a white audience. (Something that Alice Childress experienced and wrote about .)

While meta-narratives are part of Parks’s avant-garde aesthetic, “Sally & Tom” reminded me of something I had noticed when doing research for my book “Sites of Slavery” : Parks’s new play is part of a canon by Black writers that subverts genre conventions to prioritize Hemings’s life and perspective. By doing so, these authors free Hemings and the other enslaved members of her family from being mere footnotes in Jefferson’s biography.

Barbara Chase-Riboud, after reading a chapter on Hemings in Fawn Brodie’s 1974 psychological study of Thomas Jefferson , decided to write her own novel. Published in 1979 as historical fiction, “Sally Hemings” uses a nonlinear structure that jumps from Hemings and Jefferson’s earliest encounters, in 1787, when a 14-year-old Hemings accompanied the family to Paris to care for Jefferson’s daughters while he was stationed there as a senior minister; to their living together in Albemarle County in Virginia, in the early 19th century; and to her life in Virginia as a free woman after his death. These flashbacks and flash-forwards reveal how Hemings navigated enslavement and emancipation while imagining how she might have evolved into a woman who questioned Jefferson’s authority and secured freedom for their four children who survived to adulthood.

In 1997, “Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: An American Controversy,” by the historian Annette Gordon-Reed, took Jefferson’s earlier biographers and historians to task for their insistence that Jefferson’s fathering of his six children with Hemings was improbable , including some who claimed he was celibate for almost four decades, while others attributed parentage to his nephews Peter and Samuel Carr .

Gordon-Reed’s style is akin to a meta-historiography in which she compares these earlier biographies while also, as a law professor, cross-examining the motives of the Jefferson scholars, their missing evidence, and their deliberate misreadings of firsthand witness accounts of Hemings and Jefferson’s long-term relationship in the published narratives of their son Madison Hemings, and the formerly enslaved Isaac Jefferson.

But it is Robbie McCauley’s play “Sally’s Rape,” which won an Obie Award in 1992, to which Parks’s “Sally & Tom” is the most indebted. McCauley was the most experimental in her rendering of Hemings’s story and the most explicit in her condemnation of Jefferson. She played herself, her own great-great-grandmother (named Sally) and Hemings. In contrast, her artistic collaborator Jeannie Hutchins, who is white, played her liberal friend, a Smith College graduate and a slave auctioneer.

Hutchins’s character refuses to believe McCauley’s assertions that both Sallys — her ancestor and the historical one — were raped by their slave owners. The play continually broke the fourth wall by inviting the audience to participate in these uncomfortable exchanges, including the bidding, and consider how their own racial bias might stem from such founding violence.

Even though Hemings and Jefferson were not actual characters in James Ijames’s 2020 play, “TJ Loves Sally 4 Ever,” their relationship serves as the historical backdrop for his contemporary satire set on a Southern campus in which TJ, a white middle-aged college dean, sexually harasses Sally, an African American undergraduate.

In “Sally & Tom,” Parks found a way to add to the current conversations about the white gaze in American theater that are taking place among a younger generation of authors whose unorthodox storytelling Parks most likely inspired. These include Jackie Sibblies Drury, whose “Fairview” follows a Black family in an increasingly surreal setting, and Jeremy O. Harris, whose “Slave Play” takes an outrageous look at a sex therapy program for interracial couples.

“Luce is trying to give voice to a marginalized Black woman,” Irving told me about her character. “She’s trying to get it right. And that was my objective for her, to get it right, how to uplift a voice that has never really been heard on a stage in this way.”

“I think she’s architecting this way to free herself,” she added. “She’s architecting a way to free Sally, and by freeing Sally, she is able to free herself.”

An earlier version of this article referred incorrectly to the professional status of the historian Annette Gordon-Reed. She is a law professor at Harvard Law School, not a former law professor.

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Salamishah Tillet is a contributing critic at large for The Times and a professor at Rutgers University. She won the Pulitzer Prize for criticism in 2022, for columns examining race and Black perspectives as the arts and entertainment world responded to the Black Lives Matter moment with new works. More about Salamishah Tillet

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View from here: Jefferson’s warning

What’s inside the may 2024 issue of deseret magazine.

By Jesse Hyde

When the founders gathered in Philadelphia to draft the Constitution, they debated for months to decide how a president should be elected. At first, they liked the idea of Congress picking the president — as the British Parliament chooses the prime minister — but discarded that proposal over concerns it would lead to corruption between the executive and legislative branches.

Eventually, they settled on a little-known compromise called the “contingent election,” which has been mostly ignored by our history books. If no candidate emerges from the Electoral College with an electoral majority, the outcome is decided by the House of Representatives, where each state delegation gets one vote. Thomas Jefferson believed this was “the most dangerous blot in our Constitution, and one which some unlucky chance will some day hit.”

Fortunately, we haven’t come close to a contingent election since 1824, when John Quincy Adams won the presidency over populist Andrew Jackson. But as distant as it may seem, a contingent election is a real possibility this fall, at a time when confidence in American democracy is already fraying. As Ethan Bauer details this could be a dangerous mix. “With just 16 percent saying they trusted the government in 2023, a contingent election could be the poison pill embedded in the U.S. Constitution that causes the rest of the electoral system to fail.”

With so much at stake this election season, we’re making a special effort at the magazine to focus on what truly makes America great. In that vein, this month’s cover story highlights the Great Salt Lake in a gorgeous photo essay by Chris Carlson. When I met with him to see his photos for the first time, I was inspired by the spiritual connection he feels with this endangered natural wonder. He told me how his ancestors were among the first white settlers to build homes on Antelope Island. Now, he hopes his work, will spur others to take action while the vanishing lake can still be saved. “Walk the shores,” Carlson implores. “Listen to the stories. See the beauty. Witness the plight.”

We love this land and believe in the institutions dedicated to preserving our democracy, but every good fight starts with good people. As I’ve noted in this space before, one important way to help is by listening respectfully to those who hold opposing views. But as Joshua DuBois points out in this month’s Commentary that doesn’t mean compromising our deeply held beliefs. In fact, sometimes it requires the courage to call out what we see as wrong. “We need an active, lived civility that is not quiet,” DuBois writes, “that doesn’t take a backseat, but leans into the healing of this country.” I like to think our forebears — from Mason to Jefferson and Carlson’s pioneer ancestors — would agree.

This story appears in the May 2024 issue of Deseret Magazine . Learn more about how to subscribe .