reform ever at his heart. He was of opinion that this was the propitious season, when virtue glowed in the breasts of men, to discard, with a generous enthusiasm, the abuses, by which the few had been enabled so long to trample on the many. "It can never," he observes, "be too often repeated, that the time for fixing every essential right on a legal basis is while our rulers are honest and ourselves united."*

By this new code

Entails were abolished, which, to use his own language, "broke up the hereditary and high-handed aristocracy, which, by accumulating immense masses of property in single lines of family, had divided our country into two distinct orders of nobles and plebeians;"

For the rights of primogeniture were substituted the equal rights of all the children, or other representatives in equal degree;

Aliens were admitted to citizenship by a short residence;

Punishments were apportioned to crimes;

A school for common education was provided for each district of five miles square; and

Religious freedom founded on the broadest basis.

Virginia had the virtue to adopt all these noble reforms in their full extent, except that respecting schools, which was partially carried into effect. It was that which established religious freedom, in which he had the powerful aid of Mr. Madison, that, as manifesting the proudest triumph of philosophy, gave our great friend the most

On this point, in his Notes on Virginia, he says, "The spirit of the times may alter, will alter. Our rulers will become corrupt, our people careless. A single zealot may commence persecuter, and better men be his victims. It can never be too often repeated, that the time for fixing every essential right on a legal basis is while our rulers are honest, and ourselves united. From the conclusion of this war we shall be going down hill. It will not then be neces

sary to resort every moment to the people for support. They will be forgotten, therefore, and their rights disregarded. They will forget themselves, but in the sole faculty of making money, and will never think of uniting to effect a due respect for their rights. The shackles, therefore, which shall not be knocked off at the conclusion of this war, will remain on us long, will be made heavier, and heavi er, till our rights shall revive or expire in a convulsion."

cordial satisfaction. The immolation of Socrates, on the altar of superstition, could not have affected his pupils with a deeper horror, than he felt at the sacrilegious violations of conscience and atrocious inflictions with which bigots have blasphemously, in the name of Deity, scourged mankind. The act, for this purpose, is preceded by a preamble, in which the ground legally assumed is established with the force of geometrical demonstration. The grandeur of the object justified this unusual course; and the disciple of truth, on beholding this temple of refuge, may feel a holier awe from the magnificence of the portal.

By one,t who had a distinguished agency in carrying some of the most important features of this code into operation, I am enabled to say, "that it, perhaps, exacted the most severe of Mr. Jefferson's public labors. It consisted of one hundred and twenty-six bills, comprising and re-casting the whole statutory code, British and Colonial, then admitted to be in force, or proper to be adopted, and some of the most important articles of the unwritten law, with original laws on particular subjects; the whole adapted to the independent and republican form of government. The work, though not enacted in the mass, as was contemplated, has been a mine of legislative wealth, and a model of statutory composition, containing not a single superfluous word, and preferring always words and phrases of a meaning fixed as much as possible by oracular treatises, or solemn adjudications."

Even before these enactments, the prohibition of the further importation of slaves was a measure carried chiefly by his efforts. Nor should it here be forgotten that it was his purpose, and that of his coadjutors, to emancipate all slaves born after the passage of the code. To this end, an amendment was prepared, establishing the principle,

* It declares, “that no man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever, nor shall be enforced, restrained, molested, or burthened in his body or goods, nor shall otherwise suffer on acount of his religious opinions or belief; but that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinions in matters of religion, and that the same shall in no wise diminish, enlarge, or affect their civil capacities." † Madison.

and directing, on their becoming of age, their colonization, as an independent people, under our protection and at our expense. Why this measure was not urged, does not appear. Mr. Jefferson may have found the objections to it insuperable. At any rate it shows his sentiments at that time on this interesting subject.

In June, 1779, he was elected Governor of Virginia, and re-elected in June following, for another year. The period was one of awful peril, teeming chiefly with military events. He was no soldier. There were some who thought, considering the peculiar crisis, it would have better suited the temper of the times to have filled the executive chair with a military man. His administration, however, was upright, wise, vigilant, and energetic. Two events give it peculiar distinction; the generous cession to the Union of the immense region of unoccupied land claimed by Virginia, out of which so many flourishing states have been since formed, and on which the final ratification of the articles of confederation depended, and the suppression, in its birth, of an honest, but mistaken, design of conferring dictatorial powers on Patrick Henry. During this period the state was overrun and exhausted by a devastating foe. Much discontent was the consequence, and vague charges were uttered against the Governor. Mr. Jefferson, immediately after his retirement, having been chosen a member of the legislature, alluded, in his place, to these charges, and invited the freest inquiry into his official conduct. Not a murmur of dissatisfaction was expressed; on the contrary, that body passed an unanimous vote approving it.

In June, 1781, he was associated with Adams, Jay, Franklin, and Laurens, to negotiate a treaty of peace with Great Britain. Not having entered on the duties of this appointment in November, 1782, it was renewed by Congress. For reasons, which do not appear, he did not join in this mission.

In June, 1783, he was again appointed a delegate to Congress, whose journals show that he occupied the first place in that body.

In this year our great conflict ceased, and National Independence was not only achieved, but acknowledged.

The definitive treaty was ratified, and the commander of our armies, he who has been emphatically called the Father of his Country, signified to Congress his intention of asking leave to resign his commission, and, with the respect ever paid by him to the civil authority, desired to know their pleasure in what manner it would be proper to offer it. They invited him to a public audience. At this august spectacle, WASHINGTON, having in most impressive terms, surrendered his commission, and taken leave of all the employments of public life, received from Congress its valedictory answer,-an answer in which dignity and affection are happily blended. "Having," says that body, "defended the standard of liberty in this new world, having taught a lesson useful to those who inflict, and to those who feel oppression, you retire from the great theatre of action, with the blessings of your fellow-citizens; but the glory of your virtues will not terminate with your military command, it will continue to animate remote ages."This answer was from the pen of Jefferson!

On the 7th of May, 1784, he was appointed minister, in addition to Adams and Franklin, for the purpose of negociating treaties of commerce with the nations of Europe; and on the 10th of March, 1785, received the unanimous appointment of Minister Plenipotentiary to represent the United States at the court of France, in the room of Franklin, who had obtained leave to return home. A more marked distinction could not have been conferred. To succeed such a man was itself a rare distinction, and to obtain it by the undissenting vote of a body, whose choice was by ballot, was an honor, confined, it is believed, to Washington and himself. To this station he was re-elected in 1787, on the expiration of the period for which he was first appointed. The manner in which he discharged the duties of these offices was highly satisfactory to his country. It was his happiness, at Paris, then the focus of philosophy and fashion, to maintain, with little diminution, the exalted estimation in which his venerable predecessor had been held. No man, probably, on earth, would have shone there as his equal. He was respected, beloved, almost adored. Phi

losophers were his companions, princes his friends, rank and beauty and fashion the common decoration of his plain repasts. I have heard Mr. Jefferson speak with pleasantry of his feelings on his introduction to the brilliant circles of this court. Every where, instead of being noticed for his own qualities, or recognized by his own name, he was referred to as the successor of Franklin. But taking this in good part, and cordially expressing, what he truly felt, an unmeasured respect for this great man, in a short time his own merits became known and acknowledged. No agent of the United States ever supported, with more invariable ability, the character of his country. Learned men rallied round him, and the fair sex, so powerful at that seat of splendor, delighted in his society. In these, as in all other respects, it is his best eulogium, that he was in fact, as well as form, the successor of Franklin. It is not surprising that the science, the taste, and the comforts of this metropolis made a lasting impression on him; or that he should have been subsequently used to say, that, next to his own country, France was that in which a wise man would wish to live.

It was his fortune to behold the dawn of that stupendous Revolution which burst with so pure a glory on an astonished world. It is said that he aided its first stages by his counsels. It is certain that he advised, with prophetic wisdom, cautious approaches to republicanism, and urged the policy of adhering, at least for a time, to a limited monarchy, satisfied, that, until knowledge became more diffused, France could not enjoy a republican government. Unfortunately, his advice was not taken. It proves, however, that his ardent love of liberty was chastened by practical wisdom.

The Revolutionary war, although terminated in glory, left us exhausted. We were freed from avowed foreign enemies, but what a host sprung up within our own borders! There was a confederacy, but it was without power. There were thirteen independent states, but they were poor, and had yet to learn the necessity of united councils. Debts of a heavy amount pressed both on the general and state governments, and the means, even of paying the interest, could not be found. Confidence had received