a little patience and we shall see the reign of witches pass over, their spells dissolve, and the people recovering their true sight, restore their government to it’s true principles. it is true that in the mean time we are suffering deeply in spirit, and incurring the horrors of a war, & long oppressions of enormous public debt.

if the game runs sometimes against us at home, we must have patience, till luck turns, & then we shall have an opportunity of winning5 back the principles we have lost. for this is a game where principles are the stake. better luck therefore to us all, and health happiness & friendly salutations to yourself. Adieu.

I am not a Federalist, because I never submitted the whole system of my opinions to the creed of any party of men whatever in religion, in philosophy, in politics, or in anything else where I was capable of thinking for myself. Such an addiction is the last degradation of a free and moral agent. If I could not go to heaven but with a party, I would not go there at all.

My great wish is to go on in a strict but silent performance of my duty; to avoid attracting notice & to keep my name out of newspapers, because I find the pain of a little censure, even when it is unfounded, is more acute than the pleasure of much praise.

I consider the labor of a breeding woman as no object, and that a child raised every 2. years is <span class="ptj-add">of</span> more profit than the crop of the best laboring <span class="ptj-del">[. . .]</span> <span class="ptj-add">man</span>. in this, as in all other cases, providence has made our interests &amp; our duties coincide perfectly. women too are destroyed by exposure to wet at certain periodical indispositions to which nature has subjected them. with respect therefore to our women &amp; their children I must pray you to inculcate upon the overseers that it is not their labor, but their increase which is the first consideration with us.

The moral certainty therefore is that there will be an Anti-fœderal Majority in the Ensuing Legislature, and this very high probability is that this will bring <span style="font-style: italic">Jefferson</span> into the Chief Magistracy; unless it be prevented by the measure which I shall now submit to your <a id="ARHN-01-24-02-pb-0465"></a>consideration, namely the immediate calling together of the existing Legislature.

They ought not to hinder the taking of a <span style="font-style: italic">legal</span> and <span style="font-style: italic">constitutional</span> step, to prevent an <span style="font-style: italic">Atheist</span> in Religion and a <span style="font-style: italic">Fanatic</span> in politics from getting possession of the helm of the State.

In weighing this suggestion you will doubtless bear in mind that Popular Governments must certainly be overturned &amp; while they endure prove engines of mischief—if one party will call to its aid all the resources which <span style="font-style: italic">Vice</span> can give and if the other, however pressing the emergency, confines itself within all the ordinary forms of delicacy and decorum.

Mine on the subject of slavery of negroes have long since been in possession of the public, and time has only served to give them stronger root. The love of justice and the love of country plead equally the cause of these people, and it is a moral reproach to us that they should have pleaded it so long in vain, and should have produced not a single effort, nay I fear not much serious willingness to relieve them &amp; ourselves from our present condition of moral &amp; political reprobation.

Their amalgamation with the other color produces a degradation to which no lover of his country, no lover of excellence in the human character can innocently consent

I know no error more consuming to an estate than that of stocking farms with men almost exclusively. I consider a woman who brings a child every two years as more profitable than the best man of the farm.

I consider a woman who brings a child every two years as more profitable than the best man of the farm.<span class="diigoHighlightCommentLocator"><div class="diigoIcon id_d57c00d9d12f9c84d367b78971961375 type_9 TextIcon yellow" title="" style="bottom: 0px;"></div></span><span class="diigoHighlightCommentLocator"></span> what she produces is an addition to the capital, while his labors disappear in mere consumption.

I am drudging at the writing table

say nothing of my religion. it is known to my god and myself alone. it’s evidence before the world is to be sought in my life. if that has been <span style="font-style: italic">honest and dutiful to society</span>, the religion which has regulated it cannot be a bad one.”

fully confident that the good sense of the American people and their attachment to those very rights which we are now vindicating will, before it shall be too late, rally with us round the true principles of our federal compact; but determined, were we to be disappointed in this, to sever ourselves from that union we so much value, rather than give up the rights of self government which we have reserved, &amp; in which alone we see liberty, safety &amp; happiness.

The proposition for a Convention has had the result I expected. If one could be obtained I do not know whether it would not do more harm than good.

<span style="font-style: italic">While<a class="ptr" id="TSJN-01-07-0425-fn-0003-ptr" href="#TSJN-01-07-0425-fn-0003" title="jump to note 3">3</a> Mr. Henry lives</span> another bad constitution would be formed, and saddled for ever on us. What we have to do I think is <span style="font-style: italic">devoutly to pray</span> for <span style="font-style: italic">his death</span>,

Whither shall the coloured emigrants go? And the sooner we put some plan under way, the greater hope there is that it may be permitted to proceed peaceably to it’s ultimate effect. But if something is not done, and soon done, we shall be the murderers of our own children.

the revolutionary storm now sweeping the globe will be upon us,

My opinion was never worthy enough of notice to merit citing:<a class="ptr" id="TSJN-01-14-0427-fn-0002-ptr" href="#TSJN-01-14-0427-fn-0002" title="jump to note 2">2</a> but since you ask it I will tell it you.

If I could not go to heaven but with a party, I would not go there at all.

My great wish is to go on in a strict but silent performance of my duty: to avoid attracting notice and to keep my name out of newspapers, because I find the pain of a little censure, even when it is unfounded, is more acute than the pleasure of much praise.

His picture of Sarah delivering Agar to Abraham is delicious. I would have agreed to have been Abraham though the consequence would have been that I should have been dead five or six thousand years