"I wish they had formed us like the birds of the air, able to fly where we please. I would have exchanged for this many of the boasted preeminencies of man. I was so unlucky when very young, as to read the history of Fortunatus. He had a cap of such virtues that when he put it on his head, and wished himself anywhere, he was there. I have been all my life sighing for this cap. Yet if I had it, I question if I should use it but once. I should wish myself with you, and not wish myself away again. En attendant the cap, I am always thinking of you. If I cannot be with you in reality, I will in imagination."
"Mrs. Cosway and I are enjoying the quiet of the country, she plays and sings, and we very often wish that Mr. Jefferson was here, supposing that he would be indulgent to the exertions of two little women to please him, who are extremely vain of the pleasure of being permitted to write to him, and very happy to have some share of his favorable opinion."
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Angelica Schuyler Church to Thomas Jefferson, July 21, 1788
I read this for the first time recently and thought now would be an appropriate time to post it.
(via jeffersonianabyss)
"Mine is the next turn, and I shall meet it with good will, for after one’s friends are all gone before them, and our faculties leaving us too one by one, why wish to linger in mere vegetation, as a solitary trunk in a desolate field, from which all its former companions have disappeared?"
-Thomas Jefferson to Maria Cosway, December 27, 1820 (via publius-esquire)
"Wealth, title, office are no recommendations to my friendship. On the contrary, great good qualities are requisite to make amends for their having wealth, title and office."
-Thomas Jefferson, 1786, to Mrs. Cosway.
"Thanks to a benevolent arrangement of things, the greater part of life is sunshine."
-Thomas Jefferson to Maria Cosway, 1786
"The art of life is the art of avoiding pain; and he is the best pilot who steers clearest of the rocks and shoals with which it is beset."
-Thomas Jefferson to Maria Cosway
"In truth whenever I think of you, I am hurried off on the wings of imagination into regions where fancy submits all things to our will."
"When wafting on the bosom of the ocean I shall pray it to be as calm and smooth as yours to me."
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Thomas Jefferson to Maria Cosway
Paris, May 21, 1789
That’s right. He just went there.
(via fuckyeahjefferson)
I’m 12 and what is this
What woman could resist such a display?
"I wish they had formed us like the birds of the air, able to fly where we please. I would have exchanged for this many of the boasted preeminencies of man. I was so unlucky when very young, as to read the history of Fortunatus. He had a cap of such virtues that when he put it on his head, and wished himself anywhere, he was there. I have been all my life sighing for this cap. Yet if I had it, I question if I should use it but once. I should wish myself with you, and not wish myself away again."
