But in taking up the “Notes,” we must understand the relation of Jefferson’s way of thinking to his way of working.  In his thinking, the slave system was evidently a violation of the whole body of good principles, for he calls it an “evil";—­a violation of morality, for he calls it an “enormity";—­a violation of justice, for he calls it a “wrong";—­a violation of republican pretensions, for he calls it a “hideous blot";—­a violation of the healthy action of our institutions, for he calls it a “disease";—­a violation of our whole public happiness, for he calls it a “curse.”  But his way of working was more calm and cool,—­often displeasing those whose plans of action are formed far from any direct entanglement in the slave system.

This union of fervent thought and cool action has, of course, brought upon Jefferson the invectives of two great classes.  One class have looked merely at his thinking, and have distrusted him as a dreamer.  To these he is a dealer in oracles, at second-hand, from Voltaire and Diderot.  The other class have studied his plans of practical philanthropy, with all his shrewd researches and homely discussions in agriculture, finance, mechanics, and architecture, and have ridiculed him as a tinker.  To such Jefferson seems a grandmotherly sort of person,—­riding about in a gig arranged to register the length of his rides,—­walking about in boots arranged to register the length of his walks,—­weatherwise, and profound in dealing with smoky chimneys and sheep-breeding.

But whether men have cavilled at him for a dreamer or laughed at him for a tinker, they have been mainly foolish, for they have cavilled and laughed at the very combination which made him powerful.  In no other American have been so happily blended highest skill in theory and highest strength in practice.

The remarks, in the “Notes on Virginia,” on the colored race are clear and fair.  He studied carefully and stated fully all that could be learned in his time.  On the whole, his examination greatly encourages those who hope good things for that race.  But one distinction must be made.  As to those profound views of the character and destiny of the race which come only by observation of a long historic development, in a wide range of climate, in great variety of social position, Jefferson could, as he confesses, know almost nothing,—­for the same reason that the keenest observer of William the Conqueror’s Norman robbers and Saxon swineherds would have failed to foretell the great dominant race which has come from them by free growth and good culture.  But, on the other hand, of all that comes by observation of the daily life of the black race, as it then was, he knew almost everything.

He declares that the black race is inferior to the white in mind, but not in heart.  The poems of black Phillis Wheatley seem to him to prove not much; but the letters of black Ignatius Sancho he praises for depth of feeling, happy turn of thought, and ease of style, though he finds no depth of reasoning.  He does not praise the mental capacity of the race, but, at last, as if conscious, that, if developed under a free system, it might be far better, he quotes the Homeric lines,—­