Th:  Jefferson.

LETTER CLIX.—­TO GENERAL BRECKENRIDGE, February 15, 1821

TO GENERAL BRECKENRIDGE.

Monticello, February 15, 1821.

Dear Sir,

I learn with deep affliction, that nothing is likely to be done for our University this year.  So near as it is to the shore that one shove more would land it there, I had hoped that would be given; and that we should open with the next year an institution on which the fortunes of our country may depend more than may meet the general eye.  The reflections that the boys of this age are to be the men of the next; that they should be prepared to receive the holy charge which we are cherishing to deliver over to them; that in establishing an institution of wisdom for them, we secure it to all our future generations; that in fulfilling this duty, we bring home to our own bosoms the sweet consolation of seeing our sons rising under a luminous tuition, to destinies of high promise; these are considerations which will occur to all; but all, I fear, do not see the speck in our horizon which is to burst on us as a tornado, sooner or later.  The line of division lately marked out between different portions of our confederacy, is such as will never, I fear, be obliterated, and we are now trusting to those who are against us in position and principle, to fashion to their own form the minds and affections of our youth.  If, as has been estimated, we send three hundred thousand dollars a year to the northern seminaries, for the instruction of our own sons, then we must have there five hundred of our sons, imbibing opinions and principles in discord with those of their own country.  This canker is eating on the vitals of our existence, and if not arrested at once, will be beyond remedy.  We are now certainly furnishing recruits to their school.  If it be asked what are we to do, or said we cannot give the last lift to the University without stopping our primary schools, and these we think most important; I answer, I know their importance.  Nobody can doubt my zeal for the general instruction of the people.  Who first started that idea?  I may surely say, Myself.  Turn to the bill in the revised code, which I drew more than forty years ago, and before which the idea of a plan for the education of the people, generally, had never been suggested in this State.  There you will see developed the first rudiments of the whole system of general education we are now urging and acting on:  and it is well known to those With whom I have acted on this subject, that I never have proposed a sacrifice of the primary to the ultimate grade of instruction.  Let us keep our eye steadily on the whole system.  If we cannot do every thing at once, let us do one at a time.  The primary schools need no preliminary expense; the ultimate grade requires a considerable expenditure in advance.  A suspension of proceeding for a year or two on the primary schools, and an application