But I am going beyond my text, and sinning against the adage of carrying coals to Newcastle.  In hazarding to you my crude and uninformed notions of things beyond my cognizance, only be so good as to remember that it is at your request, and with as little confidence on my part as profit on yours.  You will do what is right, leaving the people of Europe to act their follies and crimes among themselves, while we pursue in good faith the paths of peace and prosperity.  To your judgment we are willingly resigned, with sincere assurances of affectionate esteem and respect.

Th:  Jefferson.

LETTER CLXXII.—­TO JUDGE JOHNSON, June 12, 1823

TO JUDGE JOHNSON.

Monticello, June 12, 1823.

Dear Sir,

Our correspondence is of that accommodating character, which admits of suspension at the convenience of either party, without inconvenience to the other.  Hence this tardy acknowledgment of your favor of April the 11th.  I learn from that with great pleasure, that you have resolved on continuing your history of parties.  Our opponents are far ahead of us in preparations for placing their cause favorably before posterity.  Yet I hope even from some of them the escape of precious truths, in angry explosions or effusions of vanity, which will betray the genuine monarchism of their principles.  They do not themselves believe what they endeavor to inculcate, that we were an opposition party, not on principle, but merely seeking for office.  The fact is, that at the formation of our government, many had formed their political opinions on European writings and practices, believing the experience of old countries, and especially of England, abusive as it was, to be a safer guide than mere theory.  The doctrines of Europe were, that men in numerous associations cannot be restrained within the limits of order and justice, but by forces physical and moral, wielded over them by authorities independent of their will.  Hence their organization of kings, hereditary nobles, and priests.  Still further to constrain the brute force of the people, they deem it necessary to keep them down by hard labor, poverty, and ignorance, and to take from them, as from bees, so much of their earnings, as that unremitting labor shall be necessary to obtain a sufficient surplus barely to sustain a scanty and miserable life.  And these earnings they apply to maintain their privileged orders in splendor and idleness, to fascinate the eyes of the people, and excite in them an humble adoration and submission, as to an order of superior beings.  Although few among us had gone all these lengths of opinion, yet many had advanced, some more, some less, on the way.  And in the convention which formed our government, they endeavored to draw the cords of power as tight as they could obtain them, to lessen the dependence of the general functionaries on their constituents, to subject to them those of the States,