Perth Amboy evening news., 1920-03-25
Five Minutes A Day
With Our Presidents
By JAMES MORGAN.
The Sage of Monticello
By JAMES MORGAN

remained the leader of his party attei
leaving the White House. Indeed, the
Democrats never have ceased to swear
allegiance to his spirit.
only after the bitterest struggle IN
American politics, he was reelected
virtually without opposition, and for
a quarter of q century the deStinies
! of the country were intrusted to his
guidance. President for eight years
he was the mentor OF presidents
through sixteen years more of The JeH-
ersonian era. Both Madison and Mon
, roe lived within a days ride of his
home. He shaped their studies in their
youth and they were to him like
younger brothers or adopted sons.
More influential than any other OF
the ex-Presidents, this many-S1ded
man was more fortunate than most OF
them in the variety of the interests
and diversions that crowded his seven
teen years Of retirement from public
office. He vas surgeon enough to
sew up q wound, tie an artery or set
the broken leg of a slave, and enough
Of a mathematician to calculate an
eclipse. He invented q l"etter-copying
press, q revolving chair and a folding
! chair, q hemp machine, a pedometer
to his walks, a plow that
won a gold medal at q French exhibl-
ftion, and a light, two-wheeled vehicle
| for Virginia's heavy roads.
He knew not only Greek and Latin,
| but also French, Italian, Spanish and
German. He wrote three books and
| compiled a Bible of his own, leaving
out of the Scriptures everything except
| the precepts of divine love, mercy and
goodness.
His correspondence would daunt q
man with a staff of stenographers ano
typists today. Generally he had to
ork from sunrise until past noon an
| swering by hand the flood of letters
that never ceased to flow In upon him.
In the finer arts, he vas a musician,
an architect and a landscape gardener.
ALTHOUGH he sprained his wrist in Paris
so badly that he could not again play
his favorite instrument, the violin. ne
could still sing well, n was forever
humming tunes as he rode horseback,
| which was his only sport.
He not molly designed his house and
| laid out the grounds of Monticello. He
| was also the architect of the Univer-
| sity of Virginia. and twentieth cen
fury architects agree that he produced
a most beautiful college group.
| Domestic sorrows n poverty form
the shadows in the picture of his old
| age. Jefferson's wife n all II one
| of his five children were taken from
him and after nearly forty years spent
in the service of the public, at sixty
| six he retired from the Presidency
| twenty thousand dollars in debt. For
fear that some partisan foe might even
Jail him as he left the White House,
he borrowed the money to a what
he owed the Washington storekeepers.
Since he was thirty, he had neither
practiced law nor been free to look
| after his farm, and in his long abb
i~1 nAN ~ n
| neglected estate. Although q mos
systematic person, an efficiency expert
| by nature he could not make his
lslende1 official salaries and his personal
| expenses meet at the end of the year.
His OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES In
come as President fell eight thousand
dollars short of the outgo in one year
lat the White House
To keep the roof owe his head and a
home for his always large family OF
grandchildren, grand nieces and grand
nephews, he sold his cherished library
to ongre Soon he was plunged
deeper into debt by the failure of a
friend whose notes he had Endorsed,
Happily the hearts and purses of the
people were touched by the spectacle
of the author of the Declaration OF
Independence in want and in peril OF
losing Monticello. Only a few months
| Oh NE TGlldlittu " It'll, buL iSoV WIZ
cheered and freed from anxiety by an
outburst of public sympathy and graft
tude.
As he lay dying al hour before mid
night of July 3, 1926, he whispered.
rs this the Fourth?" To quiet him,
the friend sitting by his bed nodded,
and the sick man fell asleep with a
smile on his face. Though he did not
open his weary eyes upon the flftietf
birthday of the Nation, his heart still
beat when the sunrise gun saluted its
fdawning and again when the noontime
bells rang out. In a few minutes more
it stopped.
His dust is mingled with the earth
that was dearest to him. close by his
house at Monticello. His burial place
was chosen by him in his boyhood
when he planned n dreamed in tn,
shade of a grand old oak. There on 9
Isimple shaft the achievements of his
manhood are set forth in his owl
words.
In this self-made tribute he does no
record that he was Governor, envoy
Vice-President and President of tn
United States; they We're only office!
he CHANGED to hold. That he added
an empire to the United States by this
Louisiana Purchase, he ignores as /:
mere real estate bargain which h,
happened upon. The three things il
his life that Jefferson deemed worth,
of remembrance were that he wrot'
the Declaration, was the author o
religious freedom in Virginia and tn
founder of the University of Virginia
Tomorrow: James INT Dolly Madison
Copyright. 1920. by James Morgan
published by special arrangement will
The Mcclure Newspaper Syndicate.