To Martha Jefferson Randolph.
Philadelphia, June 8th, 1797.
I receive with inexpressible pleasure the information your letter contained. After your happy establishment, which has given me an inestimable friend, to whom I can leave the care of every thing I love, the only anxiety I had remaining was to see Maria also so associated as to insure her happiness. She could not have been more so to my wishes if I had had the whole earth free to have chosen a partner for her.
I now see our fireside formed into a group, no one member of which has a fibre in their composition which can ever produce any jarring or jealousies among us. No irregular passions, no dangerous bias, which may render problematical the future fortunes and happiness of our descendants. We are quieted as to their condition for at least one generation more.
In order to keep us all together, instead of a present position in Bedford, as in your case, I think to open and resettle the plantation of Pantops for them. When I look to the ineffable pleasure of my family society, I become more and more disgusted with the jealousies, the hatred, and the rancorous and malignant passions of this scene, and lament my having ever again been drawn into public view. Tranquillity is now my object. I have seen enough of political honors to know that they are but splendid torments; and however one might be disposed to render services on which any of their fellow-citizens should set a value, yet, when as many would depreciate them as a public calamity, one may well entertain a modest doubt of their real importance, and feel the impulse of duty to be very weak. The real difficulty is, that being once delivered into the hands of others whose feelings are friendly to the individual and warm to the public cause, how to withdraw from them without leaving a dissatisfaction in their mind, and an impression of pusillanimity with the public.
Maria Jefferson was married on the 13th of October, 1797, to John Wayles Eppes, who was in every respect worthy of the high opinion which we have found Jefferson expressing for him in the preceding letters. His manners were frank and engaging, while his high talents and fine education placed him among the first men of the country. The young couple spent the early days of their married life at Eppington, where the little "Polly," so beautiful and so timid, had received such motherly care and affection from her good Aunt Eppes when heart-broken at the death of her own mother.
I continue Mr. Jefferson's family letters.
To Mary Jefferson Eppes.
Philadelphia, January 7th, '98.
I acknowledged, my dear Maria, the receipt of yours in a letter I wrote to Mr. Eppes. It gave me the welcome news that your sprain was well. But you are not to suppose it entirely so. The joint will remain weak for a considerable time, and give you occasional pains much longer. The state of things at —— is truly distressing. Mr. ——'s habitual intoxication will destroy himself, his fortune, and family. Of all calamities this is the greatest. I wish my sister could bear his misconduct with more patience. It would lessen his attachment to the bottle, and at any rate would make her own time more tolerable. When we see ourselves in a situation which must be endured and gone through, it is best to make up our minds to it, meet it with firmness, and accommodate every thing to it in the best way practicable. This lessens the evil, while fretting and fuming only serves to increase our own torments. The errors and misfortunes of others should be a school for our own instruction. Harmony in the married state is the very first object to be aimed at. Nothing can preserve affections uninterrupted but a firm resolution never to differ in will, and a determination in each to consider the love of the other as of more value than any object whatever on which a wish had been fixed. How light, in fact, is the sacrifice of any other wish when weighed against the affections of one with whom we are to pass our whole life! And though opposition in a single instance will hardly of itself produce alienation, yet every one has their pouch into which all these little oppositions are put; while that is filling the alienation is insensibly going on, and when filled it is complete. It would puzzle either to say why; because no one difference of opinion has been marked enough to produce a serious effect by itself. But he finds his affections wearied out by a constant stream of little checks and obstacles. Other sources of discontent, very common indeed, are the little cross-purposes of husband and wife, in common conversation, a disposition in either to criticise and question whatever the other says, a desire always to demonstrate and make him feel himself in the wrong, and especially in company. Nothing is so goading. Much better, therefore, if our companion views a thing in a light different from what we do, to leave him in quiet possession of his view. What is the use of rectifying him if the thing be unimportant; and if important, let it pass for the present, and wait a softer moment and more conciliatory occasion of revising the subject together. It is wonderful how many persons are rendered unhappy by inattention to these little rules of prudence.
I have been insensibly led, by the particular case you mention, to sermonize you on the subject generally; however, if it be the means of saving you from a single heartache, it will have contributed a great deal to my happiness; but before I finish the sermon, I must add a word on economy. The unprofitable condition of Virginia estates in general leaves it now next to impossible for the holder of one to avoid ruin. And this condition will continue until some change takes place in the mode of working them. In the mean time, nothing can save us and our children from beggary but a determination to get a year beforehand, and restrain ourselves vigorously this year to the clear profits of the last. If a debt is once contracted by a farmer, it is never paid but by a sale.
The article of dress is perhaps that in which economy is the least to be recommended. It is so important to each to continue to please the other, that the happiness of both requires the most pointed attention to whatever may contribute to it—and the more as time makes greater inroads on our person. Yet, generally, we become slovenly in proportion as personal decay requires the contrary. I have great comfort in believing that your understanding and dispositions will engage your attention to these considerations; and that you are connected with a person and family, who of all within the circle of my acquaintance are most in the dispositions which will make you happy. Cultivate their affections, my dear, with assiduity. Think every sacrifice a gain which shall tend to attach them to you. My only object in life is to see yourself and your sister, and those deservedly dear to you, not only happy, but in no danger of becoming unhappy.
I have lately received a letter from your friend Kitty Church. I inclose it to you, and think the affectionate expressions relative to yourself, and the advance she has made, will require a letter from you to her. It will be impossible to get a crystal here to fit your watch without the watch itself. If you should know of any one coming to Philadelphia, send it to me, and I will get you a stock of crystals. The river being frozen up, I shall not be able to send you things till it opens, which will probably be some time in February. I inclose to Mr. Eppes some pamphlets. Present me affectionately to all the family, and be assured of my tenderest love to yourself. Adieu.
TH. JEFFERSON.
To Martha Jefferson Randolph.
Philadelphia, Feb. 8th, '98.
I ought oftener, my dear Martha, to receive your letters, for the very great pleasure they give me, and especially when they express your affections for me; for, though I can not doubt them, yet they are among those truths which, though not doubted, we love to hear repeated. Here, too, they serve, like gleams of light, to cheer a dreary scene; where envy, hatred, malice, revenge, and all the worst passions of men, are marshalled to make one another as miserable as possible. I turn from this with pleasure, to contrast it with your fireside, where the single evening I passed at it was worth more than ages here. Indeed, I find myself detaching very fast, perhaps too fast, from every thing but yourself, your sister, and those who are identified with you. These form the last hold the world will have on me, the cords which will be cut only when I am loosened from this state of being. I am looking forward to the spring with all the fondness of desire to meet you all once more, and with the change of season to enjoy also a change of scene and society. Yet the time of our leaving this is not yet talked of.
I am much concerned to hear of the state of health of Mr. Randolph and family, mentioned in your letters of Jan. 22d and 28th. Surely, my dear, it would be better for you to remove to Monticello. The south pavilion, the parlor, and study will accommodate your family; and I should think Mr. Randolph would find less inconvenience in the riding it would occasion him than in the loss of his own and his family's health. Let me beseech you, then, to go there, and to use every thing and every body as if I were there....
All your commissions shall be executed, not forgetting the Game of the Goose, if we can find out what it is, for there is some difficulty in that. Kiss all the little ones for me. Present me affectionately to Mr. Randolph, and my warmest love to yourself. Adieu.
TH. JEFFERSON.
To Martha Jefferson Randolph.—[Extract.]