Byron In Exile
Frederick Fucking Chopin
- Joined
- May 3, 2002
- Posts
- 66,591
(to this thread, presently)
TO JOHN NORVELL.
Washington, June 11, 1807.
Sir,
Your letter of May the 9th has been duly received. The subjects it
proposes would require time and space for even moderate developement.
My occupations limit me to a very short notice of them. I think there
does not exist a good elementary work on the organization of society
into civil government: I mean a work which presents in one full
and comprehensive view the system of principles on which such an
organization should be founded, according to the rights of nature. For
want of a single work of that character, I should recommend Locke
on Government, Sidney, Priestley's Essay on the First Principles of
Government, Chipman's Principles of Government, and the Federalist.
Adding, perhaps, Beccaria on Crimes and Punishments, because of the
demonstrative manner in which he has treated that branch of the subject.
If your views of political inquiry go further, to the subjects of money
and commerce, Smith's Wealth of Nations is the best book to be read,
unless Say's Political Economy can be had, which treats the same
subjects on the same principles, but in a shorter compass, and more
lucid manner. But I believe this work has not been translated into our
language.
History, in general, only informs us what bad government is. But as we
have employed some of the best materials of the British constitution in
the construction of our own government, a knowledge of British history
becomes useful to the American politician. There is, however, no general
history of that country which can be recommended. The elegant one of
Hume seems intended to disguise and discredit the good principles of the
government, and is so plausible and pleasing in its style and manner,
as to instil its errors and heresies insensibly into the minds of unwary
readers. Baxter has performed a good operation on it. He has taken the
text of Hume as his ground-work, abridging it by the omission of some
details of little interest, and wherever he has found him endeavoring to
mislead, by either the suppression of a truth, or by giving it a false
coloring, he has changed the text to what it should be, so that we
may properly call it Hume's history republicanized. He has, moreover,
continued the history (but indifferently) from where Hume left it,
to the year 1800. The work is not popular in England, because it is
republican; and but a few copies have ever reached America. It is a
single quarto volume. Adding to this Ludlow's Memoirs, Mrs. Macaulay's
and Belknap's histories, a sufficient view will be presented of the free
principles of the English constitution.
To your request of my opinion of the manner in which a newspaper should
be conducted, so as to be most useful, I should answer, 'by restraining
it to true, facts and sound principles only.' Yet I fear such a paper
would find few subscribers. It is a melancholy truth, that a suppression
of the press could not more completely deprive the nation of its
benefits, than is done by its abandoned prostitution to falsehood.
Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself
becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. The real
extent of this state of misinformation is known only to those who are in
situations to confront facts within their knowledge with the lies of
the day. I really look with commiseration over the great body of my
fellow-citizens, who, reading newspapers, live and die in the belief,
that they have known something of what has been passing in the world in
their time; whereas the accounts they have read in newspapers are just
as true a history of any other period of the world as of the present,
except that the real names of the day are affixed to their fables.
General facts may indeed be collected from them, such as that Europe is
now at war, that Bonaparte has been a successful warrior, that he has
subjected a great portion of Europe to his will, &c. &c.; but no details
can be relied on. I will add, that the man who never looks into a
newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he
who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with
falsehoods and errors. He who reads nothing will still learn the great
facts, and the details are all false.
Perhaps an editor might begin a reformation in some such way as this.
Divide his paper into four chapters, heading the 1st, Truths. 2nd,
Probabilities. 3rd, Possibilities. 4th, Lies. The 1st chapter would be
very short, as it would contain little more than authentic papers, and
information from such sources, as the editor would be willing to risk
his own reputation for their truth. The 2nd would contain what, from a
mature consideration of all circumstances, his judgment should conclude
to be probably true. This, however, should rather contain too little
than too much. The 3rd and 4th should be professedly for those readers
who would rather have lies for their money than the blank paper they
would occupy.
Such an editor too, would have to set his face against the demoralizing
practice of feeding the public mind habitually on slander, and the
depravity of taste which this nauseous aliment induces. Defamation
is becoming a necessary of life; insomuch, that a dish of tea in the
morning or evening cannot be digested without this stimulant. Even those
who do not believe these abominations, still read them with complaisance
to their auditors, and instead of the abhorrence and indignation which
should fill a virtuous mind, betray a secret pleasure in the possibility
that some may believe them, though they do not themselves. It seems to
escape them, that it is not he who prints, but he who pays for printing
a slander, who is its real author.
These thoughts on the subjects of your letter are hazarded at your
request. Repeated instances of the publication of what has not been
intended for the public eye, and the malignity with which political
enemies torture every sentence from me into meanings imagined by their
own wickedness only, justify my expressing a solicitude, that this hasty
communication may in nowise be permitted to find its way into the public
papers. Not fearing these political bull-dogs, I yet avoided putting
myself in the way of being baited by them, and do not wish to volunteer
away that portion of tranquillity, which a firm execution of my duties
will permit me to enjoy.
I tender you my salutations, and best wishes for your success.
Th: Jefferson.
TO JOHN NORVELL.
Washington, June 11, 1807.
Sir,
Your letter of May the 9th has been duly received. The subjects it
proposes would require time and space for even moderate developement.
My occupations limit me to a very short notice of them. I think there
does not exist a good elementary work on the organization of society
into civil government: I mean a work which presents in one full
and comprehensive view the system of principles on which such an
organization should be founded, according to the rights of nature. For
want of a single work of that character, I should recommend Locke
on Government, Sidney, Priestley's Essay on the First Principles of
Government, Chipman's Principles of Government, and the Federalist.
Adding, perhaps, Beccaria on Crimes and Punishments, because of the
demonstrative manner in which he has treated that branch of the subject.
If your views of political inquiry go further, to the subjects of money
and commerce, Smith's Wealth of Nations is the best book to be read,
unless Say's Political Economy can be had, which treats the same
subjects on the same principles, but in a shorter compass, and more
lucid manner. But I believe this work has not been translated into our
language.
History, in general, only informs us what bad government is. But as we
have employed some of the best materials of the British constitution in
the construction of our own government, a knowledge of British history
becomes useful to the American politician. There is, however, no general
history of that country which can be recommended. The elegant one of
Hume seems intended to disguise and discredit the good principles of the
government, and is so plausible and pleasing in its style and manner,
as to instil its errors and heresies insensibly into the minds of unwary
readers. Baxter has performed a good operation on it. He has taken the
text of Hume as his ground-work, abridging it by the omission of some
details of little interest, and wherever he has found him endeavoring to
mislead, by either the suppression of a truth, or by giving it a false
coloring, he has changed the text to what it should be, so that we
may properly call it Hume's history republicanized. He has, moreover,
continued the history (but indifferently) from where Hume left it,
to the year 1800. The work is not popular in England, because it is
republican; and but a few copies have ever reached America. It is a
single quarto volume. Adding to this Ludlow's Memoirs, Mrs. Macaulay's
and Belknap's histories, a sufficient view will be presented of the free
principles of the English constitution.
To your request of my opinion of the manner in which a newspaper should
be conducted, so as to be most useful, I should answer, 'by restraining
it to true, facts and sound principles only.' Yet I fear such a paper
would find few subscribers. It is a melancholy truth, that a suppression
of the press could not more completely deprive the nation of its
benefits, than is done by its abandoned prostitution to falsehood.
Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself
becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. The real
extent of this state of misinformation is known only to those who are in
situations to confront facts within their knowledge with the lies of
the day. I really look with commiseration over the great body of my
fellow-citizens, who, reading newspapers, live and die in the belief,
that they have known something of what has been passing in the world in
their time; whereas the accounts they have read in newspapers are just
as true a history of any other period of the world as of the present,
except that the real names of the day are affixed to their fables.
General facts may indeed be collected from them, such as that Europe is
now at war, that Bonaparte has been a successful warrior, that he has
subjected a great portion of Europe to his will, &c. &c.; but no details
can be relied on. I will add, that the man who never looks into a
newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he
who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with
falsehoods and errors. He who reads nothing will still learn the great
facts, and the details are all false.
Perhaps an editor might begin a reformation in some such way as this.
Divide his paper into four chapters, heading the 1st, Truths. 2nd,
Probabilities. 3rd, Possibilities. 4th, Lies. The 1st chapter would be
very short, as it would contain little more than authentic papers, and
information from such sources, as the editor would be willing to risk
his own reputation for their truth. The 2nd would contain what, from a
mature consideration of all circumstances, his judgment should conclude
to be probably true. This, however, should rather contain too little
than too much. The 3rd and 4th should be professedly for those readers
who would rather have lies for their money than the blank paper they
would occupy.
Such an editor too, would have to set his face against the demoralizing
practice of feeding the public mind habitually on slander, and the
depravity of taste which this nauseous aliment induces. Defamation
is becoming a necessary of life; insomuch, that a dish of tea in the
morning or evening cannot be digested without this stimulant. Even those
who do not believe these abominations, still read them with complaisance
to their auditors, and instead of the abhorrence and indignation which
should fill a virtuous mind, betray a secret pleasure in the possibility
that some may believe them, though they do not themselves. It seems to
escape them, that it is not he who prints, but he who pays for printing
a slander, who is its real author.
These thoughts on the subjects of your letter are hazarded at your
request. Repeated instances of the publication of what has not been
intended for the public eye, and the malignity with which political
enemies torture every sentence from me into meanings imagined by their
own wickedness only, justify my expressing a solicitude, that this hasty
communication may in nowise be permitted to find its way into the public
papers. Not fearing these political bull-dogs, I yet avoided putting
myself in the way of being baited by them, and do not wish to volunteer
away that portion of tranquillity, which a firm execution of my duties
will permit me to enjoy.
I tender you my salutations, and best wishes for your success.
Th: Jefferson.
