CHAPTER II
MONTICELLO AND ITS LIBRARY
"And our own dear Monticello: where has nature spread so rich a mantle under the eye? Mountains, forests, rocks, rivers. With what majesty do we there ride above the storms! How sublime to look down into the workhouse of nature, to see her clouds, hail, snow, rain, thunder, all fabricated at our feet! And the glorious sun when rising, as if out of a distant water, just gilding the tops of the mountains, and giving life to all nature." To Mrs. Cosway, 1786
"All my wishes end, where I hope my days will end, at Monticello. Too many scenes of happiness mingle themselves with all the recollections of my native woods and fickds, to suffer them to be supplanted in my affection by any other." To George Gilmer, 1787
It is fashionable nowadays to affix tablets to houses where famous men are known, or supposed, to have lived, and even to convert them into shrines where their memories may be cherished and relics of their deeds preserved. The instinct is natural and laudable. We are grateful for the patriotism which has saved the house of Shakespeare, of Sir Walter Scott, of George Washington. If a hero deserves to be worshipped, his home deserves to be maintained. And there are some houses so interwoven with a noble life, so beautiful in themselves, so laden with history, that it were a national crime to let them perish in decay. America has just become aware that Monticello is one of her national treasures. Mount Vernon does not tell us more of Washington than Monticello of Jefferson.
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