remedies are unprovided; absolute acquiescence in the decisions of the
majority, the vital principle of republics, from which is no appeal
but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism; a
well-disciplined militia, our best reliance in peace and for the first
moments of war, till regulars may relieve them; the supremacy of the
civil over the military authority--economy in the public expenditure,
that labor may be lightly burdened; the honest payment of our debts, and
sacred preservation of the public faith; encouragement of agriculture,
and of commerce as its handmaiden; the diffusion of information and
arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public reason; freedom
of religion, freedom of the press, and freedom of person, under the
protection of the Habeas Corpus; and trial by juries impartially
selected. These principles form the bright constellation which has
gone before us, and guided our steps through an age of revolution and
reformation. The wisdom of our sages and the blood of our heroes have
been devoted to their attainment; they should be the creed of our
political faith; the text of civic instruction; the touchstone by which
to try the services of those we trust; and should we wander from them
in moments of error or of alarm, let us hasten to retrace our steps and
regain the road which alone leads to peace, liberty, and safety."

Jefferson had completed his sixty-sixth year when he relinquished the
presidency to his friend and pupil, James Madison, and retired to his
loved Virginia home. There he lived on for seventeen years, enjoying
the esteem and respect of the nation, and taking active interest in
his favorite schemes on behalf of education in his native state and his
helpful work in founding the college which was afterwards expanded into
the University of Virginia. His interest in national affairs, up to the
last, remained keen and fervid, as the vast collection of his published
correspondence show, as well as his many visiting contemporaries attest.