The Correspondence of Thomas Jefferson
By Subject
EDUCATION / STATE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA
We wish to establish in the upper country, and more centrally for the
State, an University on a plan so broad and liberal and
modern, as to be worth patronizing with the public support,
and be a temptation to the youth of other States to come and drink of
the cup of knowledge and fraternize with us. The first step is to
obtain a good plan; that is, a judicious selection of the sciences,
and a practicable grouping of some of them together, and ramifying of
others, so as to adopt the professorships to our uses and our means.
In an institution meant chiefly for use, some branches of science,
formerly esteemed, may be now omitted; so may others now valued in
Europe, but useless to us for ages to come. As an example of the
former, the Oriental learning, and of the latter, almost the whole of
the institution pro-posed to Congress by the Secretary of War's report
of the 5th instant.
I will venture even to sketch the sciences which seem useful and
practicable for us, as they occur to me while holding my pen. Botany,
chemistry, zoology, anatomy, surgery, medicine, natural philosophy,
agriculture, mathematics, astronomy, geography, politics, commerce,
history, ethics, law, arts, fine arts. This list is imperfect because
I make it hastily, and because I am unequal to the subject. It is
evident that some of these articles are too much for one professor and
must therefore be ramified; others may be ascribed in groups to a
single professor. This is the difficult part of the work, and requires
a head perfectly knowing the extent of each branch, and the limits
within which it may be circumscribed, so as to bring the whole within
the powers of the fewest professors possible, and consequently within
the degree of expense practicable for us. We should propose that the
professors follow no other calling, so that their whole time may be
given to their academical functions; and we should propose to draw
from Europe the first characters in science, by considerable
temptations, which would not need to be repeated after the first set
should have prepared fit successors and given reputation to the
institution. From some splendid characters I have received offers most
perfectly reasonable and practicable.
I do not propose to give you all this trouble merely of my own head,
that would be arrogance. It has been the subject of consultation among
the ablest and highest characters of our State, who only wait for a
plan to make a joint and I hope a successful effort to get the thing
carried into effect.
to Joseph Priestley, 18 January 1800
|