h--who will wrap themselves up in a pecuniary importance,
with an ostentatious display of their wealth, and an exclusiveness of
social intercourse, and are contented with this, and the general
contempt. Such men, and such social coteries, are few in this country.
Fortunately, wealth which is only used as a means of ostentatious
display is worthless to communities, and its possessor is contemptible.
"Wealth is power" is an adage, and is true where it is used to promote
the general good. Without it no people can be prosperous or
intelligent, and the prosperity and intelligence of every people is
greatest where there is most wealth, and where it is most generally
diffused. This is best effected by democratic institutions, where every
preferment is open to all, and where the division of estates follows
every death. No large and overshadowing estates, creating a moneyed
aristocracy, can accumulate, to control the legislation and the
people's destinies under such institutions. No privileged class can be
sustained under their operation; for such a class must always be
sustained by wealth hereditary and entailed, protected from the
obligations of debt, and prohibited from division or alienation.

Mr. Jefferson had studied the effects of governments upon their people
most thoroughly, and understood their operation upon the social
relations of society, and the character and minds of the people. He was
wont to say there was no hereditary transmission of mind; that this was
democratic, and a Caesar, a Solon, or a Demosthenes was as likely to
come from a cottage and penury as from a palace and wealth; that virtue
more frequently wore a smock-frock than a laced coat, and that the
institutions of every government should be so modelled as to afford
opportunity to these to become what nature designed they should
be--models of worth and usefulness to the country. Every one owes to
society obligations, and the means should be afforded to all to make
available these obligations for the public good. Nature never designed
that man should hedge about with law a favored few, until these should
establish a natural claim to such protection, by producing all the
intellect and virtue of the commonwealth. This was common property, and
wherever found, in all the gradations and ranges of society, should,
under the operations of law, be afforded the same opportunities as the
most favored by fortune. "In all things nature should be teacher and
guide."