n but by no means
to be confused with the Republican party which will concern us later) was
far different, for the Democratic party, represented by the President of
the United States at this moment, claims to descend from it in unbroken
apostolic succession. But we need not pause to trace the connecting
thread between them, real as it is, for parties are not to be regarded as
individuals. Indeed the personality of Thomas Jefferson, Secretary of
State in Washington's Cabinet, impressed itself, during his life and long
after, upon all America more than that of any other man. Democrats
to-day have described Lincoln, who by no means belonged to their party,
as Jefferson's spiritual heir; and Lincoln would have welcomed the
description.

No biographer has achieved an understanding presentment of Jefferson's
curious character, which as presented by unfriendly critics is an
unpleasing combination of contrasting elements. A tall and active
fellow, a good horseman and a good shot, living through seven years of
civil war, which he had himself heralded in, without the inclination to
strike a blow; a scholar, musician, and mathematician, without delicacy,
elevation, or precision of thought or language; a man of intense
ambition, without either administrative capacity or the courage to assert
himself in counsel or in debate; a dealer in philanthropic sentiment,
privately malignant and vindictive. This is not as a whole a credible
portrait; it cannot stand for the man as his friends knew him; but there
is evidence for each feature of it, and it remains impossible for a
foreigner to think of Jefferson and not compare him to his disadvantage
with the antagonist whom he eclipsed. By pertinacious industry, however,
working chiefly through private correspondence, he constructed a great
party, dominated a nation, and dominated it mainly for good. For the
rapid and complete triumph of Jefferson's party over its opponents
signifies a very definite and lasting conversion of the main stream of
American public opinion to what may be called the sane element in the
principles of the French Revolution. At the time when he set himself to
counterwork Hamilton, American statesmanship was likely to be directed
only to making Government strong and to ensuring the stability of the
business world; for reaction against the bloody absurdities that had
happened in France was strong in America, and in English thought, which
still had influence in Ame