Thomas Jefferson’s Rules for Living
Posted on Saturday, January 13th, 2007 at 9:53 am
Near the end of his life, Thomas Jefferson was asked by a father who had named his son after Jefferson (the boy’s name was Thomas Jefferson Smith) to write him a letter which he would read when he was older. In that letter Jefferson had some advice that has become almost commonplace today. Jefferson wrote over 20,000 letters, and yet this one to a person who could not yet read, and whom he had never met, he spends some time laying out what are ten rules for living. I thought that you might find them interesting. They are all very valuable, even if Jefferson himself did not keep them.
For more information on Jefferson, including a podcast in which he answers modern listener’s questions, check out http://www.th-jefferson.org
A Decalogue of Canons for observation in practical life, from a letter from Jefferson to Thomas Jefferson Smith, 2/21/1825
1. Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today.
2. Never trouble another for what you can do yourself.
3. Never spend your money before you have it. (Jefferson had a problem personally following this one)
4. Never buy what you do not want, because it is cheap; it will be dear [i.e. expensive] to you.
5. Pride costs us more than hunger, thirst, and cold.
6. We never repent of having eaten too little.
7. Nothing is troublesome that we do willingly.
8. How much pain have cost us the evils which never have happened.
9. Take things always by their smooth handle.
10. When angry, count ten, before you speak; if very angry, an hundred.
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