Scott Fitzgerald and daughter Scottie Jack London and daughter Joan Thomas Edison (center) and Thomas Edison, Jr. (far right) Brace-Up THOMAS JEFFERSON TO MARTHA “PATSY” JEFFERSON “Of all the cankers of human happiness, none corrodes it with so silent, yet so baneful a tooth, as indolence.” Indolence, a dissatisfaction resulting from a lack of interest, and ennui, a disinclination to work, were intolerable to Thomas Jefferson. He was fascinated by almost all that was around him—history, philosophy, the law, design, architecture, agriculture, painting, sculpture, music, horses, fossils, antiquities. And his interest was not passive. As an architect he designed Monticello, the Virginia state capitol, and the original campus of the University of Virginia. He performed horticultural experiments. He played the violin. And he wrote—political pamphlets, the Declaration of Independence, a book about Virginia, and it is estimated nearly fifty thousand letters. Neither indolence nor ennui were manifest in Thomas Jefferson.
