Jefferson's Education

          To understand how Jefferson impacted the history of the United States of America in his later years, it is necessary to first understand how his education and life during his formative years enabled him to do this.

  

          Thomas Jefferson was born to Peter Jefferson and Jane Randolph in 1743. Raised on a wealthy Virginian plantation, Jefferson “grew up as the eldest son of a prosperous, cultured, and sophisticated family.” Through his father’s respectable library in his study, the curious young Thomas Jefferson had access to a respectable collection of works written by Shakespeare, and others such as Paul de Rapin-Throyas’ History of England. Meacham includes about Jefferson,“ ‘When young, I was passionately fond of reading books of history and travels,’ Thomas Jefferson wrote” and “[books] offered the young Jefferson literary passage to larger worlds.” In his childhood, Jefferson received a holistic education from his tutors in subjects that included the classics, French, literature, history, philosophy, and the art of the violin. Meacham writes,      “Jefferson valued his education… remarking that… he would take the classical training his father arranged for him over the estate his father left him.” Furthermore, “Jefferson was always asking questions … learned all he could… [and] would soon be known as a ‘walking encyclopedia.’ ”

          When Jefferson was fourteen years old, his father passed away, and he was “propelled into the role…of man of the house.” Influenced by his father, Thomas Jefferson learned at an early age to become “an unflinching, resilient aristocrat,” an art of power that he brought with him to his career in politics in his later years.

          

          At the age of seventeen Jefferson enrolled in the College of William and Mary to continue his education. Located in Williamsburg, Virginia, then the colony capital and heart of politics in Virginia, “William and Mary [for Jefferson] was largely about what university life is supposed to be about: reading books, enjoying the company of the like-minded, and savoring teachers who seem to be ambassadors from other, richer, brighter worlds.” According to Meacham, “it was said that Jefferson studied fifteen hours a day, rising at dawn and reading until two o’clock each morning.” Over the course of his college education, Jefferson became influenced by the works of a number of great individuals including Sir Francis Bacon, Sir Isaac Newton, and John Locke, believing them the “greatest men the world had ever produced” . Jefferson appreciated the scientific ideas and principles of Bacon and Newton as well as Locke’s theories on individual liberty and government, which greatly shaped his political ideology.

          With this thorough education that Jefferson received during his childhood and college years, he developed an outlook on society, based on the views of Locke, which held the liberty of the people as its highest regard. He also took to his endeavors an experimenting approach similar to that of Newton, with which he conducted politics in his later years. During this time, Jefferson also developed unparalleled strength in the art of the written word, which he would become most famous for. He also, at a young age, developed a love for the arts and architecture and learned to be a leader at a young age. Jefferson, only with these skills that he received in the early years of his life, was he able impact society in the way he did in the future.