Virginia Review of Asian Studies
THOMAS JEFFERSON’S INCORPORATING POSITIVE ELEMENTS FROM CHINESE CIVILIZATION
DAVE WANG
ST. JOHN’S UNIVERSITY
On April 27, 1785, Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), then the United States ambassador to France, received a letter from James Madison (1751-1836), in which Madison requested he buy in Paris the recently published book on China.[1] This was more than an ordinary correspondence between the two great founders of the United States: indeed, it is of great significance to our study of the cultural relations between China and the United States. It reflects the fact that in Madison’s mind, Jefferson was an expert on China who was qualified to be trusted to make acquisition of books on China. This was not the first time that somebody called upon Jefferson’s expertise in the subject. Earlier in 1771, Robert Skipwith, Jefferson’s brother-in-law, requested Jefferson to recommend him "a list of the best books on general subjects available in America.”[2] Jefferson recommended two Chinese classical books. [3] This recommendation indicates two things: Jefferson was very well-versed in Chinese literature and believed the Chinese classic works belonged to the “category of practical aids to virtue and were comparable to the great Western classics.”[4] Actually, during the formative age of the United States, Jefferson wanted to incorporate positive elements from Chinese civilization to help him create a new culture in North America. With this essay, I will examine his efforts that impacted the formation of American culture.
Chinese Culture in Colonial North America
Europe was the main resource for the colonists to learn about China before the "China Fever", generated by the famous voyage of the Empress of China, the first American commercial ship that reached China in 1784. There was no direct contact between China and North America before then. All Chinese products were brought to North America through Europe. For the same token, Americans’ knowledge about China was also derived largely from European literary sources. Ever since the 17th century, the reports of European missionaries in China had been “so filled with admiration that European intellectuals were seized with a mania for things Chinese."[5] Chinese philosophical “impact on Western philosophy was of far greater and more lasting significance.[6] The admiration of Chinese culture had become the characteristic of the Age of Enlightenment in Europe.[7] Some prominent European thinkers turned to Confucian philosophy for theory to support their arguments in their debates on moral, political or religious issues. European "admiration for things Chinese reached its climax in Valtair's Essai Sur les Maurs (1756), which presented Confucius (551-479 BC) as “an anticipation of the philosophies of the eighteenth century"[8]
Some eminent colonists had realized the value of Chinese culture to the social and economic development of the colonies in North America. Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) regarded China as a source of inspiration and innovation.[9] He was very "fond of reading about China" and showed his desire to “go to China."[10] Discussion on China appeared in such favorite English periodicals as the Monthly Review and the Gentleman's Magazine.[11] In August 1775, just before the eve of the Independence, Thomas Paine (1737-1809), author of Common Sense, showed his great “interests in China."[12] He published some essays on China in the Pennsylvania Magazine.[13]
Similar to Europe, Confucius and his works were discussed in North America. As early as 1733, James Logan[14] (1674-1751) acquired a copy of “the first European printing of Confucius philosophy.[15] Some influential writers in the period, including George Anson (1697-1762), William Dampier (1651-1715), Daniel Defoe (1661-1731) and Oliver Goldsmith (1730-1774) joined the efforts to introduce China to the colonists in their works.[16]
Before American independence, Chinese products enriched colonial “American life in many, many ways."[17] Chinese products became increasingly popular and “spread among less affluent sectors of American society."[18] During the mid-eighteenth century, some colonists bought a huge amount of "Chinese Chippendale" furniture, Chinese wallpaper, silk and porcelain wares. Chinese tea had become most popular drink for the majority of colonists.[19] For some colonists, China was a source of silk.[20]
Facing the task of building a new society in North America, the colonists paid particular attention to what they could benefit from, such as Chinese agricultural and technological innovations. Benjamin Franklin, who served as the North American representative to France, sent Chinese soybean seeds back to the colony.[21] Charles Thomas (1729-1826), Secretary of the Continental Congress and later of the U.S. Congress, emphasized the Chinese industry, such as advancing the arts of living, and improving in husbandry and native plants.[22] The American Philosophical Society, founded in 1768, told the American people if they could “introduce the industry of the Chinese, their arts of living and improvements in husbandry, American might become in time as populous as China..."[23]
Certain Chinese economic theory and legal system also reached and impressed the colonists. As early as 1774, Benjamin Franklin showed his interest in a Chinese emperor's economic principle. Still some colonists showed great interest in the Chinese legal system. A writer told his readers that China's laws were "maintained with such strict impartiality, that the guilty seldom escape punishment or the injured fail to obtain prompt justice."[24] A well-known figure in colonial America even declared that he was eager to adopt “the wisdom" of Chinese government, and "therefore wishing to have his [the Chinese emperor's] code of Laws."[25]
All these Chinese cultural elements exposed the colonists to a new culture, so different from their own traditions. Like the Europeans, they took different attitudes towards these new influences. Some eminent colonists, realizing its significance, worked to incorporate Chinese civilization into their efforts to shape developing American culture. In the following, we will examine how Thomas Jefferson used Chinese influences to pursue his goal.
Creating A new Culture by Incorporating Chinese Architectural Designs
Chinese influence on American architecture also came through Europe to North America in the 18th century. In garden construction, the English were interested in the irregularity of Chinese gardening, as expressed by temples. Burlington's purchase of Ripa's engravings in 1724 confirmed the style, and some "remarkable fruit" began to appear in the 1740s and 50s. At Grove House, Old Winds, Dickie Bateman (c. 1705-73) had lived like a "pseudo-Mandarin" during the 1730s and by the end of the decade had laid out a whimsically designed irregular garden adorned with a Chinoiserie bridge, a China House which combined Chinese and English styles.
At Woodside House, Berkshire, in 1752, Hugh Hamersley Gothicized the house by laying out a rococo wildness with an elegant Chinese kiosk, which seems to have been inspired by the House of Confucius at Kew, designed by Chambers and decorated by the fan-painter Joseph Goupy. Numerous pattern books on how to build Chinese gardens were produced at this time; among them were William Halfpenny's New Designs for Chinese Temples &c (1750) and Chinese and Gothic Architecture properly ornamented (1752).[26]
Some Chinese models were brought to North America and influenced the designs of its architecture in the first part of the 18th century. Some residents built their houses with "Chinese trim," others adopted the style known as Chinese Chippendale, and still others followed the designs of British builders, which were called Chinoiserie---a style of ornamentation that "represented an Occidental interpretation of China."[27]
In the 1760s, the influence of Chippendale's "Chinese" manner was apparent in the roof balustrades. An advertisement in the South Carolina Gazette, dated April 1, 1757, shows that at that time some Americans had used Chinese style design as a great attraction to potential buyers. The advertisement describes the James Reid house offered for sale, as the "new-built, strong and modish" house was built "after the Chinese taste." The house was "remarkably commodious in many respects; it is both warm in winter and deemed the most airy in summer of any house in the province."[28] The decoration of the Miles Brewton house, completed 1769, is full of Chippendale motives, in which rococo, "Gothic," and "Chinese" are mingled. Some researchers prove that Jefferson preferred such forms of construction in 1782.[29]
The Chinese influence on architecture remained conspicuous after the founding of the United States. At Croyden, close to Philadelphia, Andreas Everardus van Braam Houckgeest (1739-1801), a member of the American Philosophical Society, built a home known as China's Retreat during the 1790s. The building adopted a Chinese-style cupola on the roof. The windows, similar to screens in Chinese homes, were double leaves that slid into pockets in the walls. The buildings that used Chinese "touches" added “decorative embellishments to an otherwise Occidental plan and structure." [30] Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz, a Polish visitor, left us a vivid description of the house and its contents. The house was "immense, surmounted with a cupola and decorated with golden serpents in the Chinese manner. Six tabourets of porcelain were arranged in a circle in the peristyle." [31]
Thomas Jefferson, who regarded architecture as "a passion of country gentleman in all countries and ages" remained affection for architecture throughout his life. According to William Short, Jefferson's secretary and lifelong friend, Jefferson had acquired his first book on architecture when he was in college.[32] He was also interested in gardening. For him, gardening was "the complement to building." [33]
Jefferson studied Chinese garden styles when he started to build his own garden in his estates. He spent his free time on making plans for his garden.[34] During the year when he finally decided upon his construction plan, Jefferson planned to build a garden "where objects are intended only to adorn,' the Chinese style."[35] Jefferson loved the Chinese railing--particular Chinese design found from Thomas Chippendale (1718-1779) and William Chambers (1723-1796). He used the railings below the dome of his main building and surrounding the walkways.[36] Jefferson loved the Chinese railing so much that he used the style all over his estates from 1756, such as in the Woodford, Schuyler, Timothy Orne, and Roger Morris houses. He continued using the style after the American Revolution.[37]
Monticello (meaning “little mountain” in Italian) is widely considered one of the greatest architectural treasures in the United States.[38] Jefferson regarded Monticello as his “architectural ideas and experiments.”[39] He made Chinese railing a recurring motif at Monticello. In his main building, Jefferson adopted the Chinese style, making drawings of Chinese lattice about 1771.[40] Before 1798, he designed the Chinese lattice for the house at Edgehill, Virginia. About 1802, He designed the lattice for the house at Farmington and also designed the Chinese lattice for his dwelling house at Barboursville. In the Swan house in Dorchester, the open panels contained the Chinese lattice, which Jefferson continued to use in balcony railings until his death in 1826.[41]
In addition to the lattice, Jefferson considered building one of his rooms with a Chinese roof.[42] In 1771 in his notebook, Jefferson recorded down his plan to build "a square ‘Chinese Temple,'" "two stories high with four columns on a side in the lower story." He then decided to “set back behind a balustrade also of Chinese form." Later, Jefferson wrote, "I think I shall prefer to these Chinese temples two regular Tuscan ones." [43] Jefferson also planned to build on his property a couple of Chinese pagodas.[44]
The vast numbers of memos dealing with temples indicate Jefferson's deep interest in and aesthetic appreciation of this Chinese style. In his 1804 memo Jefferson planned to build a number of different temples. "At the Rocks" was to be “a turning Tuscan temple 10 f., diam. 6. Columns. Proportions of Pantheon," and over the offices, he planned to erect "the Chinese pavilion of Kew garden." Then along the lower edge of the garden he proposed to place four small temples, models of the Gothic style; the Pantheon, which he regarded the masterpiece of spherical building; a "model of cubic architecture," such as the Maison Carree; and "a specimen of Chinese "architecture.[45] Jefferson also planned to build a Chinese pavilion when he worked to remodel Monticello in the last decade of the eighteenth century and built the University in the second decade of the nineteenth century.[46]
Being the first great architect in North America, in architectural history the Jeffersonian architecture is well-known. It was particularly popular during the early American period. The typical features of his designs are the use of octagonal forms, red bricks, and use of Chinese railings. It is still very popular nowadays. Taunton’s Fine Homebuilding Journal still introduces the style to the American people today.[47]
However, the meaning of Jefferson’s using of the Chinese railing was far beyond the architecture itself. He deemed that architecture was “the heart of the American cause.” For him, “a building was not merely a walled structure, but a metaphor for American ideology.” To build a building is equivalent to build a nation. Therefore, “the architecture of any American building should express the American desire to break cultural—as well as political—ties to Europe.” [48] The virtual consensus among the founding generation of American statesmen was to “pursue a political destiny separate from Europe.”[49] Jefferson was determined to make a new nation in North America rather than a replica of a European country. He realized that the elements from Chinese culture could play a very important and positive role in his efforts to build the new nation. He regarded the incorporation of Chinese elements in his own building as an attempt to develop a new identity for the nation. Therefore, he incorporated Chinese designs in his buildings and refused to copy English style.
Jefferson had “a national audience in mind”, when he built his home at Monticello.[50] He told James Madison, “You see, I am an enthusiast on the subject of the arts. But it is an enthusiasm of which I am not ashamed, as its object to improve the taste of my countrymen, to increase their reputation, to reconcile them to the rest of the world, and procure them its praise.”[51] His creation of the new style has impressed many Americans. As a person with national fame, he is visited by numerous guests from all over the country everyday. The Chinese railing included on the exterior of Monticello “became a public expression of Jefferson’s regard for Chinese culture through its inclusion in the private space of his home.” [52]
Using the Asian Dry Rice to Improve the Slave’s Working Condition