...consequences of sectional politics earlier than any of his contemporaries. "This momentous question, ^vil"^iu like a firebell in the night, awakened and filled me with terror," wrote theN'*ht-" the ex-President in a letter dated April 22, 1820, to John Holmes. "I considered it...

...system. It was this startling fact of a North arrayed against a South that drew from Jefferson the words: "This momentous question, like a fire-bell in the...considered it at once as the knell of the Union." helped to widen the gulf between them. Laying down a definite line between free soil and slave soil...

...time ceased to read newspapers, or pay any attention to public affairs, confident they were in good hands, and content to be a passenger in our bark to...am not distant. But this momentous question, like a fire bell in the night, awakened and filled me with terror. I considered it at once as the knell of...

...question settled. Of it Jefferson wrote, as if in prophecy : " This momentous question, like a fire bell in the night, awakened and filled me with terror. I considered it the knell of the Union. ' ' ' Clay wrote of the height to which the heated debate arose : " The words...

...settle the slavery question ? References. Note the following from the writings of Thomas Jefferson : " This momentous question, like a fire-bell in the night,...terror. I considered it at once as the knell of the unio i. It is hushed indeed for a moment, but this is a reprieve only, not a final sentence. A geographical...

...broached the discussion that was raging at the West. Instantly the sage of Monticello was attentive. " This momentous question, like a firebell in the night, awakened and filled me with terror. It is the knell of the Union. Since Bunker Hill we have never had so ominous a question." He who had...

...time ceased to read newspapers, or pay any attention to public affairs, confident they were in good hands, and content to be a passenger in our bark to the shore from which I am not distant. Bttt this momentous question, like a fire-bell in the night, awakened and filled me with terror. I...

...time ceased to read newspapers, or pay any attention to public affairs, confident they were in good hands, and content to be a passenger in our bark to...am not distant. But this momentous question, like a fire bell in the night, awakened and filled me with terror. I considered it at once as the knell of...

...is not dead," and, " This momentous question, like a fire bell in the night, awakened me and tilled me with terror. I considered it at once as the knell of the Union." But he seems later to have regained hope. On December 20, 1820, he wrote to Lafayette, " The boisterous...

...of the subject then first started, and he could probably have said with Jefferson that the Missouri question, " like a fire-bell in the night, awakened and filled me with terror," if he was still too full of the hope of youth to go on with the older man, " I considered it at once...