Socrates once said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” » Thomas Jefferson lived by these words while continually rebuilding himself through his architecture. Its architecture serves as an examination of self, nature and philosophy. In Charlottesville, Virginia (1769-1809), Thomas Jefferson wrote an essay in brick and wood, which sought to reconcile nature and man; he dubbed his “essay in architecture” Monticello. Thus, Jefferson's experimental house, Monticello, was not just a building block; it was his resolute philosophy.Thomas Jefferson on the SelfTo understand Thomas Jefferson's architecture, one must first understand his philosophy of the development of the self. The contextualization of his philosophy will serve as a basis for explaining Thomas Jefferson's architecture in depth. Peter S. Onuf, professor at the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation, in The Mind of Thomas Jefferson (especially in the chapter Making Sense of Jefferson), the author helps us understand how Thomas Jefferson's ideals and vision of the past developed his mental framework – sometimes paradoxical. Onuf's play offers a more humanistic (rather than iconic) Thomas Jefferson who actually separates the reality of his actions from the idol. Onuf, in The Mind of Thomas Jefferson, mentions that Jay Fliegelman argues, in Declaring Independence, that Jefferson was "a conflicted witness and participant in a new affective understanding of the operations of language, an understanding that reconceives all expression as form." of self-expression, as an opportunity as well as an imperative to exteriorize oneself, to become obvious. Jefferson was adapting to a world where language became action; and indeed all that was expressible was an attempt...... middle of paper ......ww.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/monticello-house-faq#whenOnuf, Peter S. The mind of Thomas Jefferson. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2007. eBook Collection (EBSCOhost), EBSCOhost (accessed April 19, 2014). Randolph, Sarah N. The Domestic Life of Thomas Jefferson. Scituate, MA: Digital Scanning, 2001. eBook Collection (EBSCOhost), EBSCOhost (accessed April 19, 2014). Spahn, Hannah. Thomas Jefferson, Time and History. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2011. eBook Collection (EBSCOhost), EBSCOhost (accessed April 20, 2014).VIII. Notes on Heresy, October 11-December 9, 1776,” Founders Online, National Archives (http://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-01-02-0222-0009, ver. 2014-02- 12). Source: The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 1, 1760-1776, ed. Julian P. Boyd. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1950, pp... 553–555.