Positive reconstruction · reader-scoped, not an inferred-absence lacuna
This reconstruction covers the readable fraction of Thomas Jefferson's formation -- attested reading and writing only, not the whole of a life.
Thomas Jefferson and Europe
Thomas Jefferson's attested relationship to Europe.
Thomas Jefferson is attested as having read this work by Everett (brother of Edward Everett).
Evidence ledger
- First-person reading testimony (Explicit first-person completed reading of the addressee's brother's work on Europe: 'I have read the work with great avidity and profit.' Author identified in-passage as 'your brother' (Everett); proposed as a new Work. NOTE: the same frame implies prior reading of De Pradt's Europe ('had some effect in this way') - unclaimed, recorded as a near-miss.). Self-report reliability discount 0.8: Explicit avid reading ('I have read the work with great avidity and profit, and have found my ideas of Europe in general, rallied by it') - reorganization of his own views is strong engagement; discount for the indirect flattery context (praising the correspondent's brother's book to the correspondent).