Jefferson had decorated the walls of his quarters with a collection of portraits that included Sir Francis Bacon, John Locke, and Sir Isaac Newton, all men of the Enlightenment.7 Hamilton asked Jefferson who they were.8 “I told him they were my trinity of the three greatest men the world had ever produced, naming them,” Jefferson recalled.9 Taking this in, Hamilton paused, thinking.10 After a moment, he broke his silence. “The greatest man that ever lived,” Hamilton said, “was Julius Caesar.”11
