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God Has Formed Us Moral Agents... That We May Promote The Happiness Of Those With Whom He Has Placed Us In Society, By Acting Honestly Towards All, Benevolently To Those Who Fall Within Our Way, Respecting Sacredly Their Rights, Bodily And Mental, And Cherishing Especially Their Freedom Of Conscience, As We Value Our Own.

-Thomas Jefferson

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God Has Formed Us

Thomas Jefferson

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God Has Formed Us Moral Agents... That We May Promote The Happiness Of Those With Whom He Has Placed Us In Society, By Acting Honestly Towards All, Benevolently To Those Who Fall Within Our Way, Respecting Sacredly Their Rights, Bodily And Mental, And Cherishing Especially Their Freedom Of Conscience, As We Value Our Own.

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Excessive Taxation . . . Will Carry Reason & Reflection To Every Man's Door, And Particularly In The Hour Of Election.

The Office Of Reformer Of The Superstitions Of A Nation, Is Ever More Dangerous. Jesus Had To Work On The Perilous Confines Of Reason And Religion; And A Step To The Right Or Left Might Place Him Within The Grasp Of The Priests Of The Superstition, A Bloodthirsty Race, As Cruel And Remorseless As The Being Whom They Represented As The Family God Of Abraham, Of Isaac And Of Jacob, And The Local God Of Israel. That Jesus Did Not Mean To Impose Himself On Mankind As The Son Of God, Physically Speaking, I Have Been Convinced By The Writings Of Men More Learned Than Myself In That Lore.

The Art Of Life Is The Art Of Avoiding Pain.

Subject Opinion To Coercion: Whom Will You Make Your Inquisitors? Fallible Men; Men Governed By Bad Passions, By Private As Well As Public Reasons. And Why Subject It To Coercion? To Produce Uniformity. But Is Uniformity Of Opinion Desirable? No More Than Of Face And Stature.

Private Fortunes, In The Present State Of Our Circulation, Are At The Mercy Of Those Self-created Money Lenders, And Are Prostrated By The Floods Of Nominal Money With Which Their Avarice Deluges Us.

Where A New Invention Promises To Be Useful, It Ought To Be Tried.

Nothing Is Unchangeable But The Inherent And Unalienable Rights Of Man.

When The Heart Is Right, The Feet Are Swift.

Wine Brightens The Life And Thinking Of Anyone

If We Are Made In Some Degree For Others, Yet In A Greater Are We Made For Ourselves. It Were Contrary To Feeling And Indeed Ridiculous To Suppose That A Man Had Less Rights In Himself Than One Of His Neighbors, Or Indeed All Of Them Put Together. This Would Be Slavery, And Not That Liberty Which The Bill Of Rights Has Made Inviolable, And For The Preservation Of Which Our Government Has Been Charged.

Well, Page, I Do Wish The Devil Had Old Cooke, For I Am Sure I Never Was So Tired Of An Old Dull Scoundrel In My Life ... But The Old-fellows Say We Must Read To Gain Knowledge; And Gain Knowledge To Make Us Happy And Be Admired. Mere Jargon! Is There Any Such Thing As Happiness In This World? No.

I Believe From What I Have Lately Seen That We Should Be Substantially Safe Were Our Citizens Armed, But We Have Not As Many Arms As We Have Enemies In The State.

An Equal Application Of Law To Every Condition Of Man Is Fundamental.

The Rights Of The People To The Exercise And Fruits Of Their Own Industry Can Never Be Protected Against The Selfishness Of Rulers Not Subject To Their Control At Short Periods.

I Never Submitted The Whole System Of My Opinions To The Creed Of Any Party Of Men Whatever, In Religion, In Philosophy, In Politics, Or In Anything Else, Where I Was Capable Of Thinking For Myself. Such An Addiction Is The Last Degradation Of A Free And Moral Agent. If I Could Not Go To Heaven But With A Party, I Would Not Go There At All.

By Nature's Law, Man Is At Peace With Man Till Some Aggression Is Committed, Which, By The Same Law, Authorizes One To Destroy Another As His Enemy.

Equal Rights For All, Special Privileges For None

History, In General, Only Informs Us Of What Bad Government Is.

An Acre Of The Best Ground For Hemp, Is To Be Selected And Sewn In Hemp And Be Kept For A Permanent Hemp Patch.

The Dead Should Not Rule The Living

I Have Never Been Able To Conceive How Any Rational Being Could Propose Happiness To Himself From The Exercise Of Power Over Others... An Honest Man Can Feel No Pleasure In The Exercise Of Power Over His Fellow Citizens.... Power Is Not Alluring To Pure Minds And Is Not With Them The Primary Principle Of Contest.

I Shall See With Sincere Satisfaction The Progress Of Those Sentiments Which Tend To Restore To Man All His Natural Rights, Convinced He Has No Natural Right In Opposition To His Social Duties.

The Following [addition To The Bill Of Rights] Would Have Pleased Me: The People Shall Not Be Deprived Or Abridged Of Their Right To Speak, To Write, Or Otherwise To Publish Anything But False Facts Affecting Injuriously The Life, Liberty Or Reputation Of Others, Or Affecting The Peace Of The [united States] With Foreign Nations.

The Sun Has Not Caught Me In Bed In Fifty Years.

A System Of General Instruction, Which Shall Reach Every Description Of Our Citizens, From The Richest To The Poorest, As It Was The Earliest, So Will It Be The Latest, Of All The Public Concerns In Which I Shall Permit Myself To Take An Interest.

Bind Them Down By The Chains Of The Constitution Where They Can Do No Mischief.

A Mind Always Employed Is Always Happy.

Taxes Should Be Proportioned To What May Be Annually Spared By The Individual.

[o]ur Rules Can Have Authority Over Such Natural Rights Only As We Have Submitted To Them. The Rights Of Conscience We Never Submitted, We Could Not Submit. We Are Answerable For Them To Our God.

Up Until The Late Unpleasantness Of The Civil War, Then, The Right Of Secession Was More Or Less Taken For Granted In Many Quarters, And There Has Never Been Any Amendment Or Even A Supreme Court Decision Saying It's Improper. - Samual Francis, Secession May Be Legal But Not Expedient, Conservative Chronicles If There Be Any Among Us Who Wish To Dissolve The Union Or To Change Its Republican Form, Let Them Stand Undisturbed, As Monuments Of The Safety With Which Error Of Opinion May Be Tolerated Where Reason Is Left Free To Combat It.

It Would Not Be For The Public Good To Have [a Majority In Congress Of One Party] Greater [than] Two To One.

The True Theory Of Our Constitution Is Surely The Wisest And Best, That The States Are Independent As To Everything Within Themselves And United As To Everything Respecting Foreign Nations. Let The General Government Be Reduced To Foreign Concerns Only.

Our Peculiar Security Is In The Possession Of A Written Constitution. Let Us Not Make It A Blank Paper By Construction.

War Is An Instrument Entirely Inefficient Toward Redressing Wrong; And Multiplies, Instead Of Indemnifying Losses.

Men By Their Constitutions Are Naturally Divided Into Two Parties: 1. Those Who Fear And Distrust The People, And Wish To Draw All Powers From Them Into The Hands Of The Higher Classes. 2. Those Who Identify Themselves With The People, Have Confidence In Them, Cherish And Consider Them As The Most Honest And Safe, Although Not The Most Wise Depositary Of The Public Interests. In Every Country These Two Parties Exist, And In Every One Where They Are Free To Think, Speak, And Write, They Will Declare Themselves.

Were Parties Here Divided Merely By A Greediness For Office,...to Take A Part With Either Would Be Unworthy Of A Reasonable Or Moral Man.

Never Was So Much False Arithmetic Employed On Any Subject, As That Which Has Been Employed To Persuade Nations That It Is In Their Interest To Go To War.

I Have Not Observed Mens Honesty To Increase With Their Riches.

The Evidence Of [the] Natural Right [of Expatriation], Like That Of Our Right To Life, Liberty, The Use Of Our Faculties, The Pursuit Of Happiness, Is Not Left To The Feeble And Sophistical Investigations Of Reason, But Is Impressed On The Sense Of Every Man. We Do Not Claim These Under The Charters Of Kings Or Legislators, But Under The King Of Kings.

Pursuit Of Happiness

It Is Not To The Moderation And Justice Of Others We Are To Trust For Fair And Equal Access To Market With Out Productions, Or For Our Due Share In The Transportation Of Them; But To Our Own Means Of Independence, And The Firm Will To Use Them.

The Mass Of The Citizens Is The Safest Depositary Of Their Own Rights.

The Evils Of War Are Great In Their Endurance, And Have A Long Reckoning For Ages To Come.

Experience Has Proved To Us That A Dollar Of Silver Disappears For Every Dollar Of Paper Emitted.

We See The Wisdom Of Solon's Remark, That No More Good Must Be Attempted Than The Nation Can Bear.

Nothing Is More Certainly Written In The Book Of Fate Than That These People Are To Be Free.

I Do Not Know Whether You Are Fond Of Chemical Reading. There Are Some Things In This Science Worth Reading.

The Spirit Of The Times May Alter, Will Alter. Our Rulers Will Become Corrupt, Our People Careless... From The Conclusion Of This War We Shall Be Going Downhill. It Will Not Then Be Necessary To Resort Every Moment To The People For Support. They Will Be Forgotten, Therefore, And Their Rights Disregarded. They Will Forget Themselves, But In The Sole Faculty Of Making Money, And Will Never Think Of Uniting To Affect A Due Respect For Their Rights. The Shackles, Therefore, Will Be Made Heavier And Heavier, Till Our Rights Shall Revive Or Expire In A Convulsion.

Easter Was When They Nailed Him To The Cross. And He Never Said A Mumbling Word.

If Ever There Was A Holy War, It Was That Which Saved Our Liberties And Gave Us Independence.

I Think Our Governments Will Remain Virtuous For Many Centuries As Long As They Are Chiefly Agricultural; And This Will Be As Long As There Shall Be Vacant Lands In Any Part Of America. When They Get Piled Upon One Another In Large Cities As In Europe, They Will Become Corrupt As In Europe.

Those Who Labour In The Earth Are The Chosen People Of God, If Ever He Had A Chosen, People, Whose Breasts He Has Made His Peculiar Deposit For Substantial And Genuine Virtue.

I, Place Economy Among The First & Most Important Republican Virtues, & Public Debt As The Greatest Of The Dangers To Be Feared

If Once The People Become Inattentive To The Public Affairs, You And I, And Congress And Assemblies, Judges And Governors, Shall All Become Wolves. It Seems To Be The Law Of Our General Nature, In Spite Of Individual Exceptions.

The Care Of Human Life And Happiness, And Not Their Destruction, Is The First And Only Object Of Good Government.

He, Who Steadily Observes Those Moral Precepts In Which All Religions Concur, Will Never Be Questioned At The Gates Of Heaven As To The Dogmas In Which They All Differ.

Our Public Credit Is Good, But The Abundance Of Paper Has Produced A Spirit Of Gambling In The Funds, Which Has Laid Up Our Ships At The Wharves As Too Slow Instruments Of Profit, And Has Even Disarmed The Hand Of The Tailor Of His Needle And Thimble. They Say The Evil Will Cure Itself. I Wish It May; But I Have Rarely Seen A Gamester Cured, Even By The Disasters Of His Vocation.

No Race Of Kings Has Ever Presented Above One Man Of Common Sense In Twenty Generations.

I Like A Little Rebellion Now And Then. It Is Like A Storm In The Atmosphere.

Educate And Inform The Whole Mass Of The People.

When I Contemplate The Immense Advances In Science And Discoveries In The Arts Which Have Been Made Within The Period Of My Life, I Look Forward With Confidence To Equal Advances By The Present Generation, And Have No Doubt They Will Consequently Be As Much Wiser Than We Have Been As We Than Our Fathers Were, And They Than The Burners Of Witches.

No Stile Of Writing Is So Delightful As That Which Is All Pith, Which Never Omits A Necessary Word, Nor Uses An Unnecessary One.

The Remaining Revenue On The Consumption Of Foreign Luxuries To Domestic Comforts, Being Collected On Our Seaboard And Frontiers Only, And Incorporated With The Transactions Of Our Mercantile Citizens, It May Be The Pleasure And The Pride Of An American To Ask, What Farmer, What Merchant, What Laborer Ever Sees A Tax Gatherer Of The United States?

When The Representative Body Have Lost The Confidence Of Their Constituents, When They Have Notoriously Made Sale Of Their Most Valuable Rights, When They Have Assumed To Themselves Powers Which The People Never Put Into Their Hands, Then Indeed Their Continuing In Office Becomes Dangerous To The State

Experience Having Long Taught Me The Reasonableness Of Mutual Sacrifices Of Opinion Among Those Who Are To Act Together For Any Common Object, And The Expediency Of Doing What Good We Can; When We Cannot Do All We Would Wish.

I Believe In Good Luck, And The Harder I Work And The More I Believe In Myself, The Luckier I Get.

He [washington] Has Often Declared To Me That He Considered Our New Constitution As An Experiment On The Practicability Of Republican Government, And With What Dose Of Liberty Man Could Be Trusted For His Own Good; That He Was Determined The Experiment Should Have A Fair Trial, And Would Lose The Last Drop Of His Blood In Support Of It. And These Declarations He Repeated To Me The Oftener And The More Pointedly.

To Preserve The Freedom Of The Human Mind Then And Freedom Of The Press, Every Spirit Should Be Ready To Devote Itself To Martyrdom; For As Long As We May Think As We Will, And Speak As We Think, The Condition Of Man Will Proceed In Improvement

Certainly, No Power To Prescribe Any Religious Exercise, Or To Assume Authority In Religious Discipline, Has Been Delegated To The General Government.

I Tolerate With The Utmost Latitude The Right Of Others To Differ From Me In Opinion Without Imputing To Them Criminality.

Law Is Often The Tyrant's Will, And Always So When It Violates The Right Of An Individual.

Inalienable Rights

In Defense Of Our Persons And Properties Under Actual Violation, We Took Up Arms. When That Violence Shall Be Removed, When Hostilities Shall Cease On The Part Of The Aggressors, Hostilities Shall Cease On Our Part Also.

This Institution Will Be Based On The Illimitable Freedom Of The Human Mind. For Here We Are Not Afraid To Follow Truth Wherever It May Lead, Not Tolerate Error As Long As Reason Is Left Free To Combat It.

Everyone Must Act According To The Dictates Of His Own Reason.

Rejecting All Organs Of Informationbut My Senses, I Rid Myself Of The Pyrrhonisms With Which An Indulgence In Speculations Hyperphysical And Antiphysical So Uselessly Occupy And Disquiet The Mind.

Pride Costs Us More Than Hunger, Thirst, And Cold.

Hunger And Thirst

If Our Legislature Does Not Heartily Push Our University [of Virginia] We Must Send Our Children For Education To Kentucky [transylvania College] Or Cambridge [harvard College]. The Latter Will Return Them To Us As Fanatics And Tories, The Former Will Keep Them To Add To Their Population.

The Ultimate Arbiter Is The People Of The Union.

Not Less Than Two Hours A Day Should Be Devoted To Exercise.

When Tempted To Do Any Thing In Secret, Ask Yourself If You Would Do It In Public.

I Have Done For My Country And For All Mankind, All That I Could Do, And I Now Resign My Soul, Without Fear, To My God - My Daughter To My Country.

It Is A [disputed] Question, Whether The Circulation Of Paper, Rather Than Of Specie [gold And Silver Coin], Is A Good Or An Evil I Believe It To Be One Of Those Cases Where Mercantile Clamor Will Bear Down Reason, Until It Is Corrected By Ruin.

To Consider Judges As The Ultimate Arbiters Of All Constitutional Questions Is A Very Dangerous Doctrine Indeed, And One Which Would Place Us Under The Despotism Of An Oligarchy.

All Things Here Appear To Me To Trudge On In One And The Same Round: We Rise In The Morning That We May Eat Breakfast, Dinner Andsupper And To Bed Again That We May Get Up The Next Morning And Do The Same: So That You Never Saw Two Peas More Alike Than Our Yesterday And To-day.

Man Is Not Made For The State But The State For Man And It Derives Its Just Powers Only From The Consent Of The Governed.

The Clergy Believe That Any Power Confided In Me Will Be Exerted In Opposition To Their Schemes, And They Believe Rightly.

In Matters Of Style, Swim With The Current; In Matters Of Principle, Stand Like A Rock.

So Confident Am I In The Intentions, As Well As Wisdom, Of The Government, That I Shall Always Be Satisfied That What Is Not Done, Either Cannot, Or Ought Not To Be Done.

The Tax Which Will Be Paid For The Purpose Of Education Is Not More Than The Thousandth Part Of What Will Be Paid To Kings, Priests And Nobles Who Will Rise Up Among Us If We Leave The People In Ignorance

A Government Regulating Itself By What Is Wise And Just For The Many, Uninfluenced By The Local And Selfish Views Of The Few Who Direct Their Affairs, Has Not Been Seen, Perhaps, On Earth. Or If It Existed For A Moment At The Birth Of Ours, It Would Not Be Easy To Fix The Term Of Its Continuance. Still, I Believe It Does Exist Here In A Greater Degree Than Anywhere Else; And For Its Growth And Continuance... I Offer Sincere Prayers.

We Ought Not To Schismatize On Either Men Or Measures. Principles Alone Can Justify That.

It Is Error Alone Which Needs The Support Of Government. Truth Can Stand By Itself.

For The Power Given To Congress By The Constitution Does Not Extend To The Internal Regulation Of The Commerce Of A State (that Is To Say, Of The Commerce Between Citizen And Citizen,) Which Remain Exclusively With Its Own Legislature; But To Its External Commerce Only, That Is To Say, Its Commerce With Another State, Or With Foreign Nations, Or With The Indian Tribes.

The Office Of Reformer Of The Superstitions Of A Nation Is Ever Dangerous.

If Ignorance Is Bliss, Why Aren't More People Happy?

Certain Teachings In The Bible Are As Diamonds In A Dung-heap.

And Even Should The Cloud Of Barbarism And Despotism Again Obscure The Science And Libraries Of Europe, This Country Remains To Preserve And Restore Light And Liberty To Them.

God Forbid We Should Ever Be Twenty Years Without Such A Rebellion... We Have Had Thirteen States Independent For Eleven Years. There Has Been One Rebellion. That Comes To One Rebellion In A Century And A Half, For Each State. What Country Before Ever Existed A Century And A Half Without A Rebellion.

I Am Conscious That An Equal Division Of Property Is Impracticable, But The Consequences Of This Enormous Inequality Producing So Much Misery To The Bulk Of Mankind, Legislators Cannot Invent Too Many Devices For Subdividing Property.

The Several States Composing The United States Of America Are Not United On The Principle Of Unlimited Submission To Their General Government

The Happiest Moments Of My Life Have Been The Few Which I Have Passed At Home In The Bosom Of My Family.

The Truth Is That The Want Of Common Education With Us Is Not From Our Poverty, But From The Want Of An Orderly System. More Money Is Now Paid For The Education Of A Part Than Would Be Paid For That Of The Whole If Systematically Arranged.

Debt And Revolution Are Inseparable As Cause And Effect.

Do You Want To Know Who You Are? Don't Ask. Act! Action Will Delineate And Define You.

If, In My Retirement To The Humble Station Of A Private Citizen, I Am Accompanied With The Esteem And Approbation Of My Fellow Citizens, Trophies Obtained By The Bloodstained Steel, Or The Tattered Flags Of The Tented Field, Will Never Be Envied. The Care Of Human Life And Happiness, And Not Their Destruction, Is The First And Only Legitimate Object Of Good Government.

The Great Cause Which Divides Our Countries Is Not To Be Decided By Individual Animosities. The Harmony Of Private Societies Cannot Weaken National Efforts.

Never Spend Your Money Before You Have Earned It.

But Every Difference Of Opinion Is Not A Difference Of Principle. We Have Been Called By Different Names Brethren Of The Same Principle. We Are All Republicans, We Are All Federalists.

Nothing But Free Argument, Raillery And Even Ridicule Will Preserve The Purity Of Religion.

I Like The Dreams Of The Future Better Than The History Of The Past.

Perfection In Wisdom, As Well As In Integrity, Is Neither Required Nor Expected In These Agents (public Servants). It Belongs Not To Man. The Wise Know Too Well Their Weaknesses To Assume Infallibility; And He Who Knows Most, Knows Best How Little He Knows.

Truth Is The Proper And Sufficient Antagonist To Error, And Has Nothing To Fear From The Conflict, Unless, By Human Interposition, Disarmed Of Her Natural Weapons, Free Argument And Debate; Errors Ceasing To Be Dangerous When It Is Permitted Freely To Contradict Them.

It Is Left... To The Juries, If They Think The Permanent Judges Are Under Any Bias Whatever In Any Cause, To Take On Themselves To Judge The Law As Well As The Fact. They Never Exercise This Power But When They Suspect Partiality In The Judges; And By The Exercise Of This Power They Have Been The Firmest Bulwarks Of English Liberty.

I Am An Epicurean. I Consider The Genuine (not The Imputed) Doctrines Of Epicurus As Containing Everything Rational In Moral Philosophy Which Greece And Rome Have Left Us.

All Men Are Created Equal And Have The Right To Life, Liberty, And The Pursuit Of Happiness.

Pursuit Of Happiness

From Breakfast, Or Noon At The Latest, To Dinner, I Am Mostly On Horseback, Attending To My Farm Or Other Concerns, Which I Find Healthful To My Body, Mind, And Affairs.

It Is Too Late In The Day For Men Of Sincerity To Pretend They Believe In The Platonic Mysticisms That Three Are One, And One Is Three; And Yet That The One Is Not Three, And The Three Are Not One.

The Protection Of Our Citizens, The Spirit And Honor Of Our Country, Require That Force Should Be Interposed To A Certain Degree.

It Is An Axiom In My Mind That Our Liberty Can Never Be Safe But In The Hands Of The People Themselves, And That Too Of The People With A Certain Degree Of Instruction. This It Is The Business Of The State To Effect, And On A General Plan.

The Happiest Hours Of My Life Have Been Spent In The Flow Of Affection Among Friends.

It Is Highly Interesting To Our Country, And It Is The Duty Of Its Functionaries, To Provide That Every Citizen In It Should Receive An Education Proportioned To The Condition And Pursuits Of His Life.

Gaming Corrupts Our Disposition And Teaches Us A Habit Of Hostility Against All Mankind.

I Had Rather Be Shut Up In A Very Modest Cottage, With My Books, My Family, And A Few Old Friends, Dining On Simple Bacon, And Letting The World Roll On As It Liked, Than To Occupy The Most Splendid Post Which Any Human Power Can Give.

Peace, That Glorious Moment In Time When Everyone Stops And Reloads.

Moments In Time

I Have A Right To Nothing Which Another Has A Right To Take Away.

If The Question [before Justices Of The Peace] Relate To Any Point Of Public Liberty, Or If It Be One Of Those In Which The Judges May Be Suspected Of Bias, The Jury Undertake To Decide Both Law And Fact.

Establish The Eternal Truth That Acquiescence Under Insult Is Not The Way To Escape War.

If There Is A Gratification Which I Envy Any People In This World It Is To Your Country [italy] Its Music. This Is The Favorite Passion Of My Soul, And Fortune Has Cast My Lot In A Country Where It Is In A State Of Deplorable Barbarism.

Self-love . . . Is The Sole Antagonist Of Virtue, Leading Us Constantly By Our Propensities To Self-gratification In Violation Of Our Moral Duties To Others.

Religious Institutions That Use Government Power In Support Of Themselves And Force Their Views On Persons Of Other Faiths, Or Of No Faith, Undermine All Our Civil Rights. Moreover, State Support Of An Established Religion Tends To Make The Clergy Unresponsive To Their Own People, And Leads To Corruption Within Religion Itself. Erecting The 'wall Of Separation Between Church And State,' Therefore, Is Absolutely Essential In A Free Society.

If The Body Be Feeble, The Mind Will Not Be Strong.

Our Greatest Happiness Does Not Depend On The Condition Of Life In Which Chance Has Placed Us, But Is Always The Result Of A Good Conscience, Good Health, Occupation, And Freedom In All Just Pursuits.

I Never Before Knew The Full Value Of Trees. Under Them I Breakfast, Dine, Write, Read And Receive My Company.

Not To Find Out New Principles, Or New Arguments, Never Before Thought Of . . . But To Place Before Mankind The Common Sense Of The Subject, In Terms So Plain And Firm As To Command Their Assent, And To Justify Ourselves In The Independent Stand We Are Compelled To Take.

A Truth Now And Then Projecting Into The Ocean Of Newspaper Lies Serves Like Headlands To Correct Our Course. Indeed, My Scepticism As To Everything I See In A Newspaper Makes Me Indifferent Whether I Ever See One.

I Like The Power Given The Legislature To Levy Taxes, And For That Reason Solely Approve Of The Greater House Being Chosen By The People Directly.

Such Is The Moral Construction Of The World That No National Crime Passes Unpunished In The Long Run... Were Present Oppressors To Reflect On The Same Truth, They Would Spare To Their Own Countries The Penalties On Their Present Wrongs Which Will Be Inflicted On Them In Future Times. The Seeds Of Hatred And Revenge Which They Sow With A Large Hand Will Not Fail To Produce Their Fruits In Time. Like Their Brother Robbers On The Highway, They Suppose The Escape Of The Moment A Final Escape And Deem Infamy And Future Risk Countervailed By Present Gain.

[oppose] With Manly Firmness [any] Invasions On The Rights Of The People.

Whiskey Claims To Itself Alone The Exclusive Office Of Sot-making.

I Abhor War And View It As The Greatest Scourge Of Mankind.

The Christian Religion Is The Best Religion That Has Ever Been Given To Man

The Tender Breasts Of Ladies Were Not Formed For Political Convulsion.

Paul Was The First Corrupter Of The Doctrines Of Jesus.

Ministers And Merchants Love Nobody.

He Has Waged Cruel War Against Human Nature Itself, Violating It’s Most Sacred Rights Of Life & Liberty In The Persons Of A Distant People Who Never Offended Him, Captivating & Carrying Them Into Slavery In Another Hemisphere, Or To Incur Miserable Death In Their Transportation Thither. This Piratical Warfare, The Opprobrium Of Infidel Powers, Is The Warfare Of The Christian King Of Great Britain. Determined To Keep Open A Market Where Men Should Be Bought & Sold, He Has Prostituted His Negative For Suppressing Every Legislative Attempt To Prohibit Or To Restrain This Execrable Commerce...

A True Patriot Will Defend His Country From Its Government.

I Am Entirely Persuaded That The Agitations Of The Public Mind Advance Its Powers, And That At Every Vibration Between The Points Of Liberty And Despotism, Something Will Be Gained For The Former. As Men Become Better Informed, Their Rulers Must Respect Them The More.

A Nation's Best Defense Is An Educated Citizenry

The Only Security Of All Is In A Free Press. The Force Of Public Opinion Cannot Be Resisted When Permitted Freely To Be Expressed. The Agitation It Produces Must Be Submitted To. It Is Necessary, To Keep He Waters Pure.

The Children Of Israel In The Wilderness, Led By A Cloud By Day, And A Pillar Of Fire By Night.

Freedom Of Religion, Freedom Of The Press, Freedom Of Person Under Protection Of Habeas Corpus; And Trial By Juries Impartially Selected, These Principles Form The Bright Constellation Which Has Gone Before Us, And Guided Our Steps Through An Age Of Revolution And Reformation.

No Man Will Ever Bring Out Of The Presidency The Reputation Which Carries Him Into It. To Myself, Personally, It Brings Nothing But Increasing Drudgery And Daily Loss Of Friends.

I Have Sworn Upon The Altar Of God.

I Leave To Others The Sublime Delights Of Riding In The Storm, Better Pleased With Sound Sleep & A Warmer Berth Below It Encircled, With The Society Of Neighbors, Friends & Fellow Laborers Of The Earth Rather Than With Spies & Sycophants ... I Have No Ambition To Govern Men. It Is A Painful And Thankless Office.

We Owe Gratitude To France, Justice To England, Good Will To All, And Subservience To None ... It Was By The Sober Sense Of Our Citizens That We Were Safely And Steadily Conducted From Monarchy To Republicanism, And It Is By The Same Agency Alone We Can Be Kept From Falling Back.

It Behooves Every Man Who Values Liberty Of Conscience For Himself, To Resist Invasions Of It In The Case Of Others: Or Their Case May, By Change Of Circumstances, Become His Own.

No Government Ought To Be Without Censors; And Where The Press Is Free No One Ever Will.

It Is True That In The Meantime We Are Suffering Deeply In Spirit, And Incurring The Horrors Of A War And Long Oppressions Of Enormous Public Debt.

Even In Europe A Change Has Sensibly Taken Place In The Mind Of Man. Science Has Liberated The Ideas Of Those Who Read And Reflect, And The American Example Has Kindled Feelings Of Right In The People. An Insurrection Has Consequently Begun Of Science Talents And Courage Against Rank And Birth, Which Have Fallen Into Contempt. It Has Failed In Its First Effort, Because The Mobs Of The Cities, The Instrument Used For Its Accomplishment, Debased By Ignorance, Poverty And Vice, Could Not Be Restrained To Rational Action. But The World Will Soon Recover From The Panic Of This First Catastrophe.

When We See Ourselves In A Situation Which Must Be Endured And Gone Through, It Is Best To Make Up Our Minds To It, Meet It With Firmness, And Accommodate Everything To It In The Best Way Practicable. This Lessens The Evil; While Fretting And Fuming Only Serves To Increase Your Own Torments.

If You Are Obliged To Neglect Any Thing, Let It Be Your Chemistry. It Is The Least Useful And The Least Amusing To A Country Gentleman Of All The Ordinary Branches Of Science.

The World Is Indebted For All Triumphs Which Have Been Gained By Reason And Humanity Over Error And Oppression.

Honesty Is The First Chapter In The Book Of Wisdom. Let It Be Our Endeavor To Merit The Character Of A Just Nation.

I See No Comfort In Outliving One's Friends, And Remaining A Mere Monument Of The Times Which Are Past.

We Are Not To Expect To Be Translated From Despotism To Liberty In A Featherbed.

Difficult And Easy

The Way To Silence Religious Disputes Is To Take No Notice Of Them.

The Banks Themselves Were Doing Business On Capitals Three-fourths Of Which Were Fictitious. This Fictitious Capital... Is Now To Be Lost, And To Fall On Somebody; It Must Take On Those Who Have Property To Meet It, And Probably On The Less Cautious Part, Who, Not Aware Of The Impending Catastrophe, Have Suffered Themselves To Contract, Or To Be In Debt, And Must Now Sacrifice Their Property Of A Value Many Times The Amount Of The Debt. We Have Been Truly Sowing The Wind, And Are Now Reaping The Whirlwind.

The Moral Sense Is As Much A Part Of Our Constitution As That Of Feeling, Seeing, Or Hearing.

Would It Not Be Better To Simplify The System Of Taxation Rather Than To Spread It Over Such A Variety Of Subjects And Pass Through So Many New Hands.

A Lawyer Without Books Would Be Like A Workman Without Tools.

Yet The Hour Of Emancipation Is Advancing ... This Enterprise Is For The Young; For Those Who Can Follow It Up, And Bear It Through To It's Consummation. It Shall Have All My Prayers, And These Are The Only Weapons Of An Old Man.

Whenever A Man Has Cast A Longing Eye On Offices, A Rottenness Begins In His Conduct.

Truth And Reason Are Eternal. They Have Prevailed. And They Will Eternally Prevail; However, In Times And Places They May Be Overborne For A While By Violence, Military, Civil, Or Ecclesiastical.

The Germ Of Dissolution Of Our Federal Government Is In The Constitution Of The Federal Judiciary; An Irresponsible Body, (for Impeachment Is Scarcely A Scare-crow) Working Like Gravity By Night And By Day, Gaining A Little Today And A Little Tomorrow, And Advancing Its Noiseless Step Like A Thief, Over The Field Of Jurisdiction, Until All Shall Be Usurped From The States, And The Government Of All Be Consolidated Into One.

It Is The Old Practice Of Despots To Use A Part Of The People To Keep The Rest In Order.

Moral Law, Evidence Of.- Man Has Been Subjected By His Creator To The Moral Law, Of Which His Feelings, Or Conscience As It Is Sometimes Called, Are The Evidence With Which His Creator Has Furnished Him. ... The Moral Duties Which Exist Between Individual And Individual In A State Of Nature, Accompany Them Into A State Of Society ... Their Maker Not Having Released Them From Those Duties On Their Forming Themselves Into A Nation.

For St. Paul Only Says That It Is Better To Be Married Than To Burn. Now I Presume That If That Apostle Had Known That Providence Would At An After Day Be So Kind To Any Particular Set Of People As To Furnish Them With Other Means Of Extinguishing Their Fire Than Those Of Matrimony, He Would Have Earnestly Recmmended Them To Their Practice.

Our Minds Were Circumscribed Within Narrow Limits By An Habitual Belief That It Was Our Duty To Be Subordinate To The Mother Country.

The Cement Of This Union Is The Heart-blood Of Every American.

Our [virginia's] Act For Freedom Of Religion Is Extremely Applauded. The Ambassadors And Ministers Of The Several Nations Of Europe Resident At This Court Have Asked Me Copies Of It To Send To Their Sovereigns, And It Is Inserted At Full Length In Several Books Now In The Press; Among Others, In The New Encyclopédie. I Think It Will Produce Considerable Good Even In Those Countries Where Ignorance, Superstition, Poverty And Oppression Of Body And Mind In Every Form, Are So Firmly Settled On The Mass Of The People, That Their Redemption From Them Can Never Be Hoped.

Should Things Go Wrong At Any Time, The People Will Set Them To Rights By The Peaceable Exercise Of Their Elective Rights.

The Clergy Converted The Simple Teachings Of Jesus Into An Engine For Enslaving Mankind And Adulterated By Artificial Constructions Into A Contrivance To Filch Wealth And Power To Themselves...these Clergy, In Fact, Constitute The Real Anti-christ.

Whensoever The General Government Assumes Undelegated Powers, Its Acts Are Unauthoritative, Void, And Of No Force.

Every One Must Act According To The Dictates Of His Own Reason, And Mine Tells Me That Civil Powers Alone Have Been Given To The President Of The United States, And No Authority To Direct The Religious Exercises Of His Constituents.

Take Painsto Write A Neat Round, Plain Hand, And You Will Find It A Great Convenience Through Life To Write A Small And Compact Hand As Well As A Fair And Legible One.

We Are Sensible Of The Duty And Expediency Of Submitting Our Opinions To The Will Of The Majority, And Can Wait With Patience Till They Get Right If They Happen To Be At Any Time Wrong.

An Honest Man Can Feel No Pleasure In The Exercise Of Power Over His Fellow Citizens . . . There Has Never Been A Moment Of My Life In Which I Should Have Relinquished For It The Enjoyments Of My Family, My Farm, My Friends And Books.

Our Liberty Depends On The Freedom Of The Press, And That Cannot Be Limited Without Being Lost.

I Am Tired Of A Life Of Contention, And Of Being The Personal Object For The Hatred Of Every Man, Who Hates The Present State Of Things.

Nature [has] Implanted In Our Breasts A Love Of Others, A Sense Of Duty To Them, A Moral Instinct, In Short, Which Prompts Us Irresistibly To Feel And To Succor Their Distresses.

There Is No King, Who, With Sufficient Force, Is Not Always Ready To Make Himself Absolute.

The General (federal) Government Will Tend To Monarchy, Which Will Fortify Itself From Day To Day, Instead Of Working Its Own Cures.

No Man Complains Of His Neighbor For Ill Management Of His Affairs, For An Error In Sowing His Land, Or Marrying His Daughter, For Consuming His Substance In Taverns ... In All These He Has Liberty; But If He Does Not Frequent The Church, Or Then Conform In Ceremonies, There Is An Immediate Uproar.

No Country And No People Can Be Free And Ignorant At The Same Time.

Agriculture Is At The Same Time The Most Tranquil, Healthy, And Independent Occupation.

Our Wish Is That...[there Be] Maintained That State Of Property, Equal Or Unequal, Which Results To Every Man From His Own Industry Or That Of His Fathers.

The Public School System: "usually A Twelve Year Sentence Of Mind Control. Crushing Creativity, Smashing Individualism, Encouraging Collectivism And Compromise, Destroying The Exercise Of Intellectual Inquiry, Twisting It Instead Into Meek Subservience To Authority." - Walter Karp, Editor Harper's Magazine The Ground Of Liberty Is To Be Gained By Inches, And We Must Be Contented To Secure What We Can Get From Time To Time And Eternally Press Forward For What Is Yet To Get. It Takes Time To Persuade Men To Do Even What Is For Their Own Good.

I Do Not Believe War The Most Certain Means Of Enforcing Principles. Those Peaceable Coercions Which Are In The Power Of Every Nation, If Undertaken In Concert And In Time Of Peace, Are More Likely To Produce The Desired Effect.

The Man Who Reads Nothing At All Is Better Educated Than The Man Who Reads Nothing But Newspapers.

A First Attempt To Recover The Right Of Self Government May Fail, So May A Second, A Third, Etc. But As A Younger And More Instructed Race Comes On, The Sentiment Becomes More And More Intuitive, And A Fourth, A Fifth, Or Some Subsequent One Of The Ever Renewed Attempts Will Ultimately Succeed... To Attain All This, However, Rivers Of Blood Must Yet Flow, And Years Of Desolation Pass Over; Yet The Object Is Worth Rivers Of Blood And Years Of Desolation. For What Inheritance So Valuable Can Man Leave To His Posterity?

A Room Without Books Is Like A Life Without Meaning.

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