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The Colleges Of Edinburgh And Geneva As Seminaries Of Science, Are Considered As The Two Eyes Of Europe. While Great Britain And America Give The Preference To The Former, All Other Countries Give It To The Latter.

-Thomas Jefferson

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The Colleges Of Edinburgh

Thomas Jefferson

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The Colleges Of Edinburgh And Geneva As Seminaries Of Science, Are Considered As The Two Eyes Of Europe. While Great Britain And America Give The Preference To The Former, All Other Countries Give It To The Latter.

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Every Society Has A Right To Fix The Fundamental Principles Of Its Association, And To Say To All Individuals, That If They Contemplate Pursuits Beyond The Limits Of These Principles And Involving Dangers Which The Society Chooses To Avoid, They Must Go Somewhere Else For Their Exercise; That We Want No Citizens, And Still Less Ephemeral And Pseudo-citizens, On Such Terms. We May Exclude Them From Our Territory, As We Do Persons Infected With Disease.

The Present Generation Has The Same Right Of Self-government Which The Past One Has Exercised For Itself.

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.

Students Of Reading, Writing And Common Arithmetick . . . Graecian [greek], Roman, English And American History . . . Should Be Rendered . . . Worthy To Receive, And Able To Guard The Sacred Deposit Of The Rights And Liberties Of Their Fellow Citizens.

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

Nothing Can Now Be Believed Which Is Seen In A Newspaper. Truth Itself Becomes Suspicious By Being Put Into That Polluted Vehicle... Perhaps An Editor Might Begin A Reformation In Some Such Way As This. Divide His Paper Into Four Chapters, Heading The 1st, Truths. 2d, Probabilities. 3d, Possibilities. 4th, Lies. The First Chapter Would Be Very Short.

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

[i]t Seems That The Cannibals Of Europe Are Going To Eat One Another Again. A War Between Russia And Turkey Is Like The Battle Of The Kite And Snake; Whichever Destroys The Other, Leaves A Destroyer The Less For The World.

The Moral Sense, Or Conscience, Is As Much Part Of A Man As His Leg Or Arm. It Is Given To All In A Stronger Or Weaker Degree.. It May Be Strengthened By Exercise.

Difference Of Opinion Leads To Inquiry, And Inquiry To The Truth.

We Often Repent Of What We Have Said, But Never, Never, Of That Which We Have Not.

The Law For Religious Freedom... [has]put Down The Aristocracy Of The Clergy And Restored To The Citizen The Freedom Of The Mind.

It Is Mortifying To Suppose It Possible That A People Able And Zealous To Contend With The Enemy Should Be Reduced To Fold Their Arms For Want Of The Means Of Defence; Yet No Resources That We Know Of, Ensure Us Against This Event.

I Am Persuaded Myself That The Good Sense Of The People Will Always Be Found To Be The Best Army. They May Be Led Astray For A Moment, But Will Soon Correct Themselves. The People Are The Only Censors Of Their Governors; And Even Their Errors Will Tend To Keep These To The True Principles Of Their Institution.

All Eyes Are Opened, Or Opening, To The Rights Of Man. The General Spread Of The Light Of Science Has Already Laid Open To Every View. The Palpable Truth, That The Mass Of Mankind Has Not Been Born With Saddles On Their Backs, Nor A Favored Few Booted And Spurred, Ready To Ride Them Legitimately, By The Grace Of God. These Are Grounds Of Hope For Others. For Ourselves, Let The Annual Return Of This Day Forever Refresh Our Recollections Of These Rights, And An Undiminished Devotion To Them.

Laws Abridging The Natural Right Of The Citizen Should Be Restrained By Rigorous Constructions Within Their Narrowest Limits.

My Affections Were First For My Own Country, Then, Generally, For All Mankind

A Good Neighbor Is A Very Desireable Thing.

Our Part Is To Pursue With Steadiness What Is Right, Turning Neither To Right Nor Left For The Intrigues Or Popular Delusions Of The Day, Assured That The Public Approbation Will In The End Be With Us.

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

I Have Come To A Resolution Myself As I Hope Every Good Citizen Will, Never Again To Purchase Any Article Of Foreign Manufacture Which Can Be Had Of American Make, Be The Difference Of Price What It May.

The Spirit Of 1776 Is Not Dead. It Had Only Been Slumbering. The Body Of The American People Is Substantially Republican.

Inspirational Quotes On: Honesty, Simplicity, Secret, Universe, Modesty, Peace Honesty Is The First Chapter In The Book Of Wisdom.

Money, Not Morality, Constitutes The Principle Of Commercial Nations.

I View Great Cities As Pestilential To The Morals, The Health And The Liberties Of Man. True, They Nourish Some Of The Elegant Arts; But The Useful Ones Can Thrive Elsewhere; And Less Perfection In The Others, With More Health, Virtue And Freedom, Would Be My Choice.

The Spirit Of 1776 Is Not Dead. It Has Only Been Slumbering. The Body Of The American People Is Substantially Republican. But Their Virtuous Feelings Have Been Played On By Some Fact With More Fiction; They Have Been The Dupes Of Artful Maneuvers, And Made For A Moment To Be Willing Instruments In Forging Chains For Themselves. But Times And Truth Dissipated The Delusion, And Opened Their Eyes.

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.

We Lay It Down As A Fundamental, That Laws, To Be Just, Must Give A Reciprocation Of Right; That, Without This, They Are Mere Arbitrary Rules Of Conduct, Founded In Force, And Not In Conscience.

We Have No Paupers ... The Great Mass Of Our [united States] Population Is Of Laborers; Our Rich, Who Can Live Without Labor, Either Manual Or Professional, Being Few, And Of Moderate Wealth. Most Of The Laboring Class Possess Property, Cultivate Their Own Lands, Have Families, And From The Demand For Their Labor Are Enabled To Exact From The Rich And The Competent Such Prices As Enable Them To Be Fed Abundantly, Clothed Above Mere Decency, To Labor Moderately And Raise Their Families. ... Can Any Condition Of Society Be More Desirable Than This?

Agriculture Is Our Wisest Pursuit, Because It Will In The End Contribute Most To Real Wealth, Good Morals, And Happiness.

It Is Wonderful How Much May Be Done If We Are Always Doing.

If We Could Believe That Jesus...countenanced The Follies, Falsehoods And Charlatanisms Which His Biographers Father On Him, ...the Conclusion Would Be Irresistible...that He Was An Imposter.

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.

That One Hundred And Fifty Lawyers Should Do Business Together Ought Not To Be Expected.

But The Fact Being Once Established, That The Press Is Impotent When It Abandons Itself To Falsehood, I Leave To Others To Restore It To Its Strength, By Recalling It Within The Pale Of Truth. Within That, It Is A Noble Institution, Equally The Friend Of Science And Of Civil Liberty.

Above All Things I Hope The Education Of The Common People Will Be Attended To; Convinced That On Their Good Sense We May Rely With Most Security For The Preservation Of A Due Degree Of Liberty.

Whatever Enables Us To Go To War, Secures Our Peace

National Defense

The Only Security Of All Is In A Free Press.

Freedom Of The Press

I Have The Consolation Of Having Added Nothing To My Private Fortune During My Public Service, And Of Retiring With Hands Clean As They Are Empty.

Power Is Not Alluring To Pure Minds.

Ridicule Is The Only Weapon Which Can Be Used Against Unintelligible Propositions.

A Judiciary Independent Of A King Or Executive Alone, Is A Good Thing; But Independence Of The Will Of The Nation Is A Solecism, At Least In A Republican Government.

I Believe The States Can Best Govern Our Home Concerns, And The General Government Our Foreign Ones.

The Variety Of Opinions Leads To Questions. Questions Lead To Truth.

I Am Myself An Empiric In Natural Philosophy, Suffering My Faith To Go No Further Than My Facts. I Am Pleased, However, To See The Efforts Of Hypothetical Speculation, Because By The Collisions Of Different Hypotheses, Truth May Be Elicited And Science Advanced In The End.

He Who Is Permitted By Law To Have No Property Of His Own, Can With Difficulty Conceive That Property Is Founded In Anything But Force.

A Free People [claim] Their Rights As Derived From The Laws Of Nature, And Not As The Gift Of Their Chief Magistrate.

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.

Speeches That Are Measured By The Hour Will Die With The Hour.

I Had Always Hoped That The Younger Generation Receiving Their Early Impressions After The Flame Of Liberty Had Been Kindled In Every Breast . . . Would Have Sympathized With Oppression Wherever Found, And Proved Their Love Of Liberty Beyond Their Own Share Of It.

Sir,-your Letter Of February The 18th Came To Hand On The 1st Instant; And The Request Of The History Of My Physical Habits Would Have Puzzled Me Not A Little, Had It Not Been For The Model With Which You Accompanied It, Of Doctor Rush's Answer To A Similar Inquiry. I Live So Much Like Other People, That I Might Refer To Ordinary Life As A History Of My Own. Like My Friend The Doctor, I Have Lived Temperately, Eating Very Little Animal Food, And That Not As An Aliment, So Much As A Condiment For The Vegetables, Which Constitute My Principle Diet.

Every Gentleman Plays Billiards, But Someone Who Plays Billiards Too Well, Is No Gentleman.

Neither Believe Nor Reject Any Thing Because Any Other Person, Or Description Of Persons Have Rejected Or Believed It. Your Own Reason Is The Only Oracle Given You By Heaven.

In Every Country And In Every Age, The Priest Has Been Hostile To Liberty.

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

No Occupation Is So Delightful To Me As The Culture Of The Earth, And No Culture Comparable To That Of The Garden.

Educate And Inform The Whole Mass Of The People... They Are The Only Sure Reliance For The Preservation Of Our Liberty.

We Have No Right To Prejudice Another In His Civil Enjoyments Because He Is Of Another Church.

Religious Freedom

One War, Such As That Of Our Revolution, Is Enough For One Life.

When Tyranny Becomes Law, Rebellion Becomes Duty.

Opinion, And The Just Maintenance Of It, Shall Never Be A Crime In My View.

Be A Listener Only, Keep Within Yourself, And Endeavor To Establish With Yourself The Habit Of Silence, Especially In Politics.

I Steer My Bark With Hope In The Head, Leaving Fear Astern. My Hopes Indeed Sometimes Fail, But Not Oftener Than The Forebodings Of The Gloomy.

It Takes Time To Persuade Men To Do Even What Is For Their Own Good.

Mind Your Own Business

No Experiment Can Be More Interesting Than That We Are Now Trying, And Which We Trust Will End In Establishing The Fact, That Man May Be Governed By Reason And Truth.

The Happiness Of Society Depends So Much On Preventing Party Spirit From Infecting The Common Intercourse Of Life, That Nothing Should Be Spared To Harmonize And Amalgamate The Two Parties In Social Circles.

The Sentiments Of Men Are Known Not Only By What They Receive, But What They Reject Also.

I Tremble For My Country When I Reflect That God Is Just; That His Justice Cannot Sleep Forever.

I Think We Have More Machinery Of Government Than Is Necessary, Too Many Parasites Living On The Labor Of The Industrious.

The Reward Of Esteem, Respect And Gratitude [is] Due To Those Who Devote Their Time And Efforts To Render The Youths Of Every Successive Age Fit Governors For The Next.

Educate And Inform The Whole Mass Of The People. Enable Them To See That It Is Their Interest To Preserve Peace And Order, And They Will Preserve Them.

I Prefer To Be Remembered For What I Have Done For Others, Not What Others Have Done For Me.

We Could In The United States Make As Great A Variety Of Wines As Are Made In Europe, Not Exactly Of The Same Kinds, But Doubtless As Good.

Responsibility Is A Tremendous Engine In A Free Government.

Free Government

Compulsion In Religion Is Distinguished Peculiarly From Compulsion In Every Other Thing. ...i Cannot Be Saved By A Worship I Disbelieve And Abhor.

I Wish It Were Possible To Obtain A Single Amendment To Our Constitution. I Would Be Willing To Depend On That Alone For The Reduction Of The Administration Of Our Government; I Mean An Additional Article Taking From The Federal Government The Power Of Borrowing.

To Constrain The Brute Force Of The People, The European Governments Deem It Necessary To Keep Them Down By Hard Labor, Poverty And Ignorance, And To Take From Them, As From Bees, So Much Of Their Earnings, As That Unremitting Labor Shall Be Necessary To Obtain A Sufficient Surplus To Sustain A Scanty And Miserable Life.

There Is A Fulness Of Time When Men Should Go, And Not Occupy Too Long The Ground To Which Others Have A Right To Advance.

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.

Preach, My Dear Sir, A Crusade Against Ignorance; Establish & Improve The Law For Educating The Common People.

The People Are Not Always Well-informed, But Is Better That They Have Misconceptions That Make Them Restless Than That They Be Lethargic-for Lethargy In The People Means Death For Republics.

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.

Democrats Consider The People As The Safest Depository Of Power In The Last Resort; They Cherish Them, Therefore, And Wish To Leave In Them All The Powers To The Exercise Of Which They Are Competent.

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

We Have Solved, By Fair Experiment, The Great And Interesting Question Whether Freedom Of Religion Is Compatible With Order In Government And Obedience To The Laws. And We Have Experienced The Quiet As Well As The Comfort Which Results From Leaving Every One To Profess Freely And Openly Those Principles Of Religion Which Are The Inductions Of His Own Reason And The Serious Convictions Of His Own Inquiries.

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

Hemp Is Of First Necessity To The Wealth & Protection Of The Country.

I Place Economy Among The First And Most Important Virtues And Public Debt As The Greatest Dangers To Be Feared. To Preserve Our Independence, We Must Not Let Our Rulers Load Us With Perpetual Debt. If We Run Into Such Debts, We Must Be Taxed In Our Meat And Drink, In Our Necessities And In Our Comforts, In Our Labor And In Our Amusements. If We Can Prevent The Government From Wasting The Labor Of The People, Under The Pretense Of Caring For Them, They Will Be Happy.

The Sickly, Weakly, Timid Man Fears The People, And Is A Tory By Nature. The Healthy, Strong And Bold Cherishes Them, And Is Formed A Whig By Nature.

[t]he Dignity Of Parliament It Seems Can Brook No Opposition To It's Power. Strange That A Set Of Men Who Have Made Sale Of Theirvirtue To The Minister Should Yet Talk Of Retaining Dignity!

The Benefit Of Even Limited Monopolies Is Too Doubtful, To Be Opposed To That Of Their General Suppression.

It Is A Moot Question Whether The Origin Of Any Kind Of Property Is Derived From Nature At All. It Is Agreed By Those Who Have Seriously Considered The Subject That No Individual Has, Of Natural Right, A Separate Property In An Acre Of Land, For Instance. By A Universal Law, Indeed, Whatever, Whether Fixed Or Movable, Belongs To All Men Equally And In Common Is The Property For The Moment Of Him Who Occupies It; But When He Relinquishes The Occupation, The Property Goes With It. Stable Ownership Is The Gift Of Social Law, And Is Given Late In The Progress Of Society.

Progress Of Society

The Natural Cause Of The Human Mind Is Certainly From Credulity To Skepticism.

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

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

Religious Leaders Will Always Avail Themselves Of Public Ignorance For Their Own Purpose.

Fear Can Only Prevail When Victims Are Ignorant Of The Facts.

If We Did A Good Act Merely From Love Of God And A Belief That It Is Pleasing To Him, Whence Arises The Morality Of The Atheist? ...their Virtue, Then, Must Have Had Some Other Foundation Than The Love Of God.

The Art Of Life Is The Art Of Avoiding Pain.

A Country Whose Buildings Are Of Wood, Can Never Increase In Its Improvements To Any Considerable Degree.... Whereas When Buildings Are Of Durable Materials, Every New Edifice Is An Actual And Permanent Acquisition To The State, Adding To Its Value As Well As To Its Ornament.

With Your Talents And Industry, With Science, And That Steadfast Honesty Which Eternally Pursues Right, Regardless Of Consequences, You May Promise Yourself Every Thing-but Health, Without Which There Is No Happiness. An Attention To Health Then Should Take Place Of Evey Other Object. The Time Necessary To Secure This By Active Exercises, Should Be Devoted To It In Preference To Every Other Pursuit.

There Are Other Places At Which ... The Laws Have Said There Shall Be Towns; But Nature Has Said There Shall Not, And They Remain Unworthy Of Enumeration.

[states And The Federal Government Are] Coordinate Departments Of One Simple And Integral Whole... The One Is The Domestic, The Other The Foreign Branch Of The Same Government.

The Objects Of This Primary Education . . . Would Be . . . To Form The Statesmen, Legislators And Judges, On Whom Public Prosperity And Individual Happiness Are So Much To Depend.

Individual Happiness

If We Can But Prevent The Government From Wasting The Labours Of The People, Under The Pretence Of Taking Care Of Them, They Must Become Happy.

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

Difference Of Opinion Leads To Enquiry, And Enquiry To Truth; And I Am Sure...we Both Value Too Much The Freedom Of Opinion Sanctioned By Our Constitution, Not To Cherish Its Exercise Even Where In Opposition To Ourselves.

Let Our Countrymen Know That The People Alone Can Protect Us Against These Evils Of Misgovernment.

The Mobs Of The Great Cities Add Just So Much To The Support Of Pure Government As Sores Do To The Strength Of The Human Body. It Is The Manners And Spirit Of A People Which Preserve A Republic In Vigor. A Degeneracy In These Is A Canker Which Soon Eats To The Heart Of Its Laws And Constitution.

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.

It Be Urged That The Wild And Uncultivated Tree, Hitherto Yielding Sour And Bitter Fruit Only, Can Never Be Made To Yield Better; Yet We Know That The Grafting Art Implants A New Tree On The Savage Stock, Producing What Is Most Estimable In Kind And Degree. Education, In Like Manner, Engrafts A New Man On The Native Stock, And Improves What In His Nature Was Vicious And Perverse Into Qualities Of Virtue And Social Worth.

No Government Can Be Maintained Without The Principle Of Fear As Well As Duty. Good Men Will Obey The Last, But Bad Ones The Former Only. If Our Government Ever Fails, It Will Be From This Weakness.

The Main Objects Of All Science, The Freedom And Happiness Of Man. . . . [are] The Sole Objects Of All Legitimate Government. A Plaque With This Quotation, With The First Phrase Omitted, Is In The Stairwell Of The Pedestal Of The Statue Of Liberty.

Whenever You Do A Thing, Act As If All The World Were Watching.

The People, Especially When Moderately Instructed, Are The Only Safe, Because The Only Honest, Depositaries Of The Public Rights, And Should Therefore Be Introduced Into The Administration Of Them In Every Function To Which They Are Sufficient; They Will Err Sometimes And Accidentally, But Never Designedly, And With A Systematic And Persevering Purpose Of Overthrowing The Free Principles Of The Government.

I Never Will, By Any Word Or Act, Bow To The Shrine Of Intolerance Or Admit A Right Of Inquiry Into The Religious Opinions Of Others.

If The Measures Which Have Been Pursued Are Approved By The Majority, It Is The Duty Of The Minority To Acquiesce And Conform.

I Find That The Harder I Work, The More Luck I Seem To Have.

The President Is Bound To Stop At The Limits Prescribed By Our Constitution And Law To The Authorities In His Hands, [and This] Would Apply In An Occasion Of Peace As Well As War.

Ministers And Merchants Love Nobody.

How Did Jefferson Feel About The People Of His Day Who Were The Equivalent Of Our Modern Day Penecostals? You Know, Those Revelation Reveling Tongue Speaking Idiots.

Your Own Reason Is The Only Oracle Given To You By God.

You Have Heard Of The New Chemical Nomenclature Endeavored To Be Introduced By Lavoisier, Fourcroy, &c. Other Chemists Of This Country, Of Equal Note, Reject It, And Prove In My Opinion That It Is Premature, Insufficient And False. These Latter Are Joined By The British Chemists; And Upon The Whole, I Think The New Nomenclature Will Be Rejected, After Doing More Harm Than Good. There Are Some Good Publications In It, Which Must Be Translated Into The Ordinary Chemical Language Before They Will Be Useful.

It Is Strangely Absurd To Suppose That A Million Of Human Beings, Collected Together, Are Not Under The Same Moral Laws Which Bind Each Of Them Separately.

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.

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.

‎we Must Make Our Choice Between Economy And Liberty Or Confusion And Servitude...if We Run Into Such Debts, We Must Be Taxed In Our Meat And Drink, In Our Necessities And Comforts, In Our Labor And In Our Amusements...if We Can Prevent The Government From Wasting The Labor Of The People, Under The Pretense Of Caring For Them, They Will Be Happy.

I Feel Much Alarmed At The Prospect Of Seeing General Jackson President. He Is The Most Unfit Man I Know For Such A Place.

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.

The Bible Makes The Best People In The World.

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

If You Have To Eat Crow, Eat It While It's Young And Tender.

Above All I Hope That The Education Of The Common People Will Be Attended To So They Won't Forget The Basic Principles Of Freedom.

Leave No Authority Existing Not Responsible To The People.

The Clergy, By Getting Themselves Established By Law And In-grafted Into The Machine Of Government, Have Been A Very Formidable Engine Against The Civil And Religious Rights Of Man.

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.

Do Not Be Too Severe Upon The Errors Of The People, But Reclaim Them By Enlightening Them.

The Colleges Of Edinburgh And Geneva As Seminaries Of Science, Are Considered As The Two Eyes Of Europe. While Great Britain And America Give The Preference To The Former, All Other Countries Give It To The Latter.

Natural Rights [are] The Objects For The Protection Of Which Society Is Formed And Municipal Laws Established.

The Christian God Is A Being Of Terrific Character - Cruel, Vindictive, Capricious And Unjust.

To Lay Taxes To Provide For The General Welfare Of The United States, That Is To Say, 'to Lay Taxes For The Purpose Of Providing For The General Welfare.' For The Laying Of Taxes Is The Power, And The General Welfare The Purpose For Which The Power Is To Be Exercised. They Are Not To Lay Taxes Ad Libitum For Any Purpose They Please; But Only To Pay The Debts Or Provide For The Welfare Of The Union.

Experience Has Already Shown That The Impeachment The Constitution Has Provided Is Not Even A Scarecrow.

The Press Is Impotent When It Abandons Itself To Falsehood.

Instead Of That Liberty Which Takes Root And Growth In The Progress Of Reason, If Recovered By Mere Force Or Accident, It Becomes With An Unprepared People A Tyranny Still Of The Many, The Few, Or The One.

Truth Is Certainly A Branch Of Morality And A Very Important One To Society.

This Ball Of Liberty, I Believe Most Piously, Is Now So Well In Motion That It Will Roll Round The Globe. At Least The Enlightened Part Of It, For Light & Liberty Go Together.

The Only Way To Win Money Out Of A Casino Is To Own One.

And For The Support Of This Declaration, With A Firm Reliance On The Protection Of Divine Providence, We Mutually Pledge To Each Other Our Lives, Our Fortunes And Our Sacred Honor.

[t]he True Key For The Construction Of Everything Doubtful In A Law Is The Intention Of The Law-makers. This Is Most Safely Gathered From The Words, But May Be Sought Also In Extraneous Circumstances Provided They Do Not Contradict The Express Words Of The Law.

All Persons Shall Have Full And Free Liberty Of Religious Opinion; Nor Shall Any Be Compelled To Frequent Or Maintain Any Religious Institution.

Confidence Is Everywhere The Parent Of Despotism. Free Government Is Founded In Jealousy, And Not In Confidence.

When The Subject Is Strong, Simplicity Is The Only Way To Treat It.

Politics Is Such A Torment That I Advise Everyone I Love Not To Mix With It.

I Do Not Agree That An Age Of Pleasure Is No Compensation For A Moment Of Pain.

Evil Triumphs When Good Men Do Nothing.

Having Always Observed That Public Works Are Much Less Advantageously Managed Than The Same Are By Private Hands, I Have Thought It Better For The Public To Go To Market For Whatever It Wants Which Is To Be Found There; For There Competition Brings It Down To The Minimum Value.

Well Aware That The Opinions And Belief Of Men Depend Not On Their Own Will, But Follow Involuntarily The Evidence Proposed To Their Minds; That Almighty God Hath Created The Mind Free, And Manifested His Supreme Will That Free It Shall Remain By Making It Altogether Insusceptible Of Restraint; That All Attempts To Influence It By Temporal Punishments, Or Burthens, Or By Civil Incapacitations, Tend Only To Beget Habits Of Hypocrisy And Meanness, And Are A Departure From The Plan Of The Holy Author Of Our Religion.

Still Less, Let It Be Proposed That Our Properties Within Our Own Territories Shall Be Taxed Or Regulated By Any Power On Earth But Our Own. The God Who Gave Us Life Gave Us Liberty At The Same Time: The Hand Of Force May Destroy, But Cannot Disjoin Them.

Our People Shall Be Free

Be Polite To All, But Intimate With Few.

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

While Learning The Language In France A Young Man's Morals, Health And Fortune Are More Irresistibly Endangered Than In Any Country Of The Universe.

I Have Sometimes Asked Myself Whether My Country Is The Better For My Having Lived At All? I Do Not Know That It Is. I Have Been The Instrument Of Doing The Following Things; But They Would Have Been Done By Others; Some Of Them, Perhaps, A Little Better.

In A Republican Nation Whose Citizens Are To Be Led By Reason And Persuasion And Not By Force, The Art Of Reasoning Becomes Of First Importance.... Reason And Persuasion Are The Only Practicable Instruments. To Make Way For These, Free Inquiry Must Be Indulged.... Let Them Take Arms. The Remedy Is To Set Them Right As To The Facts, Pardon And Pacify Them.

My Most Earnest Wish Is To See The Republican Element Of Popular Control Pushed To The Maximum Of Its Practicable Exercise. I Shall Then Believe That Our Government May Be Pure And Perpetual.

I Shall Need, Too, The Favor Of That Being In Whose Hands We Are, Who Led Our Fathers, As Israel Of Old, From Their Native Land And Planted Them In A Country Flowing With All The Necessaries Of Comforts Of Life.

... I Am Not Afraid Of Priests. They Have Tried Upon Me All Their Various Batteries Of Pious Whining, Hypocritical Canting, Lying And Slandering. I Have Contemplated Their Order From The Magi Of The East To The Saints Of The West And I Have Found No Difference Of Character, But Of More Or Less Caution, In Proportion To Their Information Or Ignorance On Whom Their Interested Duperies Were To Be Played Off. Their Sway In New England Is Indeed Formidable. No Mind Beyond Mediocrity Dares There To Develop Itself.

The Contradictory Experiments Of Chemists Leave Us At Liberty To Conclude What We Please. My Conclusion Is, That Art Has Not Yet Invented Sufficient Aids To Enable Such Subtle Bodies [air, Light, &c.] To Make A Well-defined Impression On Organs As Blunt As Ours; That It Is Laudable To Encourage Investigation But To Hold Back Conclusion.

Life Is Of No Value But As It Brings Gratifications. Among The Most Valuable Of These Is Rational Society. It Informs The Mind, Sweetens The Temper, Chears Our Spirits, And Promotes Health.

When Two Parties Make A Compact, There Results To Each A Power Of Compelling The Other To Execute It.

In A Government Bottomed On The Will Of All, The... Liberty Of Every Individual Citizen Becomes Interesting To All.

When You Abandon Freedom To Achieve Security, You Lose Both And Deserve Neither.

Peace And Abstinence From European Interferences Are Our Objects, And So Will Continue While The Present Order Of Things In America Remain Uninterrupted.

I Think Myself That We Have More Machinery Of Government Than Is Necessary, Too Many Parasites Living On The Labor Of The Industrious. Government Big Enough To Supply Everything You Need Is Big Enough To Take Everything You Have ... The Course Of History Shows That As A Government Grows, Liberty Decreases. The Two Enemies Of The People Are Criminals And Government, So Let Us Tie The Second Down With The Chains Of The Constitution So The Second Will Not Become The Legalized Version Of The First.

There Is No Act, However Virtuous, For Which Ingenuity May Not Find Some Bad Motive.

Many Are The Exercises Of Power Reserved To The States Wherein A Uniformity Of Proceeding Would Be Advantageous To All. Such Are Quarantines, Health Laws, Regulations Of The Press, Banking Institutions, Training Militia, Etc., Etc.

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.

The Expedition Of Messrs. Lewis & Clarke For Exploring The River Missouri, & The Best Communication From That To The Pacific Ocean, Has Had All The Success Which Could Have Been Expected.

The Constitution On Which Our Union Rests, Shall Be Administered By Me [as President] According To The Safe And Honest Meaning Contemplated By The Plain Understanding Of The People Of The United States At The Time Of Its Adoption - A Meaning To Be Found In The Explanations Of Those Who Advocated, Not Those Who Opposed It, And Who Opposed It Merely Lest The Construction Should Be Applied Which They Denounced As Possible.

An Industrious Farmer Occupies A More Dignified Place In The Scale Of Beings...than A Lazy Lounger...too Proud To Work, And Drawing Out A Miserable Existence By Eating On That Surplus Of Other Men's Labor.

A Coward Is Much More Exposed To Quarrels Than A Man Of Spirit.

Let Us, Then, Fellow Citizens, Unite With One Heart And One Mind. Let Us Restore To Social Intercourse That Harmony And Affection Without Which Liberty And Even Life Itself Are But Dreary Things. And Let Us Reflect That Having Banished From Our Land That Religious Intolerance Under Which Mankind So Long Bled, We Have Yet Gained Little If We Counternance A Political Intolerance As Despotic, As Wicked, And Capable Of A Bitter And Bloody Persecutions.

In Every Free And Deliberating Society, There Must, From The Nature Of Man, Be Opposite Parties, And Violent Dissensions And Discords; And One Of These, For The Most Part, Must Prevail Over The Other For A Longer Or Shorter Time.

Always Take Hold Of Things By The Smooth Handle.

I Have Been Long Sensible That While I Was Endeavoring To Render Our Country The Greatest Of All Services, That Of Regenerating The Public Education, And Placing Our Rising Generation On The Level Of Our Sister States (which They Have Proudly Held Heretofore), I Was Discharging The Odious Function Of A Physician Pouring Medicine Down The Throat Of A Patient Insensible Of Needing It.

No Society Is So Precious As That Of One’s Own Family.

In Short I Must Confide In You To Take Such Care Of The Men Under You As An Economical Householder Would Of His Own Family, Doingevery Thing Within Himself As Far As He Can, And Calling For As Few Supplies As Possible. The Less You Depend For Supplies From This Quarter, The Less You Will Be Disappointed.

Material Abundance Without Character Is The Surest Way To Destruction.

...let Us Save What Remains; Not By Vaults And Locks Which Fence Them From The Public Eye And Use In Consigning Them To The Waste Of Time, But By Such A Multiplication Of Copies, As Shall Place Them Beyond The Reach Of Accident.

The Same Facts Impress Us Differently.

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.

One Of My Favorite Ideas Is, Never To Keep An Unnecessary Soldier.

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

I Look To The Diffusion Of Light And Education As The Resource Most To Be Relied On For Ameliorating The Condition, Promoting The Virtue And Advancing The Happiness Of Man.

I Can Never Fear That Things Will Go Far Wrong Where Common Sense Has Fair Play.

[t]he People Seem To Have Deposited The Monarchical And Taken Up The Republican Government With As Much Ease As Would Have Attended Their Throwing Off An Old And Putting On A New Suit Of Clothes.

Where The Law Of The Majority Ceases To Be Acknowledged, There Government Ends; The Law Of The Strongest Takes Its Place, And Life And Property Are His Who Can Take Them.

Nothing Can Now Be Believed Which Is Seen In A Newspaper. Truth Itself Becomes Suspicious By Being Put Into That Polluted Vehicle.

Freedom Of The Press

The Habeas Corpus Secures Every Man Here, Alien Or Citizen, Against Everything Which Is Not Law, Whatever Shape It May Assume.

The Oppressed Should Rebel, And They Will Continue To Rebel And Raise Disturbance Until Their Civil Rights Are Fully Restored To Them And All Partial Distinctions, Exlusions, And Incapacitations Are Removed.

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