Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Never did a prisoner, released from his chains, feel such relief as I shall on shaking off the shackles of power.
To compel a man to furnish funds for the propagation of ideas he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.
Laws that forbid the carrying of arms disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes.
I do verily believe that a single, consolidated government would become the most corrupt government on the earth.
No occupation is so delightful to me as the culture of the earth, and no culture comparable to that of the garden.
Whensoever the General Government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force.
No knowledge can be more satisfactory to a man than that of his own frame, its parts, their functions and actions.
Congress has scarcely any thing to employ them, and complain that the place [Washington, D.C.] is remarkably dull.
It is as useless to argue with those who have renounced the use of reason as to administer medication to the dead.
The worst day in a man's life is when he sits down and begins thinking about how he can get something for nothing.
We are now vibrating between too much and too little government, and the pendulum will rest finally in the middle.
Travelling. ... when men of sober age travel, they gather knowlege which they may apply usefully for their country
The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive.
War is an instrument entirely inefficient toward redressing wrong; and multiplies, instead of indemnifying losses.
Honesty is the first chapter in the Book of wisdom. Let it be our endeavor to merit the character of a just nation.
I find friendship to be like wine, raw when new, ripened with age, the true old man's milk and restorative cordial.
I am for freedom of religion, and against all maneuvers to bring about a legal ascendency of one sect over another.
In a government bottomed on the will of all, the... liberty of every individual citizen becomes interesting to all.
Let the farmer forevermore be honored in his calling; for they who labor in the earth are the chosen people of God.
The greatest service which can be rendered any country is to add a useful plant to its culture. --The Fruit Hunters
Civil government being the sole object of forming societies, its administration must be conducted by common consent.
The wise know too well their weakness to assume infallibility; and he who knows most knows best how little he knows.
It may be regarded as certain that not a foot of land will ever be taken from the Indians without their own consent.
Each generation has a right to choose for itself the form of government it believes most promotive of its happiness.
The issuing power [of money] should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.
The genuine and simple religion of Jesus will one day be restored: such as it was preached and practiced by Himself.
It is surely time for men to think for themselves, and to throw off the authority of names so artificially magnified.
Every day is lost in which we do not learn something useful. Man has no nobler or more valuable possession than time.
My confidence is that there will for a long time be virtue and good sense enough in our countrymen to correct abuses.
If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.
I hope that we have not labored in vain, and that our experiment will still prove that men can be governed by reason.
From the nature of things, every society must at all times possess within itself the sovereign powers of legislation.
A free people [claim] their rights as derived from the laws of nature, and not as the gift of their chief magistrate.
We should talk over the lessons of the day, or lose them in Music, Chess, or the merriments of our family companions.
It is a misnomer to call a government republican in which a branch of the supreme power is independent of the nation.
It is not by the consolidation or concentration of powers but by their distribution that good government is effected.
Liberty is the great parent of science and of virtue; and a nation will be great in both in proportion as it is free.
Was the government to prescribe to us our medicine and diet, our bodies would be in such keeping as our souls are now.
We are completely saddled and bridled, and... the bank is so firmly mounted on us that we must go where it will guide.
Idleness begets ennui, ennui the hypochondriac, and that a diseased body. No laborious person was ever yet hysterical.
It is more dangerous that even a guilty person should be punished without the forms of law than that he should escape.
The right to use a thing comprehends a right to the means necessary to its use, and without which it would be useless.
Excessive taxation . . . will carry reason & reflection to every man's door, and particularly in the hour of election.
Independence can be trusted nowhere but with the people in mass. They are inherently independent of all but moral law.
I will not believe our labors are lost. I shall not die without a hope that light and liberty are on a steady advance.
Defend our liberties and fashion into one united people the multitudes brought hither out of many kindred and tongues.
Every citizen should be a soldier. This was the case with the Greeks and Romans, and must be that of every free state.
May I never get too busy in my own affairs that I fail to respond to the needs of others with kindness and compassion.
The republican is the only form of government which is not eternally at open or secret war with the rights of mankind.
Difference of opinion is advantageous in religion. The several sects perform the office of a Censor - over each other.