“Be courteous to all, but intimate with few, and let those few be well tried before you give them your confidence.”
―
George Washington
“There is nothing which can better deserve our patronage than the promotion of science and literature. Knowledge is in every country the surest basis of public happiness.”
―
George Washington
“Experience teaches us that it is much easier to prevent an enemy from posting themselves than it is to dislodge them after they have got possession. ”
―
George Washington
“The common and continual mischief's [sic] of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and the duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it. It serves always to distract the public councils and enfeeble the public administration. It agitates the community with ill founded jealousies and false alarms, kindles the animosity of one part against another, foments occasionally riot and insurrection. It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which find a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party passion.”
―
George Washington
“no punishment, in my opinion, is to great, for the man who can build his greatness upon his country's ruin”
―
George Washington
“There is nothing so likely to produce peace as to be well prepared to meet the enemy”
―
George Washington
“Where are our Men of abilities? Why do they not come forth to save their Country?”
―
George Washington
“As Mankind becomes more liberal, they will be more apt to allow that all those who conduct themselves as worthy members of the community are equally entitled to the protections of civil government. I hope ever to see America among the foremost nations of justice and liberality.”
―
George Washington
“No morn has ever dawned more favourably than ours did; and no day was ever more clouded than the present. Wisdom and good examples are necessary at this time to rescue the political machine from the impending storm.”
―
George Washington
“We should not look back unless it is to derive useful lessons from past errors, and for the purpose of profiting by dearly bought experience. ”
―
George Washington
“If we desire to avoid insult, we must be able to repel it; if we desire to secure peace, one of the most powerful instruments of our rising prosperity, it must be known, that we are at all times ready for War.”
―
George Washington
“If freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.”
―
George Washington
“Harmony, liberal intercourse with all nations, are recommended by policy, humanity, and interest.”
―
George Washington
“However [political parties] may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.”
―
George Washington
