“It is substantially true, that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, indeed, extends with more or less force to every species of free government.”
―
George Washington
“Arbitrary power is most easily established on the ruins of liberty abused to licentiousness.”
―
George Washington
“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?"
―
George Washington
“Of Congress, "party disputes and personal quarrels are the great business of the day whilst the momentous concerns of an empire...are but secondary considerations," that "business of a trifling nature and personal concernment withdraws their attention from matters of great national moment.”
―
George Washington
“Every day the increasing weight of years admonishes me more and more, that the shade of retirement is as necessary to me as it will be welcome.”
―
George Washington
“No individual has any right to come into the world and go out of it without leaving behind him distinct and legitimate reasons for having passed through it.”
―
George Washington
Being Set at meat Scratch not, neither Spit, Cough, or blow your Nose except there's a Necessity for it.”
―
George Washington
“We began a contest for liberty ill provided with the means for the war, relying on our patriotism to supply the deficiency. We expected to encounter many wants and distressed… we must bear the present evils and fortitude…”
―
George Washington
“It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people, that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights. For happily the government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction - to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens.”
―
George Washington
“Unhappy it is, though, to reflect that a brother's sword has been sheathed in a brother's breast and that the once-happy plains of America are either to be drenched with blood or inhabited by slaves. Sad alternative! But can a virtuous man hesitate in his choice?”
―
George Washington
“Discipline is the soul of an army. It makes small numbers formidable; procures success to the weak, and esteem to all”
―
George Washington
“[death]...the abyss from where no traveler is permitted to return”
―
George Washington
“If the cause is advanced, indifferent is it to me where or in what quarter it happens.”
―
George Washington
“No pecuniary consideration is more urgent, than the regular redemption and discharge of the public debt: on none can delay be more injurious, or an economy of time more valuable.
―
George Washington
