“I hope they pardoned them. The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions, that i wish it to be always kept alive....I like a little rebellion now and then. It is like a storm in the atmosphere.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“The fantastical idea of virtue and the public good being a sufficient security to the state against the commission of crimes...was never mine. It is only the sanguinary hue of our penal laws which I meant to object to. Punishments I know are necessary, and I would provide them strict and inflexible, but proportioned to the crime. Death might be inflicted for murder and perhaps for treason, [but I] would take out of the description of treason all crimes which are not such in their nature. Rape, buggery, etc., punish by castration. All other crimes by working on high roads, rivers, gallies, etc., a certain time proportioned to the offence... Laws thus proportionate and mild should never be dispensed with. Let mercy be the character of the lawgiver, but let the judge be a mere machine. The mercies of the law will be dispensed equally and impartially to every description of men; those of the judge or of the executive power will be the eccentric impulses of whimsical, capricious designing man.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“never trust a man who won't accept that there is more than one way to spell a word
Paraphrased”
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Thomas Jefferson
“Everything is useful which contributes to fix in the principles and practices of virtue.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“He who knows nothing is closer to the truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“To take from one because it is thought that his own industry and that of his father’s has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association--the guarantee to every one of a free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“The laws that forbid the carrying of arms... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“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.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“[Christianity is] the most ... perverted system that ever shone on man.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of Liberty.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“The object of walking is to relax the mind. You should therefore not permit yourself even to think while you walk. But divert your attention by the objects surrounding you.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“The majority, oppressing an individual, is guilty of a crime, abuses its strength, and by acting on the law of the strongest breaks up the foundations of society.”
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Thomas Jefferson
