“It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes. A principle which if acted on would save one-half the wars of the world.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“he repudiated the writings of the Apostle Paul," whom he considered the (first corrupter of the doctrines of Jesus”
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Thomas Jefferson
“I think one travels more usefully when they travel alone, because they reflect more."
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Thomas Jefferson
“Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“When the clergy addressed General Washington on his departure from the government, it was observed in their consultation that he had never on any occasion said a word to the public which showed a belief in the Christian religion and they thought they should so pen their address as to force him at length to declare publicly whether he was a Christian or not. They did so. However [Dr. Rush] observed the old fox was too cunning for them. He answered every article of their address particularly except that, which he passed over without notice... I know that Gouverneur Morris, who pretended to be in his secrets & believed himself to be so, has often told me that General Washington believed no more of that system than he himself did.
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Thomas Jefferson
“Enlighten the people, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“I have no ambition to govern men; it is a painful and thankless office.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“Can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of people that these liberties are the gift of God?”
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Thomas Jefferson
“I wish I was a despot that I might save the noble, the beautiful trees that are daily falling sacrifice to the cupidity of their owners, or the necessity of the poor. The unnecessary felling of a tree, perhaps the growth of centuries, seems to me a crime little short of murder.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“It was one of the rules which above all others made Doctr. Franklin the most amiable of men in society, "never to contradict anybody.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends [life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness] it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute new government...”
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Thomas Jefferson
“… the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them, inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws of Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“Those who expect to be both ignorant and free, expect what never was and never will be.”
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Thomas Jefferson
