“I have often thought that nothing would do more extensive good at small expense than the establishment of a small circulating library in every county, to consist of a few well-chosen books, to be lent to the people of the country under regulations as would secure their safe return in due time.”

“A morsel of genuine history is a thing so rare as to be always valuable.”

“Some men look at constitutions with sanctimonious reverence, and deem them like the ark of the covenant, too sacred to be touched. They ascribe to the men of the preceding age a wisdom more than human, and suppose what they did to be beyond amendment. I knew that age well; I belonged to it, and labored with it. It deserved well of its country. It was very like the present, but without the experience of the present; and forty years of experience in government is worth a century of book-reading; and this they would say themselves, were they to rise from the dead. I am certainly not an advocate for frequent and untried changes in laws and constitutions. I think moderate imperfections had better be borne with; because, when once known, we accommodate ourselves to them, and find practical means of correcting their ill effects. But I know also, that laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths disclosed, and manners and opinions change with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also, and keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy, as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.” 

“the measure of society is how it treats the weakest members”

“A coward is much more exposed to quarrels than a man of spirit.”

“It be urged that the wild and uncultivated tree, hitherto yielding sour and bitter fruit only, can never be made to yield better; yet we know that the grafting art implants a new tree on the savage stock, producing what is most estimable in kind and degree. Education, in like manner, engrafts a new man on the native stock, and improves what in his nature was vicious and perverse into qualities of virtue and social worth.”

“Leave no authority existing not responsible to the people.”

“I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty, than those attending too small a degree of it.”

“The main objects of all science, the freedom and happiness of man. . . . [are] the sole objects of all legitimate government.

“Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost.”

“The equal rights of man, and the happiness of every individual, are now acknowledged to be the only legitimate objects of government.”

“If you want something you've never had You must be willing to do something you've never done.” 

“I cannot live without books . . .”

“Whatever enables us to go to war, secures our peace”

“I cannot live without books: but fewer will suffice where amusement, and not use, is the only future object.”