“The God who gave us life gave us liberty at the same time; the hand of force may destroy but cannot disjoin them.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“I am certainly not an advocate for frequent and untried changes in laws and constitutions...but I know also that laws and constitutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind.....”
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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
“When describing the University of Virginia: Here, We are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead, nor to tolerate any error so long as reason is left free to combat it.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“Were I to undertake to answer the calumnies of the newspapers, it would be more than all my own time, and that of 20 aids could effect. For while I should be answering one, twenty new ones would be invented. I have thought it better to trust the justice of my country-men, that they would judge me by what they see of my conduct on the stage where they have placed me.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“It is neither wealth nor splendor, but tranquility and occupation which give happiness.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“The greatest service which can be rendered any country is to add a useful plant to its culture.
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Thomas Jefferson
“If, therefore, from the settlement of the Saxons, to the introduction of Christianity among them, that system of religion could not be a part of the common law, because they were not yet Christians; and if, having their laws from that period to the close of the common law, we are able to find among them no such act of adoption; we may safely affirm (though contradicted by all the judges and writers on earth) that Christianity neither is, nor ever was, a part of the common law.
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Thomas Jefferson
“I sincerely believe the banking institutions having the issuing power of money, are more dangerous to liberty than standing armies.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“I set out on this ground, which I suppose to be self-evident, that the dart belongs in usufruct to the living.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“The Tree of Liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrant. It is its natural manure.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our People, and eat out their substance.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“We in America do not have government by the majority. We have government by the majority who participate.”
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Thomas Jefferson
