“I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“A government which can be felt; a government of energy. God send that our country may never have a government, which it can feel.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“If you want something you’ve never had, you’ve got to do something you’ve never done before.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“He who permits himself to tell a lie once, finds it much easier to do it the second time.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“You have heard of the new chemical nomenclature endeavored to be introduced by Lavoisier, Fourcroy, &c. Other chemists of this country, of equal note, reject it, and prove in my opinion that it is premature, insufficient and false. These latter are joined by the British chemists; and upon the whole, I think the new nomenclature will be rejected, after doing more harm than good. There are some good publications in it, which must be translated into the ordinary chemical language before they will be useful.”
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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
“Even in Europe a change has sensibly taken place in the mind of man. Science has liberated the ideas of those who read and reflect, and the American example has kindled feelings of right in the people.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“Any Government strong enough to give you what you want, is a Government strong enough to take everything you have!”
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Thomas Jefferson
“The executive power in our government is not the only, perhaps not even the principal, object of my solicitude. The tyranny of the legislature is really the danger most to be feared, and will continue to be so for many years to come. The tyranny of the executive power will come in its turn, but at a more distant period.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“In every country and every age, the priest had been hostile to Liberty.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“Every day is lost in which we do not learn something useful. Man has no nobler or more valuable possession than time.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“No man will ever bring out of that office the reputation which carries him into it. The honeymoon would be as short in that case as in any other, and its moments of ecstasy would be ransomed by years of torment and hatred.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“Man once surrendering his reason, has no remaining guard against absurdities the most monstrous, and like a ship without rudder, is the sport of every wind. With such persons, gullibility, which they call faith, takes the helm from the hand of reason, and the mind becomes a wreck.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“We seem not to perceive that, by the law of nature, one generation is to another as one independent nation is to another.”
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Thomas Jefferson