“Nothing was or is farther from my intentions, than to enlist myself as the champion of a fixed opinion, where I have only expressed doubt.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“When the people fear the government there is tyranny, when the government fears the people there is liberty.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“All should be laid open to you without reserve, for there is not a truth existing which I fear, or would wish unknown to the whole world.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“A wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circlue of our felicities.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“When I hear another express an opinion which is not mine, I say to myself, he has a right to his opinion, as I to mine. Why should I question it? His error does me no injury, and shall I become a Don Quixote, to bring all men by force of argument to one opinion? ...Be a listener only, keep within yourself, and endeavor to establish with yourself the habit of silence, especially in politics.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“The contest is not between Us and Them, but between Good and Evil, and if those who would fight Evil adopt the ways of Evil, Evil wins.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“If the present Congress errs in too much talking, how can it be otherwise in a body to which the people send 150 lawyers, whose trade it is to question everything, yield nothing, & talk by the hour? That 150 lawyers should do business together ought not to be expected.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“I am convinced our own happiness requires that we should continue to mix with the world, and to keep pace with it as it goes. "
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Thomas Jefferson
“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
“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
“The whole art of government consists in the art of being honest. Only aim to do your duty, and mankind will give you credit where you fail.”
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Thomas Jefferson
“Here was buried Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of American Independence, of the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom, and Father of the University of Virginia.
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Thomas Jefferson
