Those who don’t read the newspapers are better off than those who do insofar as those who know nothing are better off than those whose heads are filled with half-truths and lies.
Say nothing of my religion. It is known to God and myself alone.
Above all things, lose no occasion of exercising your dispositions to be grateful, to be generous, to be charitable, to be humane, to be true, just, firm, orderly, courageous, etc. Consider every act of this kind as an exercise which will strengthen your moral faculties and increase your worth.
On a hot day in Virginia, I know nothing more comforting than a fine spiced pickle, brought up trout-like from the sparkling depths of the aromatic jar below the stairs of Aunt Sally’s cellar.
And even should the cloud of barbarism and despotism again obscure the science and libraries of Europe, this country remains to preserve and restore light and liberty to them.
Reason and free inquiry are the only effectual agents against error.
I steer my bark with hope in the head, leaving fear astern.
Government can do something for the people only in proportion as it can do something to the people.
We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt.
A lawyer without books would be like a workman without tools.
Men of quality are not threatened by women of equality.
I have great confidence in the common sense of mankind in general.
The tax which will be paid for the purpose of education is not more than the thousandth part of what will be paid to kings, priests and nobles who will rise up among us if we leave the people in ignorance.
I have ever deemed it more honorable and more profitable, too, to set a good example than to follow a bad one.
The press is the best instrument for enlightening the mind of man, and improving him as a rational, moral and social being.
A strong body makes the mind strong.
While the farmer holds the title to the land, actually, it belongs to all the people because civilization itself rests upon the soil.
Every man has two countries: his own and France.
The several states composing the United States of America are not united on the principle of unlimited submission to their general government.
If ever this vast country is brought under a single government, it will be one of the most extensive corruption.