Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Comment on this quote Share via Email Print this Page [241-260] of 579 President quotesPresident QuotesPresident Previous 20 quotes Next 20 quotes Bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.~ Thomas Jefferson ...Enlightened by a benign religion, professed, indeed, and practiced in various forms, yet all of them inculcating honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of man, acknowledging and adoring an overruling Providence, which by all its dispensations proves that it delights in the happiness of man here and his greater happiness hereafter -- with all these blessings, what more is necessary to make us a happy and a prosperous people? Still one thing more.. .a wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, 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 circle of our felicities.~ Thomas Jefferson I have no fear that the result of our experiment will be that men may be trusted to govern themselves without a master.~ Thomas Jefferson The care of human life and happiness and not their destruction is the first and only legitimate object of good government.~ Thomas Jefferson A strong body makes the mind strong. As to the species of exercises, I advise the gun. While this gives moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprise and independence to the mind. Games played with the ball, and others of that nature, are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun therefore be the constant companion of your walks.~ Thomas Jefferson An honest man can feel no pleasure in the exercise of power over his fellow citizens.~ Thomas Jefferson Yes, we did produce a near-perfect republic. But will they keep it? Or will they, in the enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom? Material abundance without character is the path of destruction.~ Thomas Jefferson Government can do something for the people only in proportion as it can do something to the people.~ Thomas Jefferson No free man shall ever be de-barred the use of arms. The strongest reason for the people to retain their right to keep and bear arms is as a last resort to protect themselves against tyranny in government.~ Thomas Jefferson Liberty is to the collective body, what health is to every individual body. Without health no pleasure can be tasted by man; without liberty, no happiness can be enjoyed by society.~ Thomas Jefferson The whole art of government consists in the art of being honest.~ Thomas Jefferson The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground.~ Thomas Jefferson I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Already they have raised up a moneyed aristocracy that has set the Government at defiance. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs.~ Thomas Jefferson If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their money, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them (around the banks), will deprive the people of their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.~ Thomas Jefferson An individual, thinking himself injured, makes more noise than a State.~ Thomas Jefferson In every country and every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own. It is easier to acquire wealth and power by this combination than by deserving them, and to effect this, they have perverted the purest religion ever preached to man into mystery and jargon, unintelligible to all mankind, and therefore the safer for their purposes.~ Thomas Jefferson It is not only vain, but wicked, in a legislature to frame laws in opposition to the laws of nature, and to arm them with the terrors of death. This is truly creating crimes in order to punish them.~ Thomas Jefferson That government is best which governs the least, because its people discipline themselves.~ Thomas Jefferson The greatest service which can be rendered any country is to add a useful plant to its culture.~ Thomas Jefferson Every citizen should be a soldier. This was the case with the Greeks and Romans, and must be that of every free state.~ Thomas Jefferson Previous 20 quotes Next 20 quotes Share on Facebook Tweet Email Print