Thomas Jefferson Quotes - Page 37

• I have ever deemed it fundamental for the United States never to take active part in the quarrels of Europe. Their political interests are entirely distinct from ours. Their mutual jealousies, their balance of power, their complicated alliances, their forms and principles of government, are all foreign to us. They are nations of eternal war.

  Thomas Jefferson

  War, Europe, Government

  Thomas Jefferson (1829). “Memoirs, 4: Correspondence and Private Papers”, p.375

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• All the capital employed in paper speculation is barren and useless, producing, like that on a gaming table, no accession to itself, and is withdrawn from commerce and agriculture where it would have produced addition to the common mass It nourishes in our citizens habits of vice and idleness instead of industry and morality It has furnished effectual means of corrupting such a portion of the legislature as turns the balance between the honest voters whichever way it is directed.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Mean, Agriculture, Balance

  Thomas Jefferson, Richard Holland Johnston, Thomas Jefferson memorial association of the United States (1907). “The writings of Thomas Jefferson”

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• I was dupedby the Secretary of the treasury [Alexander Hamilton], and made a fool for forwarding his schemes, not then sufficiently understood by me; and of all the errors of my political life, this has occasioned the deepest regret.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Regret, Errors, Political

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• Shake off all the fears and servile prejudices under which weak minds are servilely crouched. Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a god; because, if there be one, he must more approve the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear... Your own reason is the only oracle given you by heaven, and you are answerable not for the rightness but uprightness of the decision.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Decision, Heaven, Mind

  Thomas Jefferson's letter to Peter Carr, founders.archives.gov. August 10, 1787.

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• [I]t seems that the Cannibals of Europe are going to eat one another again. A war between Russia and Turkey is like the battle of the kite and snake; whichever destroys the other, leaves a destroyer the less for the world.

  Thomas Jefferson

  War, Russia, Europe

  Samuel Putnam Waldo, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson (1823). “Biographical sketches of distinguished American naval heroes in the war of the revolution, between the American Republic and the Kingdom of Great Britain: comprising sketches of Com. Nicholas Biddle, Com. John Paul Jones, Com. Edward Preble, and Com. Alexander Murray. With incidental allusions to other distinguished characters ...”, p.381

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• What has destroyed liberty and the rights of man in every government which has ever existed under the sun? The generalizing and concentrating all cares and power into one body, no matter whether of the autocrats of Russia or France, or of the aristocrats of a Venetian senate.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Men, Russia, Rights

  Thomas Jefferson, Joyce Appleby, Terence Ball (1999). “Jefferson: Political Writings”, p.205, Cambridge University Press

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• When great evils happen, I am in the habit of looking out for what good may arise from them as consolations to us, and Providence has in fact so established the order of things, as that most evils are the means of producing some good.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Mean, Order, Evil

  Thomas Jefferson, Jerry Holmes (2002). “Thomas Jefferson: A Chronology of His Thoughts”, p.167, Rowman & Littlefield

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• I have sometimes asked myself whether my country is the better for my having lived at all? I do not know that it is. I have been the instrument of doing the following things; but they would have been done by others; some of them, perhaps, a little better.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Country, Done, Littles

  Thomas Jefferson (1829). “Memoir, correspondence, and miscellanies from the papers of T. Jefferson”, p.142

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• [If a book were] very innocent, and one which might be confided to the reason of any man; not likely to be much read if let alone, but if persecuted, it will be generally read. Every man in the United States will think it a duty to buy a copy, in vindication of his right to buy and to read what he pleases.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Book, Men, Thinking

  Thomas Jefferson (1855). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson”, p.340

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• One insult pocketed soon produces another.

  Thomas Jefferson

  War, Political, Insult

  Thomas Jefferson (1854). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Being His Autobiography, Correspondence, Reports, Messages, Addresses, and Other Writings, Official and Private : Published by the Order of the Joint Committee of Congress on the Library, from the Original Manuscripts, Deposited in the Department of State”, p.510

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• The sickly, weakly, timid man fears the people, and is a Tory by nature. The healthy, strong and bold cherishes them, and is formed a Whig by nature.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Strong, Men, People

  Thomas Jefferson, Brett F. Woods (2009). “Thomas Jefferson: Thoughts on War and Revolution : Annotated Correspondence”, p.298, Algora Publishing

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• The earth belongs to the living. No man can, by natural right, oblige the lands he occupied or the persons who succeed him in that occupation, to the payment of debts contracted by him. For if he could, he might, during his own life, eat up the use of the lands for several generations to come, and then the lands would belong to the dead, and not to the living. No generation can contract debts greater than may be paid during the course of its own existence.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Men, Land, Generations

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• There is no habit you will value so much as that of walking far without fatigue.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Habit, Daily Exercise, Fatigue

  Thomas Jefferson (1977). “The Portable Thomas Jefferson”, p.298, Penguin

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• The proscribing any citizen as unworthy the public confidence by laying upon him an incapacity of being called to offices of trust and emolument unless he profess or renounce this or that religious opinion is depriving him injuriously of those privileges and advantages to which, in common with his fellow citizens, he has a natural right.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Religious, Office, Atheism

  Thomas Jefferson, Richard Holland Johnston, Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association of the United States “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson”

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• No government can continue good, but under the control of the people.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Government, People

  Thomas Jefferson (1829). “Memoirs, correspondence and private papers of Thomas Jefferson, ed. by T.J. Randolph”

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• Though written constitutions may be violated in moments of passion or delusion, yet they furnish a text to which those who are watchful may again rally and recall the people; they fix too for the people the principles of their political creed.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Passion, People, Political

  Thomas Jefferson (1854). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence, contin”, p.441

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• My principles, and those always received by the republicans, do not admit to removing any person from office merely for a difference of political opinion. Malversations in office, and the exerting of official influence to control the freedom of election are good causes for removal.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Political Opinions, Differences, Office

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• My only fear is that I may live too long. This would be a subject of dread to me.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Time, Fear, Long

  Thomas Jefferson (2010). “The Works of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. IX (in 12 Volumes)”, p.210, Cosimo, Inc.

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• I find that he is happiest of whom the world says least, good or bad.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Bad Relationship, Government, World

  Thomas Jefferson (2010). “The Works of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence 1786-1787”, p.181, Cosimo, Inc.

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• Health, learning and virtue will ensure your happiness; they will give you a quiet conscience, private esteem and public honour.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Happiness, Teacher, Teaching

  Thomas Jefferson, Lyman Henry Butterfield, Charles T. Cullen, John Catanzariti, Barbara Oberg (1950). “The papers of Thomas Jefferson”

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• The man who loves his country on its own account, and not merely for its trappings of interest or power, can never be divorced for it, can never refuse to come forward when he finds that she is engaged in dangers which he has the means of warding off.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Country, Mean, Men

  Thomas Jefferson (1829). “Memoir, correspondence, and miscellanies from the papers of T. Jefferson”, p.360

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• A noiseless course, not meddling with the affairs of others, unattractive of notice, is a mark that society is going on in happiness. If we can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them, they must become happy.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Government, People, Unattractive

  Thomas Jefferson (1854). “The writings of Thomas Jefferson: being his autobiography, correspondence, reports, messages, addresses, and other writings, official and private”, p.453

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• It has also been a great solace to me, to believe that you are engaged in vindicating to posterity the course we have pursued for preserving to them, in all their purity, the blessings of self-government, which we had assisted too in acquiring for them. If ever the earth has beheld a system of administration conducted with a single and steadfast eye to the general interest and happiness of those committed to it, one which, protected by truth, can never know reproach, it is that to which our lives have been devoted.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Believe, Eye, Blessing

  Thomas Jefferson (2006). “The Essential Jefferson”, p.276, Hackett Publishing

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• We shall divert through our own Country a branch of commerce which the European States have thought worthy of the most important struggles and sacrifices, and in the event of peace on terms which have been contemplated by some powers we shall form to the American union a barrier against the dangerous extension of the British Province of Canada and add to the Empire of liberty an extensive and fertile Country thereby converting dangerous Enemies into valuable friends.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Country, Struggle, Sacrifice

  Thomas Jefferson's letter to George Rogers Clark, founders.archives.gov. December 25, 1780.

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• Nature [has] implanted in our breasts a love of others, a sense of duty to them, a moral instinct, in short, which prompts us irresistibly to feel and to succor their distresses.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Moral, Instinct, Duty

  Thomas Jefferson (1977). “The Portable Thomas Jefferson”, p.429, Penguin

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