The mind once enlightened cannot again become dark.
THOMAS PAINEThe strength and power of despotism consists wholly in the fear of resistance.
More Thomas Paine Quotes
-
-
The greatest tyrannies are always perpetuated in the name of the noblest causes.
THOMAS PAINE -
Arms discourage and keep the invader and plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property… Horrid mischief would ensue were the law-abiding deprived of the use of them.
THOMAS PAINE -
I have always strenuously supported the right of every man to his own opinion, however different that opinion might be to mine. He who denies to another this right, makes a slave of himself to his present opinion, because he precludes himself the right of changing it.
THOMAS PAINE -
What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; it is dearness only that gives everything its value.
THOMAS PAINE -
Where knowledge is a duty, ignorance is a crime.
THOMAS PAINE -
Men should not petition for rights, but take them.
THOMAS PAINE -
The slavery of fear had made men afraid to think.
THOMAS PAINE -
Some people can be reasoned into sense, and others must be shocked into it.
THOMAS PAINE -
In Deism our reason and our belief become happily united. The wonderful structure of the universe, and everything we behold in the system of the creation, prove to us, far better than books can do, the existence of a God, and at the same time proclaim His attributes.
THOMAS PAINE -
I consider the war of America against Britain as the country’s war, the public’s war, or the war of the people in their own behalf, for the security of their natural rights, and the protection of their own property.
THOMAS PAINE -
If those to whom power is delegated do well, they will be respected; if not, they will be despised.
THOMAS PAINE -
Reputation is what men and women think of us; character is what God and angels know of us.
THOMAS PAINE -
A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody ought not to be trusted by anybody.
THOMAS PAINE -
Government is not a trade which any man or body of men has a right to set up and exercise for his own emolument, but is altogether a trust, in right of those by whom that trust is delegated, and by whom it is always resumable. It has of itself no rights; they are altogether duties.
THOMAS PAINE -
These are the times that try men’s souls.
THOMAS PAINE -
It is the duty of every man, as far as his ability extends, to detect and expose delusion and error.
THOMAS PAINE -
The Bible is a book that has been read more and examined less than any book that ever existed.
THOMAS PAINE -
It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry.
THOMAS PAINE -
It is easy to see that when republican virtue fails, slavery ensues.
THOMAS PAINE -
Reason obeys itself; and ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it.
THOMAS PAINE -
A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right.
THOMAS PAINE -
To argue with a man who has renounced the use and authority of reason, and whose philosophy consists in holding humanity in contempt, is like administering medicine to the dead, or endeavoring to convert an atheist by scripture.
THOMAS PAINE -
Character is much easier kept than recovered.
THOMAS PAINE -
It is always to be taken for granted, that those who oppose an equality of rights never mean the exclusion should take place on themselves.
THOMAS PAINE -
Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.
THOMAS PAINE -
It has been the political career of this man to begin with hypocrisy, proceed with arrogance, and finish with contempt.
THOMAS PAINE