He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.
THOMAS JEFFERSONI am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and Constitutions. But laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind.
More Thomas Jefferson Quotes
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Be polite to all, but intimate with few.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
What a stupendous, what an incomprehensible machine is man! Who can endure toil, famine, stripes, imprisonment and death itself in vindication of his own liberty, and the next moment
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions, that I wish it to be always kept alive. It will often be exercised when wrong, but better so than not to be exercised at all. I like a little rebellion now and then. It is like a storm in the atmosphere.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
Determine never to be idle. No person will have occasion to complain of the want of time, who never loses any. It is wonderful how much may be done, if we are always doing.
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.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
I hope that we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
I had rather be shut up in a very modest cottage with my books, my family and a few old friends, dining on simple bacon, and letting the world roll on as it liked, than to occupy the most splendid post, which any human power can give.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
Let us save what remains: not by vaults and locks which fence them from the public eye and use in consigning them to the waste of time, but by such a multiplication of copies, as shall place them beyond the reach of accident.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
A great deal of love given to a few is better than a little to many.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance of which their civil as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purposes.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
Every human being must be viewed according to what it is good for. For not one of us, no, not one, is perfect. And were we to love none who had imperfection, this world would be a desert for our love.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
Peace and friendship with all mankind is our wisest policy, and I wish we may be permitted to pursue it.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
I predict future happiness for Americans, if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
I am increasingly persuaded that the earth belongs exclusively to the living and that one generation has no more right to bind another to it’s laws and judgments than one independent nation has the right to command another.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
No people can be both ignorant and free.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
I prefer dangerous freedom over peaceful slavery.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
The whole art of government consists in the art of being honest.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
When angry, count 10. before you speak; if very angry, 100.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of Liberty.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield, and government to gain ground.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
Where the press is free and every man able to read, all is safe.
THOMAS JEFFERSON -
He who permits himself to tell a lie once, finds it much easier to do it the second time.
THOMAS JEFFERSON