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 PAINEWhere knowledge is a duty, ignorance is a crime.
More Thomas Paine Quotes
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A Constitution is not the act of a Government, but of a people constituting a government, and a government without a constitution is a power without right.
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The strength and power of despotism consists wholly in the fear of resistance.
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All churches, whether Jewish, Christian or Muslim, are simply human inventions. They use fear to enslave us. They are a monopoly for power and profit.
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For though the flame of liberty may sometimes cease to shine, the coal can never expire.
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It is not in numbers, but in unity, that our great strength lies.
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Men should not petition for rights, but take them.
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Some people can be reasoned into sense, and others must be shocked into it.
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There are two distinct classes of men – those who pay taxes and those who receive and live upon taxes.
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The right of voting for representatives , is the primary right by which other rights are protected.
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He who dares not offend cannot be honest.
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Beware the greedy hand of government thrusting itself into every corner and crevice of industry.
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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 -
Reason and Ignorance, the opposites of each other, influence the great bulk of mankind. If either of these can be rendered sufficiently extensive in a country, the machinery of Government goes easily on. Reason obeys itself; and Ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it.
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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.
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A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody ought not to be trusted by anybody.
THOMAS PAINE






