Government is best which governs least.
THOMAS PAINEMen should not petition for rights, but take them.
More Thomas Paine Quotes
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The right of voting for representatives , is the primary right by which other rights are protected.
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It is important that we should never lose sight of this distinction. We must not confuse the peoples with their governments.
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Beware the greedy hand of government thrusting itself into every corner and crevice of industry.
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A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom. But the tumult soon subsides. Time makes more converts than reason.
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It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry.
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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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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.
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Moderation in temper is always a virtue; but moderation in principle is always a vice.
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Reputation is what men and women think of us; character is what God and angels know of us.
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Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.
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The World is my country, all mankind are my brethren, and to do good is my religion.
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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.
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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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One good schoolmaster is of more use than a hundred priests.
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The greatest tyrannies are always perpetuated in the name of the noblest causes.
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He that would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty, he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.
THOMAS PAINE -
What is it the Bible teaches us? – raping, cruelty, and murder. What is it the New Testament teaches us? – to believe that the Almighty committed debauchery with a woman engaged to be married, and the belief of this debauchery is called faith.
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Freedom had been hunted round the globe; reason was considered as rebellion; and the slavery of fear had made men afraid to think. But such is the irresistible nature of truth, that all it asks, and all it wants, is the liberty of appearing.
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The trade of governing has always been monopolized by the most ignorant and the most rascally individuals of mankind.
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These are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands it NOW, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.
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You cannot undermine police authority and then complain about rising crime.
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Taxes were not raised to carry on wars, but that wars were raised to carry on taxes.
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Government without a constitution, is a power without a right.
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Religion is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize humankind; and, for my part, I sincerely detest it as I detest everything that is cruel.
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The right of voting for representatives is the primary right by which other rights are protected. To take away this right is to reduce a man to slavery, for slavery consists in being subject to the will of another, and he that has not a vote in the election of representatives is in this case.
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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.
THOMAS PAINE