Authors - Thomas Jefferson
Brief Biography
Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 - July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Father, the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence (1776) and the third President of the United States (1801 - 1809). At the beginning of the American Revolution, Jefferson served in the Continental Congress, representing Virginia. He then served as a wartime Governor of Virginia (1779 - 1781). Just after the war ended, from mid-1784 Jefferson served as a diplomat, stationed in Paris, initially as a commissioner to help negotiate commercial treaties. - Wikipedia
Quotes by Thomas JeffersonBrowse all of these
Quote 1001by Anonymous on 09/01/2011
I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.
Quote 1219by Anonymous on 11/01/2011
I have ever deemed it more honorable and more profitable, too, to set a good example than to follow a bad one.
Quote 1448by Anonymous on 13/01/2011
It is strangely absurd to suppose that a million of human beings, collected together, are not under the same moral laws which bind each of them separately.
Quote 1456by Anonymous on 13/01/2011
The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
Quote 1572by Anonymous on 14/01/2011
I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that His justice cannot sleep forever.
Quote 1628by Anonymous on 14/01/2011
The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.
Quote 1727by Anonymous on 15/01/2011
The flames kindled on the Fourth of July, 1776, have spread over too much of the globe to be extinguished by the feeble engines of despotism; on the contrary, they will consume these engines and all who work them.
Quote 1770by Anonymous on 16/01/2011
When angry, count ten before you speak; if very angry, a hundred.
Quote 2071by Anonymous on 21/01/2011
Error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it.
Quote 2192by Anonymous on 24/01/2011
I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past.
Quote 2216by Anonymous on 24/01/2011
Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
Quote 2296by Anonymous on 27/01/2011
Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations -- entangling alliances with none.
Quote 2490by Anonymous on 31/01/2011
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.
Quote 2539by Anonymous on 31/01/2011
I never believed there was one code of morality for a public and another for a private man.
Quote 2576by Anonymous on 02/02/2011
A little patience, and we shall see the reign of witches pass over, their spells dissolve, and the people, recovering their true sight, restore their government to its true principles. It is true that in the meantime we are suffering deeply in spirit, and incurring the horrors of a war and long oppressions of enormous public debt...If the game runs sometime against us at home, we must have patience till luck turns, and then we shall have an opportunity of winning back the principles we have lost, for this is a game where principles are at stake.
Quote 2633by Anonymous on 02/02/2011
I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. This is the true corrective of abuses of constitutional power.
Quote 2678by Anonymous on 03/02/2011
If you are obliged to neglect any thing, let it be your chemistry. It is the least useful and the least amusing to a country gentleman of all the ordinary branches of science.
Quote 3022by Anonymous on 03/02/2011
I would rather be exposed to the inconveniencies attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it.
Quote 3234by Anonymous on 05/02/2011
Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost.
Quote 3277by Anonymous on 05/02/2011
The force of public opinion cannot be resisted when permitted freely to be expressed. The agitation it produces must be submitted to.
Quote 3358by Anonymous on 05/02/2011
The government is best which governs least.
Quote 3461by Anonymous on 06/02/2011
The will of the people is the only legitimate foundation of any government, and to protect its free expression should be our first object.
Quote 3483by Anonymous on 06/02/2011
If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.
Quote 3567by Anonymous on 07/02/2011
Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blind-folded fear.
Quote 3569by Anonymous on 07/02/2011
It is part of the American character to consider nothing as desperate - to surmount every difficulty by resolution and contrivance.
Quote 3734by Anonymous on 09/02/2011
Nothing gives one person so much advantage over another as to remain always cool and unruffled under all circumstances.
Quote 4029by Anonymous on 12/02/2011
Peace, commerce and honest friendship with all nations; entangling alliances with none.
Quote 4225by Anonymous on 18/02/2011
It was by the sober sense of our citizens that we were safely and steadily conducted from monarchy to republicanism, and it is by the same agency alone we can be kept from falling back.
Quote 4370by Anonymous on 20/02/2011
No man will ever bring out of the Presidency the reputation which carries him into it. To myself, personally, it brings nothing but increasing drudgery and daily loss of friends.
Quote 4443by Anonymous on 21/02/2011
War is an instrument entirely inefficient toward redressing wrong; and multiplies, instead of indemnifying losses.
Quote 4514by Anonymous on 22/02/2011
I do not find in orthodox Christianity one redeeming feature.
Quote 4526by Anonymous on 22/02/2011
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.
Quote 4602by Anonymous on 25/02/2011
...a wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.
Quote 4814by Anonymous on 01/03/2011
There is no act, however virtuous, for which ingenuity may not find some bad motive.
Quote 5857by Anonymous on 01/09/2011
Never fear the want of business. A man who qualifies himself well for his calling, never fails of employment.
Quote 6402by Anonymous on 19/09/2011
I read no newspaper now but Ritchie's, and in that chiefly the advertisements, for they contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper.
Quote 6453by Anonymous on 19/09/2011
Do not bite at the bait of pleasure till you know there is no hook beneath it.
Quote 6756by Anonymous on 07/10/2011
Enlighten the people, generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like spirits at the dawn of day.
Quote 7119by Anonymous on 22/10/2011
No instance exists of a person's writing two languages perfectly. That will always appear to be his native language which was most familiar to him in his youth.
Quote 7138by Anonymous on 23/10/2011
Some men look at constitutions with sanctimonious reverence, and deem them like the ark of the covenant, too sacred to be touched.
Quote 7199by Anonymous on 27/10/2011
No government ought to be without censors & where the press is free, no one ever will.
Quote 7376by Anonymous on 07/11/2011
We in America do not have government by the majority. We have government by the majority who participate.
Quote 8232by Anonymous on 30/04/2012
But friendship is the breathing rose, with sweets in every fold.
Quote 8516by Anonymous on 15/05/2012
When angry count to ten before you speak. If very angry, count to one hundred.
Quote 8807by Anonymous on 30/05/2012
I have no ambition to govern men; it is a painful and thankless office.
Quote 9311by Anonymous on 11/07/2012
The glow of one warm thought is to me worth more than money.
Quote 9345by Anonymous on 12/07/2012
Do not weep; do not wax indignant. Understand.
Quote 10362by Anonymous on 28/09/2012
One travels more usefully when alone, because he reflects more.
Quote 10518by Anonymous on 09/10/2012
It is neither wealth nor splendor, but tranquility and occupation which give happiness.
Quote 10588by Anonymous on 11/10/2012
Whenever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government.
Quote 10705by Anonymous on 22/10/2012
Say nothing of my religion. It is known to God and myself alone. Its evidence before the world is to be sought in my life: if it has been honest and dutiful to society the religion which has regulated it cannot be a bad one.
Quote 10766by Anonymous on 26/10/2012
Walking is the best possible exercise. Habituate yourself to walk very fast.
Quote 11119by Anonymous on 25/11/2012
Leave all the afternoon for exercise and recreation, which are as necessary as reading. I will rather say more necessary because health is worth more than learning.
Quote 11341by Anonymous on 14/12/2012
Every citizen should be a soldier. This was the case with the Greeks and Romans, and must be that of every free state.
Quote 11560by Anonymous on 09/01/2013
When you reach the end of your rope, tie a knot in it and hang on.
Quote 12589by Anonymous on 01/05/2013
Either you run the day or the day runs you.
Quote 13601by Anonymous on 08/08/2013
Whenever a man has cast a longing eye on offices, a rottenness begins in his conduct.
Quote 14027by Anonymous on 11/10/2013
I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.
