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Thomas Jefferson Quotes - Page 23

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It is a principle that the right to a thing gives a right to the means without which it could not be used, that is to say, that the means follow their end.

It is a principle that the right to a thing gives a right to the means without which it could not be used, that is to say, that the means follow their end.

Thomas Jefferson
Mean, Giving, Principles
Thomas Jefferson (1861). “Correspondence. Reports and opinions while secretarry of state”, p.579

Idleness begets ennui, ennui the hypochondriac, and that a diseased body. No laborious person was ever yet hysterical.

Thomas Jefferson
Body, Hysterical, Ennui
Letter to Martha Jefferson, 28 March (1787)

We are sensible of the duty and expediency of submitting our opinions to the will of the majority, and can wait with patience till they get right if they happen to be at any time wrong.

Thomas Jefferson
Waiting, Democracy, Majority
Thomas Jefferson (2010). “The Works of Thomas Jefferson: 1799-1803”, p.107, Cosimo, Inc.

Conquest is not in our principles. It is inconsistent with our government.

Thomas Jefferson
War, Government, Principles

We are not to expect to be translated from despotism to liberty in a featherbed.

Thomas Jefferson
Encouragement, Difficult And Easy, Political
Letter to Marquis de Lafayette, 2 Apr. 1790

I do not take a single newspaper, nor read one a month, and I feel myself infinitely the happier for it.

Thomas Jefferson
Motivational, Drinking, Months
Thomas Jefferson, Brett F. Woods (2009). “Thomas Jefferson: Thoughts on War and Revolution : Annotated Correspondence”, p.135, Algora Publishing

The way to silence religious disputes is to take no notice of them.

Thomas Jefferson
Religious, Silence, Religion
Thomas Jefferson (1832). “Notes on the State of Virginia”, p.168

The boisterous sea of liberty is never without a wave.

Thomas Jefferson
4th Of July, Sea, Liberty
Thomas Jefferson, H. A. Washington (2011). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Being His Autobiography, Correspondence, Reports, Messages, Addresses, and Other Writings, Official and Private”, p.182, Cambridge University Press

No occupation is so delightful to me as the culture of the earth, and no culture comparable to that of the garden.

Thomas Jefferson
Garden, Culture, Earth
Thomas Jefferson (1855). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson”, p.6

War is an instrument entirely inefficient toward redressing wrong; and multiplies, instead of indemnifying losses.

Thomas Jefferson
Peace, War, Loss
Letter to John Sinclair, 1798.

I think with the Romans, that the general of today should be a soldier tomorrow if necessary.

Thomas Jefferson
Thinking, Soldier, Today
Thomas Jefferson (2010). “The Works of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence 1793-1798”, p.262, Cosimo, Inc.

Speeches that are measured by the hour will die with the hour.

Thomas Jefferson
Death, Speech, Hours

You and I have formerly seen warm debates and high political passions. But gentlemen of different politics would then speak to each other and separate the business of the Senate from that of society. It is not so now. Men who have been intimate all their lives, cross the streets to avoid meeting, and turn their heads another way, lest they should be obliged to touch their hats. This may do for young men with whom passion is enjoyment. But it is afflicting to peaceable minds. Tranquility is the old man's milk.

Thomas Jefferson
Passion, Men, Political

Where the preamble declares, that coercion is a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, an amendment was proposed by inserting "Jesus Christ," so that it would read "A departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion;" the insertion was rejected by the great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mohammedan, the Hindoo and Infidel of every denomination.

Thomas Jefferson
Christian, Religious, Jesus
"Autobiography of Thomas Jefferson". Book by Thomas Jefferson, 1821.

It is a melancholy truth, that a suppression of the press could not more completely deprive the nation of its benefits than is done by its abandoned prostitution to falsehood.

Thomas Jefferson
Done, Benefits, Melancholy
Thomas Jefferson, Henry Augustine Washington (1854). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence, contin”, p.92

My passion strengthens daily to quit political turmoil, and retire into the bosom of my family, the only scene of sincere and purehappiness.

Thomas Jefferson
Happiness, Passion, Political

If the book be false in its facts, disprove them; if false in its reasoning, refute it. But, for God's sake, let us freely hear both sides, if we choose.

Thomas Jefferson
Book, Political Differences, Politics
Thomas Jefferson (2011). “Jefferson on Freedom: Wisdom, Advice, and Hints on Freedom, Democracy, and the American Way”, p.41, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

Above all things I hope the education of the common people will be attended to; convinced that on their good sense we may rely with most security for the preservation of a due degree of liberty.

Thomas Jefferson
Thank You, Education, Teacher
Thomas Jefferson, Jerry Holmes (2002). “Thomas Jefferson: A Chronology of His Thoughts”, p.93, Rowman & Littlefield

Reason and free inquiry are the only effectual agents against error... They are the natural enemies of error, and of error only... If [free enquiry] be restrained now, the present corruptions will be protected, and new ones encouraged.

Thomas Jefferson
Truth, Errors, Political

In our own native land, in defense of the freedom that is our birthright and which we ever enjoyed till the late violation of it. For the protection of our property, acquired solely by the honest industry of our fore-fathers and ourselves, against violence actually offered, we have taken up arms. We shall lay them down when hostilities shall cease on the part of the aggressors, and all danger of their being renewed shall be removed, and not before.

Thomas Jefferson
Father, Taken, Land
Thomas Jefferson, Joyce Appleby, Terence Ball (1999). “Jefferson: Political Writings”, p.87, Cambridge University Press

The Bible is the cornerstone of liberty ... students perusal of the sacred volume will make us better citizens.

Thomas Jefferson
Liberty, Citizens, Sacred

Preachers dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight.

Thomas Jefferson
Faith Religion, Daylight, Witch

We are overdone with banking institutions, which have banished the precious metals, and substituted a more fluctuating and unsafe medium... These have withdrawn capital from useful improvements and employments to nourish idleness... These are evils more easily to be deplored than remedied.

Thomas Jefferson
Wisdom, Evil, Employment
Thomas Jefferson (1853). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence, cont”, p.516

Everyone has a natural right to choose that vocation in life which he thinks most likely gives him comfortable subsistence.

Thomas Jefferson
Life, Thinking, Giving

The banks themselves were doing business on capitals three-fourths of which were fictitious. This fictitious capital... is now to be lost, and to fall on somebody; it must take on those who have property to meet it, and probably on the less cautious part, who, not aware of the impending catastrophe, have suffered themselves to contract, or to be in debt, and must now sacrifice their property of a value many times the amount of the debt. We have been truly sowing the wind, and are now reaping the whirlwind.

Thomas Jefferson
Wisdom, Fall, Sacrifice