No government ought to be without censors and where the press is free no one ever will.
It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God.
No body wishes more than I do to see such proofs as you exhibit, that nature has given to our black brethren, talents equal to those of the other colors of men, and that the appearance of a want of th...
Our country is now taking so steady a course as to show by what road it will pass to destruction, to wit: by consolidation of power first, and then corruption, its necessary consequence.
The republican is the only form of government which is not eternally at open or secret war with the rights of mankind.
Everything yields to diligence
Every citizen should be a soldier. This was the case with the Greeks and Romans, and must be that of every free state.
Whenever there is in any country, uncultivated lands and unemployed poor, it is clear that the laws of property have been so far extended as to violate natural right. The earth is given as a common st...
I am conscious that an equal division of property is impracticable. But the consequences of this enormous inequality [in Europe] producing so much misery to the bulk of mankind, legislators cannot inv...
It behooves every man who values liberty of conscience for himself, to resist invasions of it in the case of others: or their case may, by change of circumstances, become his own.
Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion.
The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves are its only safe depositories.
In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock.
It is rare that the public sentiment decides immorally or unwisely and the individual who differs from it ought to distrust and examine well his own opinion.
I steer my bark with hope in my heart leaving fear astern.
When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty.
Some men look at constitutions with sanctimonious reverence and deem them like the ark of the covenant, too sacred to be touched. They ascribe to the men of the preceding age a wisdom more than human...
There is a natural aristocracy among men. The grounds of this are virtue and talents.
That government is the strongest of which every man feels himself a part.