Quotes By Thomas Jefferson

I have no fear that the result of our experiment will be that men may be trusted to govern themselves without a master.

Resort is had to ridicule only when reason is against us.

I cannot live without books.

I own that I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive.

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.

Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day.

To penetrate and dissipate these clouds of darkness, the general mind must be strengthened by education.

The natural cause of the human mind is certainly from credulity to skepticism.

Our greatest happiness does not depend on the condition of life in which chance has placed us, but is always the result of a good conscience, good health, occupation, and freedom in all just pursuits.

So confident am I in the intentions, as well as wisdom, of the government, that I shall always be satisfied that what is not done, either cannot, or ought not to be done.

There is not a sprig of grass that shoots uninteresting to me.

I believe that every human mind feels pleasure in doing good to another.

Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then be trusted with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the form of kings to govern him? Let history answer this question.

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

Advertisements contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper.

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.

He who knows nothing is closer to the truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors.

Do not bite at the bait of pleasure, till you know there is no hook beneath it.

Merchants have no country. The mere spot they stand on does not constitute so strong an attachment as that from which they draw their gains.

It is always better to have no ideas than false ones; to believe nothing, than to believe what is wrong.

An injured friend is the bitterest of foes.

I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial by strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country.

It takes time to persuade men to do even what is for their own good.

The spirit of this country is totally adverse to a large military force.

Peace, commerce and honest friendship with all nations; entangling alliances with none.

An association of men who will not quarrel with one another is a thing which has never yet existed, from the greatest confederacy of nations down to a town meeting or a vestry.

Force is the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism.

I find that he is happiest of whom the world says least, good or bad.

Don't talk about what you have done or what you are going to do.

It is more dangerous that even a guilty person should be punished without the forms of law than that he should escape.