70 quotes found
“Philosophy is common sense with big words.”
“Liberty is to faction what air is to fire...”
“If men were angels, no government would be necessary.”
“The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted.”
“All men having power ought to be distrusted to a certain degree.”
“A well-instructed people alone can be permanently a free people.”
“In framing a government, which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty is this: You must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place, oblige it to...”
“The circulation of confidence is better than the circulation of money.”
“The means of defence agst. foreign danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home.”
“Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind, and unfits it for every noble enterprise, every expanded prospect.]”
“Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other.”
“A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
“I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.”
“The purpose of separation of church and state is to keep forever from these shores the ceaseless strife that has soaked the soil of Europe in blood for cent”
“Justice is the end of government. It is the end of civil society. It ever has been and ever will be pursued until it be obtained, or until liberty be lost in the pursuit.”
“Every new and successful example, therefore, of a perfect separation between the ecclesiastical and civil matters, is of importance; and I have no doubt that every new example will succeed, as ever...”
“The advancement and diffusion of knowledge is the only guardian of true liberty.”
“Where we see the same faults followed regularly by the same misfortunes, we may reasonably think that if we could have known the first we might have avoided the others.”
“The truth is, that in all cases a certain number at least seems to be necessary to secure the benefits of free consultation and discussion, and to guard against too easy a combination for improper ...”
“Measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the rights of the minor party, but by the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority.”
“During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and se...”
“The means of defence against foreign danger have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended. Through...”
“Liberty may be endangered by the abuses of liberty as well as by the abuses of power.”
