Thomas Jefferson Quotes

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War is not the best engine for us to resort to; nature has given us one in our commerce, which if properly managed, will be a better instrument for obliging the interested nations of Europe to treat us with justice.

Thomas Jefferson
The patriot, like the Christian, must learn to bear revilings and persecutions as a part of his duty; and in proportion as the trial is severe, firmness under it becomes more requisite and praiseworthy. It requires, indeed, self-command. But that will be fortified in proportion as the calls for its exercise are repeated.

Thomas Jefferson
They have retired into the Judiciary as a stronghold. There the remains of federalism are to be preserved and fed from the Treasury; and from that battery all the works of republicanism are to be beaten down and erased.

Thomas Jefferson
I had rather ask an enlargement of power from the nation, where it is found necessary, than to assume it by a construction which would make our powers boundless.

Thomas Jefferson
We could in the United States make as great a variety of wines as are made in Europe, not exactly of the same kinds, but doubtless as good.

Thomas Jefferson
Public employment contributes neither to advantage nor happiness. It is but honorable exile from one's family and affairs.

Thomas Jefferson
The trifling economy of paper, as a cheaper medium, or its convenience for transmission, weighs nothing in opposition to the advantages of the precious metals it is liable to be abused, has been, is, and forever will be abused, in every country in which it is permitted.

Thomas Jefferson
History has informed us that bodies of men, as well as individuals, are susceptible of the spirit of tyranny.

Thomas Jefferson
But whatever be their degree of talent it is no measure of their rights. Because Sir Isaac Newton was superior to others in understanding, he was not therefore lord of the person or property of others. On this subject they are gaining daily in the opinions of nations, and hopeful advances are making towards their re- establishment on an equal footing with the other colors of the human family.

Thomas Jefferson
Government as well as religion has furnished its schisms, its persecutions and its devices for fattening idleness on the earnings of the people.

Thomas Jefferson
When habit has strengthened our sense of duties, they leave us no time for other things; but when young we neglect them and this gives us time for anything.

Thomas Jefferson
But though an old man, I am but a young gardener.

Thomas Jefferson
The question whether the judges are invested with exclusive authority to decide on the constitutionality of a law has been heretofore a subject of consideration with me in the exercise of official duties. Certainly there is not a word in the Constitution which has given that power to them more than to the Executive or Legislative branches.

Thomas Jefferson
If ever there was a holy war, it was that which saved our liberties and gave us independence.

Thomas Jefferson
Whensoever hostile aggressions... require a resort to war, we must meet our duty and convince the world that we are just friends and brave enemies.

Thomas Jefferson
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
I am not myself apt to be alarmed at innovations recommended by reason. That dread belongs to those whose interests or prejudices shrink from the advance of truth and science.

Thomas Jefferson
I shall within a few days divest myself of the anxieties and the labors with which I have been oppressed, and retire with inexpressible delight to my family, my friends, my farms, and books. There I may indulge at length in that tranquillity and those pursuits from which I have been divorced by the character of the times in which I have lived, and which have forced me into the line of political life under a sense of duty and against a great and constant aversion to it.

Thomas Jefferson
The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.

Thomas Jefferson
My affections were first for my own country, then, generally, for all mankind

Thomas Jefferson
Never fear the want of business. A man who qualifies himself well for his calling, never fails of employment.

Thomas Jefferson
He who made us would have been a pitiful bungler, if he had made the rules of our moral conduct a matter of science. For one man of science, there are thousands who are not. What would have become of them? Man was destined for society. His morality, therefore, was to be formed to this object. He was endowed with a sense of right and wrong, merely relative to this.

Thomas Jefferson
It is neither wealth nor splendor, but tranquillity and occupation, which give happiness.

Thomas Jefferson
All eyes are opened, or opening, to the rights of man. The general spread of the light of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth, that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God. These are grounds of hope for others. For ourselves, let the annual return of this day forever refresh our recollections of these rights, and an undiminished devotion to them.

Thomas Jefferson
If the present Congress errs in too much talking, how can it be otherwise in a body to which the people send one hundred and fifty lawyers, whose trade it is to question everything, yield nothing, and talk by the hour?

Thomas Jefferson
I consider the foundation of the Constitution as laid on this ground: That "all powers not delegated to the United States, by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States or to the people." To take a single step beyond the boundaries thus specially drawn around the powers of Congress, is to take possession of a boundless field of power, no longer susceptible of any definition.
The incorporation of a bank, and the powers assumed by this bill, have not, in my opinion, been delegated to the United States, by the Constitution... They are not among the powers specially enumerated...

Thomas Jefferson
I was bold in the pursuit of knowledge, never fearing to follow truth and reason to whatever results they led, and bearding every authority which stood in their way.

Thomas Jefferson
When wrongs are pressed because it is believed they will be borne, resistance becomes morality.

Thomas Jefferson
I agree with you that there is a natural aristocracy among men. The grounds of this are virtue and talents... The natural aristocracy I consider as the most precious gift of nature, for the instruction, the trusts, and government of society... Every one, by his property, or by his satisfactory situation, is interested in the support of law and order. And such men may safely and advantageously reserve to themselves a wholesome control over their public affairs, and a degree of freedom, which, in the hands of the canaille [the masses] of the cities of Europe, would be instantly perverted to the demolition and destruction of everything public and private.

Thomas Jefferson
Yours of July 27 is received. It confirms the accounts we receive from others that the infractions of the embargo in Maine and Massachusetts are open. I have removed Pope, of New Bedford, for worse than negligence. The collector of Sullivan is on the totter. The Tories of Boston openly threaten insurrection if their importation of flour is stopped. The next post will stop it. I fear your Governor [Sullivan] is not up to the tone of these parricides, and I hope on the first symptom of an open opposition of the law by force you will fly to the scene, and aid in suppressing any commotion.

Thomas Jefferson