Thomas Jefferson Quotes
Best selected Thomas Jefferson quotes for your inspiration are given below.
The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground. ~Thomas Jefferson - Liberty
Peace and friendship with all mankind is our wisest policy, and I wish we may be permitted to pursue it. ~Thomas Jefferson - Peace
I do not take a single newspaper, nor read one a month, and I feel myself infinitely happier for it. ~Thomas Jefferson - Newspapers
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. ~Thomas Jefferson - Questions
I hope our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us, that the less we use our power the greater it will be. ~Thomas Jefferson - Power
Honesty is the first chapter of the book of wisdom. ~Thomas Jefferson - Honesty
It is the trade of lawyers to question everything, yield nothing, and talk by the hour. ~Thomas Jefferson - Law and Lawyers
How much pain worries have cost us that have never happened? ~Thomas Jefferson - Worry
Whenever you are to do a thing, though it can never be known but to yourself, ask yourself how you would act were all the world looking at you, and act accordingly. ~Thomas Jefferson - Morality
The glow of one warm thought is to me worth more than money. ~Thomas Jefferson - Thoughts and Thinking
The world is indebted for all triumphs which have been gained by reason and humanity over error and oppression. ~Thomas Jefferson - Debt
The Creator has not thought proper to mark those in the forehead who are of stuff to make good generals. We are first, therefore, to seek them blindfold, and then let them learn the trade at the expense of great losses. ~Thomas Jefferson - Generals
I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man. ~Thomas Jefferson - Tyranny
The most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do. ~Thomas Jefferson - Brevity
While wading through the whimsies, the puerilities, and unintelligible jargon of this work Plato's Republic
Every citizen should be a soldier. This was the case with the Greeks and Romans, and must be that of every free state. ~Thomas Jefferson - Soldier
I have no ambition to govern men. It is a painful and thankless office ~Thomas Jefferson - Government
Happiness is not being pained in body or troubled in mind. ~Thomas Jefferson - Happiness
Always take hold of things by the smooth handle. ~Thomas Jefferson - Life and Living
Traveling makes a man wiser, but less happy. ~Thomas Jefferson - Travel and Tourism
The republican is the only form of government which is not eternally at open or secret war with the rights of mankind. ~Thomas Jefferson - Republican
The will of the people is the only legitimate foundation of any government, and to protect its free expression should be our first object. ~Thomas Jefferson - Freedom
I'm a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it. ~Thomas Jefferson - Luck
No man will ever bring out of the Presidency the reputation which carries him into it. ~Thomas Jefferson - President
Experience demands that man is the only animal which devours his own kind, for I can apply no milder term to the general prey of the rich on the poor. ~Thomas Jefferson - Greed
Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate for a moment to prefer the latter. ~Thomas Jefferson - Newspapers
Politics are such a torment that I would advise every one I love not to mix with them. ~Thomas Jefferson - Politicians and Politics
In truth, politeness is artificial good humor, it covers the natural want of it, and ends by rendering habitual a substitute nearly equivalent to the real virtue. ~Thomas Jefferson - Manners
The boisterous sea of liberty is never without a wave. ~Thomas Jefferson - Liberty
I cannot live without books. ~Thomas Jefferson - Books and Reading
Peace, commerce and honest friendship with all nations; entangling alliances with none. ~Thomas Jefferson - Alliances
A strict observance of the written laws is doubtless one of the high virtues of a good citizen, but it is not the highest. The laws of necessity, of self-preservation, of saving our country when in danger, are of higher obligation. ~Thomas Jefferson - Citizenship
Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. ~Thomas Jefferson - Resignation
We confide in our strength, without boasting of it; we respect that of others, without fearing it. ~Thomas Jefferson - Strength
He who permits himself to tell a lie once, finds it much easier to do it a second and a third time till at length it becomes habitual. ~Thomas Jefferson - Lies and Lying
A mind always employed is always happy. This is the true secret, the grand recipe, for felicity. ~Thomas Jefferson - Happiness
Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God. ~Thomas Jefferson - Tyranny
Public employment contributes neither to advantage nor happiness. It is but honorable exile from one's family and affairs. ~Thomas Jefferson - Public Office
I sincerely believe that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies, and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale. ~Thomas Jefferson - Bankers and Banking
Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. ~Thomas Jefferson - Vigilance
The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing, but newspapers. ~Thomas Jefferson - Newspapers
Tranquility is the old man's milk. ~Thomas Jefferson - Tranquility
Walking is the best possible exercise. Habituate yourself to walk very fast. ~Thomas Jefferson - Exercise
Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude. ~Thomas Jefferson - Attitude
We rarely repent of having eaten too little. ~Thomas Jefferson - Regret
The whole commerce between master and slave is a perpetual exercise of the most boisterous passions, the most unremitting despotism on the one part, and degrading submissions on the other. Our children see this, and learn to imitate it. ~Thomas Jefferson - Slavery
This is the fourth? ~Thomas Jefferson - Famous Last Words
The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only legitimate object of good government. ~Thomas Jefferson - Government
Take not from the mouth of labor the bread it as earned. ~Thomas Jefferson - Labor
If there be one principle more deeply rooted than any other in the mind of every American, it is that we should have nothing to do with conquest. ~Thomas Jefferson - Conquest
I have not observed men's honesty to increase with their riches. ~Thomas Jefferson - Money
The happiest moments of my life have been the few which I have passed at home in the bosom of my family. ~Thomas Jefferson - Family
Information is the currency of democracy. ~Thomas Jefferson - Information
It is neither wealth nor splendor; but tranquillity and occupation which give happiness. ~Thomas Jefferson - Occupation
But friendship is precious, not only in the shade, but in the sunshine of life; and thanks to a benevolent arrangement of things, the greater part of life is sunshine. ~Thomas Jefferson - Friends and Friendship
When a man assumes a public trust he should consider himself a public property. ~Thomas Jefferson - Politicians and Politics
It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself. ~Thomas Jefferson - Truth
Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong. ~Thomas Jefferson - Ignorance
To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical. ~Thomas Jefferson - Opinions
I have never been able to conceive how any rational being could propose happiness to himself from the exercise of power over others. ~Thomas Jefferson - Power
Resort is had to ridicule only when reason is against us. ~Thomas Jefferson - Ridicule
Banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies. ~Thomas Jefferson - Bankers and Banking
To myself, personally, it brings nothing but increasing drudgery and daily loss of friends. ~Thomas Jefferson - Friends and Friendship
That government is the strongest of which every man feels himself a part. ~Thomas Jefferson - Government
I find the pain of a little censure, even when it is unfounded, is more acute than the pleasure of much praise. ~Thomas Jefferson - Censure
Books constitute capital. A library book lasts as long as a house, for hundreds of years. It is not, then, an article of mere consumption but fairly of capital, and often in the case of professional men, setting out in life, it is their only capital. ~Thomas Jefferson - Books and Reading
Friendship is but another name for an alliance with the follies and the misfortunes of others. Our own share of miseries is sufficient: why enter then as volunteers into those of another? ~Thomas Jefferson - Friends and Friendship
It is part of the American character to consider nothing as desperate -- to surmount every difficulty by resolution and contrivance. ~Thomas Jefferson - Character
When angry, count to ten before you speak. If very angry, count to one hundred. ~Thomas Jefferson - Anger
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. ~Thomas Jefferson - Happiness
In the fevered state of our country, no good can ever result from any attempt to set one of these fiery zealots to rights, either in fact or principle. They are determined as to the facts they will believe, and the opinions on which they will act. Get by them, therefore, as you would by an angry bull; it is not for a man of sense to dispute the road with such an animal. ~Thomas Jefferson - Fanatics and Fanaticism
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. ~Thomas Jefferson - Liberty
The selfish spirit of commerce, which knows no country, and feels no passion or principle but that of gain. ~Thomas Jefferson - Business
, I laid it down often to ask myself how it could have been that the world should have so long consented to give reputation to such nonsense as this? ~Thomas Jefferson - Philosophers and Philosophy
Never spend your money before you have earned it. ~Thomas Jefferson - Economy and Economics
The art of life is the art of avoiding pain; and he is the best pilot, who steers clearest of the rocks and shoals with which it is beset. ~Thomas Jefferson - Pain
No occupation is so delightful to me as the culture of the earth, and no culture comparable to that of the garden. ~Thomas Jefferson - Gardening and Gardens
Great innovations should not be forced on slender majorities. ~Thomas Jefferson - Innovation
We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness ~Thomas Jefferson - Equality
Taste cannot be controlled by law. ~Thomas Jefferson - Taste
Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day. ~Thomas Jefferson - Education
In matters of principals, stand like a rock; in matters of taste, swim with the current. ~Thomas Jefferson - Principles
The man who fears no truth has nothing to fear from lies. ~Thomas Jefferson - Truth
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. ~Thomas Jefferson - Trade
The advertisements are the most truthful part of a newspaper. ~Thomas Jefferson - Newspapers
I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have. ~Thomas Jefferson - Luck
There is a natural aristocracy among men. The grounds of this are virtue and talents. ~Thomas Jefferson - Aristocracy
Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today. ~Thomas Jefferson - Procrastination
The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure. ~Thomas Jefferson - Revolutions and Revolutionaries
Pride costs more than hunger, thirst and cold. ~Thomas Jefferson - Pride
I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that his justice cannot sleep forever. ~Thomas Jefferson - Injustice
For here we are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead... ~Thomas Jefferson - Truth
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. ~Thomas Jefferson - Argument
We may consider each generation as a distinct nation, with a right, by the will of its majority, to bind themselves, but none to bind the succeeding generation, more than the inhabitants of another country. ~Thomas Jefferson - Generations
It is more dangerous that even a guilty person should be punished without the forms of law than that he should escape. ~Thomas Jefferson - Guilt
What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure. ~Thomas Jefferson - Martyrdom
My reading of history convinces me that most bad government results from too much government. ~Thomas Jefferson - Government
We seldom report of having eaten too little. ~Thomas Jefferson - Food and Eating
Errors of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it. ~Thomas Jefferson - Opinions
Do not bite at the bait of pleasure, till you know there is no hook beneath it. ~Thomas Jefferson - Pleasure
My only fear is that I may live too long. This would be a subject of dread to me. ~Thomas Jefferson - Age and Aging
A coward is much more exposed to quarrels than a man of spirit. ~Thomas Jefferson - Coward and Cowardice
I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past. ~Thomas Jefferson - Dreams
I hold it that a little rebellion, now and then, is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government. ~Thomas Jefferson - Rebellion
I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than those attending too small a degree of it. ~Thomas Jefferson - Liberty
Nothing gives a person so much advantage over another as to remain always cool and unruffled under all circumstances. ~Thomas Jefferson - Control
Victory and defeat are each of the same price. ~Thomas Jefferson - Victory
Agriculture, manufactures, commerce, and navigation, the four pillars of our prosperity, are then most thriving when left most free to individual enterprise. Protection from casual embarrassments, however, may sometimes be seasonably interposed. ~Thomas Jefferson - Free Enterprise
The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time. ~Thomas Jefferson - Liberty
Certainly one of the highest duties of the citizen is a scrupulous obedience to the laws of the nation. But it is not the highest duty. ~Thomas Jefferson - Law and Lawyers
I think with the Romans, that the general of today should be a soldier tomorrow if necessary. ~Thomas Jefferson - Generals
The sovereign invigorator of the body is exercise, and of all the exercises walking is the best. ~Thomas Jefferson - Health
Whenever the people are well informed, they can be trusted with their own government; that whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their notice, they may be relied on to set them to rights. ~Thomas Jefferson - Government
Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of liberty. ~Thomas Jefferson - Liberty
Speeches that are measured by the hour will die with the hour. ~Thomas Jefferson - Speech
Whenever there are 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 stock for man to labor and live on. The small landowners are the most precious part of a state. ~Thomas Jefferson - Farming and Farmers
A little rebellion now and then... is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government. ~Thomas Jefferson - Medicine
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