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Man is fed with fables through life, and leaves it in the belief he knows something of what has been passing, when in truth he knows nothing but what has passed under his own eyes.

Thomas Jefferson

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Thomas Jefferson
Age: 83 †
Born: 1743
Born: April 2
Died: 1826
Died: July 4
3Rd U.S. President
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President Jefferson
T. Jefferson
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More quotes by Thomas Jefferson

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For here we are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead.
Thomas Jefferson
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God has formed us moral agents... that we may promote the happiness of those with whom He has placed us in society, by acting honestly towards all, benevolently to those who fall within our way, respecting sacredly their rights, bodily and mental, and cherishing especially their freedom of conscience, as we value our own.
Thomas Jefferson
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[A] spirit of justice and friendly accomodation...is our duty and our interest to cultivate with all nations.
Thomas Jefferson
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We are here lounging our time away, doing nothing, and having nothing to do. It gives me great regret to be passing my time so uselessly when it could have been so importantly employed at home.
Thomas Jefferson
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It is left... to the juries, if they think the permanent judges are under any bias whatever in any cause, to take on themselves to judge the law as well as the fact. They never exercise this power but when they suspect partiality in the judges and by the exercise of this power they have been the firmest bulwarks of English liberty.
Thomas Jefferson
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In a world which furnishes so many employments which are useful, and so many which are amusing, it is our own fault if we ever know what ennui [boredom] is, or if we are ever driven to the miserable resource of gaming, which corrupts our dispositions, and teaches us a habit of hostility against all mankind.
Thomas Jefferson
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Whatever enables us to go to war, secures our peace
Thomas Jefferson
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A share in the sovereignty of the state, which is exercised by the citizens at large, in voting at elections is one of the most important rights of the subject, and in a republic ought to stand foremost in the estimation of the law.
Thomas Jefferson
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Our Constitution... has not left the religion of its citizens under the power of its public functionaries, were it possible that any of these should consider a conquest over the conscience of men either attainable or applicable to any desirable purpose.
Thomas Jefferson
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Resort is had to ridicule only when reason is against us.
Thomas Jefferson
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We wish the happiness and prosperity of every nation.
Thomas Jefferson
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It takes time to persuade men to do even what is for their own good.
Thomas Jefferson
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Of distinction by birth or badge, [Americans] had no more idea than they had of the mode of existence in the moon or planets. They had heard only that there were such, and knew that they must be wrong.
Thomas Jefferson
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Never buy what you do not want, because it is cheap it will be dear to you.
Thomas Jefferson
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Turning, then, from this loathsome combination of church and state, and weeping over the follies of our fellow men, who yield themselves the willing dupes and drudges of these mountebanks, I consider reformation and redress as desperate, and abandon them to the Quixotism of more enthusiastic minds.
Thomas Jefferson
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By nature's law, man is at peace with man till some aggression is committed, which, by the same law, authorizes one to destroy another as his enemy.
Thomas Jefferson
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Drawing ... is an innocent & engaging amusement, often useful, and a qualification not to be neglected in one who is to become a mother & an instructor.
Thomas Jefferson
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I am an Epicurean. I consider the genuine (not the imputed) doctrines of Epicurus as containing everything rational in moral philosophy which Greece and Rome have left us.
Thomas Jefferson
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I am not afraid of the priests. They have tried upon me all their various batteries, of pious whining, hypocritical canting, lying and slandering, without being able to give me one moment of pain.
Thomas Jefferson
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A government is republican in proportion as every member composing it has his equal voice in the direction of its concerns, not indeed in person, which would be impracticable beyond the limits of a city or small township, but by representatives chosen by himself and responsible to him at short periods.
Thomas Jefferson