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

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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Nothing is more certainly written in the book of fate than that these people are to be free. Nor is it less certain that the two races, equally free, cannot live in the same government. Nature, habit, opinion has drawn indelible lines of distinction between them.
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Gaming corrupts our disposition and teaches us a habit of hostility against all mankind.
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Public offices were not made for private convenience.
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The only foundation for useful education in a republic is to be laid in religion.
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I consider ethics, as well as religion, as supplements to law in the government of man.
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I do not like [in the new Federal Constitution] the omission of a Bill of Rights providing clearly and without the aid of sophisms for... protection against standing armies
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You see I am an enthusiast on the subject of the arts.
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The President is bound to stop at the limits prescribed by our Constitution and law to the authorities in his hands, [and this] would apply in an occasion of peace as well as war.
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I find the pain of a little censure, even when it is unfounded, is more acute than the pleasure of much praise.
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never trust a man who won't accept that there is more than one way to spell a word Paraphrased
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Paper money is liable to be abused, has been, is, and forever will be abused, in every country in which it is permitted.
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Knowing that religion does not furnish grosser bigots than law, I expect little from old judges.
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Religions are all alike- founded upon fables and mythologies.
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Ignorance of the law is no excuse in any country. If it were, the laws would lose their effect, because it can always be pretended.
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Whiskey claims to itself alone the exclusive office of sot-making.
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Too old to plant trees for my own gratification, I shall do it for my posterity.
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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?
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The dead should not rule the living
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Every constitution..., and every law, naturally expires at the end of 19 years [a generation]. If it be enforced longer, it is anact of force, and not of right.
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Our duty to ourselves, to posterity, and to mankind, call on us by every motive which is sacred or honorable, to watch over the safety of our beloved country during the troubles which agitate and convulse the residue of the world, and to sacrifice to that all personal and local considerations.
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