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Where a new invention promises to be useful, it ought to be tried.

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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The introduction of so powerful an agent as steam [to a carriage on wheels] will make a great change in the situation of man.
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It is surely time for men to think for themselves, and to throw off the authority of names so artificially magnified.
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I would rather have newspapers without a government than a government without newspapers.
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I have come to a resolution myself as I hope every good citizen will, never again to purchase any article of foreign manufacture which can be had of American make, be the difference of price what it may.
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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.
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The fortune of our lives depends on employing well the short period of our youth.
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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.
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Health is worth more than learning.
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Nature intended me for the tranquil pursuits of science, by rendering them my supreme delight. But the enormities of the times in which I have lived, have forced me to take a part in resisting them, and to commit myself on the boisterous ocean of political passions.
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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.
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What has been the effect of coercion? To make one half the world fools, and the other half hypocrites. To support roguery and error all over the earth.... [Instead] reason and persuasion are the only practicable instruments. To make way for these, free enquiry must be indulged and how can we wish others to indulge it while we refuse it ourselves?
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Trial by jury is part of the bright constellation which leads to peace, liberty and safety.
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No man will ever bring out of that office the reputation which carries him into it. The honeymoon would be as short in that case as in any other, and its moments of ecstasy would be ransomed by years of torment and hatred.
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The equal rights of man and the happiness of every individual are now acknowledged to be the only legitimate objects of government.
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In a virtuous and free state, no rewards can be so pleasing to sensible minds, as those which include the approbation of our fellow citizens. My great pain is, lest my poor endeavours should fall short of the kind expectations of my country.
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Common sense is the foundation of all authorities, of the laws themselves, and of their construction.
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Nothing gives one person so much advantage over another as to remain always cool and unruffled under all circumstances.
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Our part is to pursue with steadiness what is right, turning neither to right nor left for the intrigues or popular delusions of the day, assured that the public approbation will in the end be with us.
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Reading, reflection and time have convinced me that the interests of society require the observation of those moral precepts only in which all religions agree.
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Tobacco is a culture productive of infinite wretchedness.
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