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The authors of the gospels were unlettered and ignorant men and the teachings of Jesus have come to us mutilated, misstated and unintelligible.

Thomas Jefferson

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Thomas Jefferson
Age: 83 †
Born: 1743
Born: April 2
Died: 1826
Died: July 4
3Rd U.S. President
Archaeologist
Architect
Cryptographer
Diplomat
Farmer
Inventor
Jurist
Lawyer
Philosopher
Politician
Slaveholder
President Jefferson
T. Jefferson
Men
Unintelligible
Gospels
Teachings
Authors
Ignorant
Teaching
Jesus
Unlettered
Come
Mutilated

More quotes by Thomas Jefferson

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The day is not distant when we must bear and adopt [the abolition of slavery], or worse will follow.
Thomas Jefferson
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The advocate of religious freedom is to expect neither peace nor forgiveness from [the clergy].
Thomas Jefferson
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Those who have once got an ascendancy, and possessed themselves of all the resources of the nation, their revenues and offices, have immense means for retaining their advantage.
Thomas Jefferson
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One loves to possess arms, though they hope never to have occasion for them.
Thomas Jefferson
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The ordinary affairs of a nation offer little difficulty to a person of any experience.
Thomas Jefferson
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Would the honest patriot, in the full tide of successful experiment, abandon a government which has so far kept us free and firm on the theoretic and visionary fear that this Government, the world's best hope, may by possibility want energy to preserve itself? I trust not.
Thomas Jefferson
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Nothing but a necessity invincible by any other means can justify ... a prostitution of laws, which constitute the pillars of our whole system of jurisprudence.
Thomas Jefferson
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If we move in mass, be it ever so circuitously, we shall attain our object but if we break into squads, everyone pursuing the path he thinks most direct, we become an easy conquest to those who can now barely hold us in check.
Thomas Jefferson
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A pirate spreading misery and ruin over the face of the ocean
Thomas Jefferson
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I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies.
Thomas Jefferson
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The general (federal) government will tend to monarchy, which will fortify itself from day to day, instead of working its own cures.
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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Every one must act according to the dictates of his own reason, and mine tells me that civil powers alone have been given to the President of the United States, and no authority to direct the religious exercises of his constituents.
Thomas Jefferson
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Walking is the best possible exercise. Habituate yourself to walk very far. The Europeans value themselves on having subdued the horse to the uses of man but I doubt whether we have not lost more than we have gained, by the use of this animal.
Thomas Jefferson
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...We are all Federalists,and we are all Republicans.
Thomas Jefferson
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There is not a single crowned head in Europe whose talents or merit would entitle him to be elected a vestryman by the people of any parish in America.
Thomas Jefferson
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When tyranny becomes law, rebellion becomes duty.
Thomas Jefferson
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If ignorance is bliss, why aren't more people happy?
Thomas Jefferson
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Take not from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned.
Thomas Jefferson
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Common sense is the foundation of all authorities, of the laws themselves, and of their construction.
Thomas Jefferson