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Amplification is the vice of modern oratory.

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
Amplification
Oratory
Vice
Vices
Modern

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A nation, as a society, forms a moral person, and every member of it is personally responsible for his society.
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To preserve the freedom of the human mind then and freedom of the press, every spirit should be ready to devote itself to martyrdom for as long as we may think as we will, and speak as we think, the condition of man will proceed in improvement
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I wish I was a despot that I might save the noble, the beautiful trees that are daily falling sacrifice to the cupidity of their owners, or the necessity of the poor. The unnecessary felling of a tree, perhaps the growth of centuries, seems to me a crime little short of murder.
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I think by far the most important bill in our whole code is that for the diffusion of knowlege among the people. no other sure foundation can be devised for the preservation of freedom, and happiness.
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The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases.
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.
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Educate and inform the whole mass of the people.
Thomas Jefferson
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The lamp of war is kindled here, not to be extinguished but by torrents of blood.
Thomas Jefferson
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May I never get too busy in my own affairs that I fail to respond to the needs of others with kindness and compassion.
Thomas Jefferson
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The physician is happy in the attachment of the families in which he practices. All think he has saved one of them, and he finds himself everywhere a welcome guest, a home in every house.
Thomas Jefferson
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The failure of one thing is repaired by the success of another.
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On every question of construction (of the Constitution) let us carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit of the debates, and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text, or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed.
Thomas Jefferson
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The majority, oppressing an individual, is guilty of a crime, abuses its strength, and by acting on the law of the strongest breaks up the foundations of society.
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Every honest man will suppose honest acts to flow from honest principles, and the rogues may rail without intermission.
Thomas Jefferson
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The federal government is our servant, not our master.
Thomas Jefferson
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What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms.
Thomas Jefferson
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Principle will, in... most... cases open the way for us to correct conclusion.
Thomas Jefferson
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Can one generation bind another, and all others, in succession forever? I think not. The Creator has made the earth for the living, not the dead. Rights and powers can only belong to persons, not to things, not to mere matter endowed with will...Nothing is unchangeable but the inherent and unalienable rights of man.
Thomas Jefferson
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By... [selecting] the youths of genius from among the classes of the poor, we hope to avail the State of those talents which nature has sown as liberally among the poor as the rich, but which perish without use if not sought for and cultivated.
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The happiest hours of my life have been spent in the flow of affection among friends.
Thomas Jefferson