Quote

Every science has for its basis a system of principles as fixed and unalterable as those by which the universe is regulated and governed. Man cannot make principles he can only discover them.

Thomas Paine

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Thomas Paine
Age: 72 †
Born: 1737
Born: January 29
Died: 1809
Died: June 8
Author
Entrepreneur
Journalist
Opinion Journalist
Philosopher
Politician
Prosaist
Writer
Thetford
Norfolk
Science
Invention
Cannot
Fixed
Every
Basis
Make
Bases
Men
Discover
Principles
Unalterable
System
Regulated
Universe
Governed

More quotes by Thomas Paine

Image
Men did not make the earth... It is the value of the improvements only, and not the earth itself, that is individual property. ... Every proprietor owes to the community a ground rent for the land which he holds.
Thomas Paine
Image
Tears may soothe the wounds they cannot heal.
Thomas Paine
Image
Those who knew Benjamin Franklin will recollect that his mind was forever young, his temper ever serene science, that never grows gray, was always his mistress. He was never without an object, for when we cease to have an object, we become like an invalid in a hospital waiting for death.
Thomas Paine
Image
The whole religious complexion of the modern world is due to the absence from Jerusalem of a lunatic asylum.
Thomas Paine
Image
Peace, which costs nothing, is attended with infinitely more advantage than any victory with all its expence.
Thomas Paine
Image
It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry.
Thomas Paine
Image
Prejudice, like the spider, makes everywhere its home. It has neither taste nor choice of place, and all that it requires is room. If the one prepares her food by poisoning it to her palate and her use, the other does the same. Prejudice may be denominated the spider of the mind.
Thomas Paine
Image
There is something in meanness which excites a species of resentment that never subsides, and something in cruelty which stirs up the heart to the highest agony of human hatred.
Thomas Paine
Image
To possess ourselves of a clear idea of what government is, or ought to be, we must trace it to its origin.
Thomas Paine
Image
Mystery is the antagonist of truth. It is a fog of human invention, that obscures truth, and represents it in distortion.
Thomas Paine
Image
Thus commerce, though in itself a moral nullity, has had a considerable influence in tempering the human mind....he trades with the same countries ...(that he) would have gone to war with.
Thomas Paine
Image
It is only by the exercise of reason that man can discover God.
Thomas Paine
Image
Death is not the monarch for the dead, but of the dying. The moment he obtains a conquest he loses a subject.
Thomas Paine
Image
Common sense will tell us, that the power which hath endeavoured to subdue us, is of all others, the most improper to defend us.
Thomas Paine
Image
Accustom a people to believe that priests, or any other class of men can forgive sins and you will have sins in abundance.
Thomas Paine
Image
From whence, then, could arise the solitary and strange conceit that the Almighty, who had millions of worlds equally dependant on His protection, should quit the care of all the rest, and come to die in our world, because, they say, one man and one woman had eaten an apple?
Thomas Paine
Image
Every age and generation must be as free to act for itself in all cases as the ages and generations which preceded it. The vanity and presumption of governing beyond the grave is the most ridiculous and insolent of all tyrannies.
Thomas Paine
Image
As priestcraft was always the enemy of knowledge, because priestcraft supports itself by keeping people in delusion and ignorance, it was consistent with its policy to make the acquisition of knowledge a real sin.
Thomas Paine
Image
When a man has so far corrupted and prostituted the chastity of his mind, as to [profess] things he does not believe, he has prepared himself for the commission of every other crime.
Thomas Paine
Image
The times that tried men's souls are over-and the greatest and completest revolution the world ever knew, gloriously and happily accomplished.
Thomas Paine