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For all men being originally equals, no one by birth could have the right to set up his own family in perpetual preference to all others forever, and tho' himself might deserve some decent degree of honours of his cotemporaries, yet his descendants might be far too unworthy to inherit them.

Thomas Paine

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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
Right
Degree
Descendants
Men
Degrees
Equals
Deserve
Originally
Birth
Unworthy
Forever
Preference
Family
Honour
Others
Perpetual
Honours
Might
Decent
Inherit

More quotes by Thomas Paine

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For the fate of Charles the first, hath only made kings more subtle — not more just.
Thomas Paine
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Now, which am I to believe, a book that any impostor might make and call the Word of God, or the creation itself which none but an Almighty Power could make? For the Bible says one thing and the creation says the contrary. The Bible represents God with all the passions of a mortal, and the creation proclaims him with all the attributes of a God.
Thomas Paine
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Wisdom is not the purchase of a day, and it is no wonder that we should err at the first setting off.
Thomas Paine
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It is the fable of Jesus Christ, as told in the New Testament, and the wild and visionary doctrine raised thereon, against which I contend. The story, taking it as it is told, is blasphemously obscene.
Thomas Paine
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The graceful pride of truth knows no extremes, and preserves, in every latitude of life, the right-angled character of man.
Thomas Paine
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The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.
Thomas Paine
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One good schoolmaster is of more use than a hundred priests.
Thomas Paine
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The Vatican is a dagger in the heart of Italy.
Thomas Paine
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It is from the power of taxation being in the hands of those who can throw so great a part of it from their own shoulders, that it has raged without a check.
Thomas Paine
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Therefore we say that a lying Spirit has been in the mouth of the writers of the books of the Bible.
Thomas Paine
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To believe that God created a plurality of worlds, at least as numerous as what we call stars, renders the Christian faith at once little and ridiculous and scatters it in the mind like feathers in the air.
Thomas Paine
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Those who expect to reap the blessing of freedom must undertake to support it.
Thomas Paine
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When my country, into which I had just set my foot, was set on fire about my ears, it was time to stir. It was time for every man to stir.
Thomas Paine
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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
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Man did not enter society to be worse off, or to have fewer rights, but rather to have those rights better secured
Thomas Paine
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I disbelieve all holy men and holy books.
Thomas Paine
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Wrong cannot have a legal descendant.
Thomas Paine
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A man may write himself out of reputation when nobody else can do it.
Thomas Paine
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Tears may soothe the wounds they cannot heal.
Thomas Paine
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If the present generation, or any other, are disposed to be slaves, it does not lessen the right of the succeeding generation to be free: wrongs cannot have a legal descent.
Thomas Paine