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A government of our own is our natural right and when a man seriously reflects on the precariousness of human affairs, he will become convinced, that it is infinitely wiser and safer, to form a constitution of our own in a cool deliberate manner, while we have it in our power, than to trust such an interesting event to time and chance.

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
Humans
Chance
Event
Precariousness
Right
Interesting
Affair
Safer
Men
Natural
Seriously
Reflects
Time
Form
Convinced
Infinitely
Become
Cool
Deliberate
Power
Constitution
Wiser
Government
Events
Affairs
Human
Trust
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More quotes by Thomas Paine

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The stupid texts of the Bible - from which, be the talents of the preacher what they may, only stupid sermons can be preached.
Thomas Paine
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Is it because you are sunk in the cruelty of superstition, or feel no interest in the honor of your Creator, that you listen to the horrid tales of the Bible, or hear them with callous indifference?
Thomas Paine
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Government without a constitution, is a power without a right.
Thomas Paine
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When extraordinary power and extraordinary pay are allotted to any individual in a government, he becomes the center, round which every kind of corruption generates and forms.
Thomas Paine
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Mystery is the antagonist of truth. It is a fog of human invention, that obscures truth, and represents it in distortion.
Thomas Paine
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And when we view a flag, which to the eye is beautiful, and to contemplate its rise and origin inspires a sensation of sublime delight, our national honor must unite with our interests to prevent injury to the one, or insult to the other.
Thomas Paine
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Of all the systems of religion that ever were invented, there is no more derogatory to the Almighty, more unedifiying to man, more repugnant to reason, and more contradictory to itself than this thing called Christianity.
Thomas Paine
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Arms, like laws, discourage and keep the invader and plunderer in awe and preserve order.
Thomas Paine
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Reason obeys itself and ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it.
Thomas Paine
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Now is the seedtime of continental union, faith and honor. The least fracture now, will be like a name engraved with the point of a pin on the tender rind of a young oak the wound would enlarge with the tree, and posterity read in it full grown characters.
Thomas Paine
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Each government accuses the other of perfidy, intrigue and ambition, as a means of heating the imagination of their respective nations, and incensing them to hostilities. Man is not the enemy of man, but through the medium of a false system of government.
Thomas Paine
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These are the times that try men's souls.
Thomas Paine
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No man is prejudiced in favor of a thing, knowing it to be wrong. He is attached to it on the belief of its being right and when he sees it is not so, the prejudice will be gone.
Thomas Paine
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That which we obtain too easily, we esteem too lightly.
Thomas Paine
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...It would be more consistent that we call [the Bible] the work of a demon than the word of God. It is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind.
Thomas Paine
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Lay then the axe to the root, and teach governments humanity. It is their sanguinary punishments which corrupt mankind.
Thomas Paine
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It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry.
Thomas Paine
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The cunning of the fox is as murderous as the violence of the wolf.
Thomas Paine
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Persecution is not an original feature in any religion but it is always the strongly marked feature of all religions established by law.
Thomas Paine
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I die content, I die for the liberty of my country.
Thomas Paine