2,194 Quotes by Thomas Jefferson

I hope our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us, that the less we use our power the greater it will be.

The purpose of establishing different houses of legislation is to introduce the influence of different interests or different principles.

There is also an artificial aristocracy founded on wealth and birth, without either virtue or talents; for with these it would belong to the first class

[The Federal Convention] is really an assembly of demigods.

We must endeavor to forget our former love for them [the British] and to hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends.

I never told my own religion nor scrutinized that of another. I never attempted to make a convert, nor wished to change another's creed. I am satisfied that yours must be an excellent religion to have produced a life of such exemplary virtue and correctness. For it is in our lives, and not from our words, that our religion must be judged.

Establish the eternal truth that acquiescence under insult is not the way to escape war.

It is not by the consolidation or concentration of powers but by their distribution that good government is effected.

Believing that happiness of mankind is best promoted by the useful pursuits of peace, that on these alone a stable prosperity can be founded, that the evils of war are great in their endurance, and have a long reckoning for ages to come, I have used