Our country is now taking so steady a course as to show by what road it will pass to destruction, to wit: by consolidation of power first, and then corruption, its necessary consequence.

Agreeable society is the first essential in constituting the happiness and of course the value of our existence.

The Creator has not thought proper to mark those in the forehead who are of stuff to make good generals. We are first, therefore, to seek them blindfold, and then let them learn the trade at the expense of great losses.

I, place economy among the first & most important republican virtues, & public debt as the greatest of the dangers to be feared

Freedom [is] the first-born daughter of science