I cannot conceive a rank more honorable than that which flows from the uncorrupted choice of a brave and free people—the purest source and original fountain of all power.

The great mass of our Citizens require only to understand matters rightly, to form right decisions.

To encourage literature and the arts is a duty which every good citizen owes to his country.

There is nothing which can better deserve our patronage than the promotion of science and literature. Knowledge is in every country the surest basis of public happiness.

The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the Republican model of Government, are justly considered... deeply, perhaps as finally, staked on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people.

The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty and the destiny of the Republican model of Government are justly considered... deeply, perhaps as finally, staked on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people.

Labor to keep alive in your breast that little spark of celestial fire called conscience.

My movements to the chair of Government will be accompanied by feelings not unlike those of a culprit who is going to the place of his execution.

Whenever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government * * * whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their notice, they may be relied on to set them to rights.

In republican government, the legislative authority necessarily predominates.

In a society under the forms of which the stronger faction can readily unite and oppress the weaker, anarchy may as truly be said to reign as in a state of nature.

If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.

Ambition must be made to counteract ambition.

Wherever the real power in a Government lies, there is the danger of oppression.

Liberty, when it begins to take root, is a plant of rapid growth.

Truth will ultimately prevail where there is pains to bring it to light.

The public good is disregarded in the conflicts of rival parties, and the measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the rights of the minor party, but by the superior force of an interested and overbearing…

Liberty is to faction what air is to fire, an aliment without which it instantly expires.