Thomas Jefferson Quotes

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Leave all the afternoon for exercise and recreation, which are as necessary as reading. I will rather say more necessary because health is worth more than learning.

- Thomas Jefferson

In justice, too, to our excellent Constitution, it ought to be observed, that it has not placed our religious rights under the power of any public functionary.

- Thomas Jefferson

A Nation's best defense is an educated citizenry.

- Thomas Jefferson

I like dreams of the future better than the history of the past.

- Thomas Jefferson

The people cannot be all, and always well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive.

- Thomas Jefferson

I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial by strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country.

- Thomas Jefferson

A politician looks forward only to the next election. A statesman looks forward to the next generation.

- Thomas Jefferson

Honesty is the first chapter in the book of wisdom.

- Thomas Jefferson

I know of no safe repository of the ultimate power of society but people. And if we think them not enlightened enough, the remedy is not to take the power from them, but to inform them by education.

- Thomas Jefferson

He who permits himself to tell a lie once, finds it much easier to do it a second and third time, till at length it becomes habitual.

- Thomas Jefferson

Reason and free inquiry are the only effectual agents against error.

- Thomas Jefferson

If the game runs sometimes against us at home we must have patience till luck turns, and then we shall have an opportunity of winning back the principles we have lost, for this is a game where principles are at stake.

- Thomas Jefferson

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Too old to plant trees for my own gratification, I shall do it for my posterity.

- Thomas Jefferson

Though an old man I am but a young gardener.

- Thomas Jefferson

I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and Constitutions. But laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.

- Thomas Jefferson

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I have no fear that the result of our experiment will be that men may be trusted to govern themselves without a master.

- Thomas Jefferson

Ignorance is preferable to error, and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing than he who believes what is wrong.

- Thomas Jefferson

Error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it.

- Thomas Jefferson

We mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honour. Declaration of Independence

- Thomas Jefferson

Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political; peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, -- entangling alliances with none; the support of the State governments in all their rights, as the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns, and the surest bulwarks against anti-republican tendencies; the preservation of the general government in its whole constitutional vigour, as the sheet anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad; -- freedom of religion; freedom of the press; freedom of person under the protection of the habeas corpus; and trial by juries impartially selected, -- these principles form the bright constellation which has gone before us, and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation.

- Thomas Jefferson

The happiest moments of my life have been the few which I have passed at home in the bosom of my family.

- Thomas Jefferson

I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions, but laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.

- Thomas Jefferson

I'm a great believer in luck and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it.

- Thomas Jefferson

In truth, politeness is artificial good humor, it covers the natural want of it, and ends by rendering habitual a substitute nearly equivalent to the real virtue.

- Thomas Jefferson