Government is a contrivance of human wisdom to provide for human wants.

There is nothing in the world really beneficial that does not lie within the reach of an informed understanding and a well-protected pursuit.

I cannot help concurring with the opinion that an absolute democracy, no more than absolute monarchy, is to be reckoned among the legitimate forms of government.

Liberty must be limited in order to be possessed.

When slavery is established in any part of the world, those who are free are by far the most proud and jealous of their freedom.

In on summer they have done their business... they have completely pulled down to the ground their monarchy, their church, their nobility, their law, their revenue, their army, their navy, their commerce, their arts, and their manufactures... destroyed all balances and counterpoises which serve to fix a state and give it steady direction, and then they melted down the whole into one incongrous mass of mob and democracy... the people, along with their political servitude, have thrown off the yoke of law and morals.

No passion so effectually robs the mind of all its powers of acting and reasoning as fear.