A government by the passions of the multitude, or, no less correctly, according to the vices, and ambitions of their leaders is a democracy.

The happiness of a people, and the good order and preservation of civil government, essentially depend on piety, religion, and morality.

No man can be a sound lawyer in this land who is not well read in the ethics of Moses and the virtues of Jesus.

Liberty is not to be enjoyed, indeed it cannot exist, without the habits of just subordination; it consists, not so much in removing all restraint from the orderly, as in imposing it on the violent.

[O]ur sages in the great [constitutional] convention... intended our government should be a republic which differs more widely from a democracy than a democracy from a despotism. The rigours of a despotism often... oppress only a few, but it is the very essence and nature of a democracy, for a faction claiming to oppress a minority, and that minority the chief owners of the property and truest lovers of their country.

The rights of conscience, of bearing arms, of changing the government, are declared to be inherent in the people.

I consider biennial elections as a security that the sober, second thought of the people shall be law.