Don't wait around for your life to happen to you. Find something that makes you happy, and do it. Because everything else is all just background noise.

Who are the militia? They consist now of the whole people, except a few public officers. But I cannot say who will be the militia of the future day. If that paper on the table [the Constitution] gets no alteration, the militia of the future day may not consist of all classes, high and low, and rich and poor.

The augmentation of slaves weakens the states; and such a trade is diabolical in itself, and disgraceful to mankind.

That slow poison [slavery] is daily contaminating the minds and morals of our people. Every gentlemen here is born a petty tyrant, practiced in acts of despotism and cruelty.

A well-regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the proper, natural, and safe defense of a free state; that standing armies, in time of peace, should be avoided as dangerous to liberty; and that in all cases the military should be under strict subordination to, and governed by, the civil power.

The poor despise labor when performed by slaves.

The freedom of the press is one of the great bulwarks of liberty, and can never be restrained but by despotic governments.