We should amuse our evening hours of life in cultivating the tender plants, and bringing them to perfection, before they are transplanted to a happier clime.

Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be.

[T]he first transactions of a nation, like those of an individual upon his first entrance into life make the deepest impression, and are to form the leading traits in its character.

Extensive powers not exercised as far as was necessary have, I believe, scarcely ever failed to ruin the possessor.

Make sure you are doing what God wants you to do--then do it with all your strength.

In the discharge of this trust I will only say that I have, with good intentions, contributed toward the organization and administration of the Government the best exertions of which a very fallible judgment was capable.

[T]here is no truth more thoroughly established, than that there exists . . . an indissoluble union between virtue and happiness.