There are other places at which ... the laws have said there shall be towns; but Nature has said there shall not, and they remain unworthy of enumeration.

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies.

Man, once surrendering his reason, has no remaining guard against absurdities the most monstrous. . . .

Victory and defeat are each of the same price.

Those who labor in the earth are the chosen people of God.

The diffusion of information and the arraignment of all abuses at the bar of public reason, I deem [one of] the essential principles of our government, and consequently [one of] those which ought to shape its administration.

We are firmly convinced, and we act on that conviction, that with nations as with individuals our interests soundly calculated will ever be found inseparable from our moral duties, and history bears witness to the fact that a just nation is trusted on its word when recourse is had to armaments and wars to bridle others.