None but an armed nation can dispense with a standing army. To keep ours armed and disciplined is therefore at all times important.

For if one link in nature's chain might be lost, another might be lost, until the whole of things will vanish by piecemeal.

I hope the necessity will at length be seen of establishing institutions, here as in Europe, where every branch of science, useful at this day, may be taught in it's highest degrees.

Gouverneur Morris had often told me that General Washington believed no more of that system (Christianity) than did he himself.

But the fact being once established, that the press is impotent when it abandons itself to falsehood, I leave to others to restore it to its strength, by recalling it within the pale of truth. Within that, it is a noble institution, equally the friend of science and of civil liberty.

Almighty God hath created the mind free. All attempts to influence it by temporal punishments or burthens...are a departure from the plan of the holy Author of our religion...No man shall be compelled to frequent or support religious worship or ministry or shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief, but all men shall be free to profess and by argument to maintain, their opinions in matters of religion. I know but one code of morality for men whether acting singly or collectively.

The mobs of great cities add just so much to the support of pure government as sores do to the strength of the human body.