Error is to be pitied and pardoned: it is the weakness of human nature. But vice is a foul blemish, not pardonable in any character.

Nothing gives one person so much advantage over another as to remain always cool and unruffled under all circumstances.

The functionaries of every government have propensities to command at will the liberty and property of their constituents.

The opinions of men should not be the object of any government. Our civil rights are no more dependent on our religious beliefs than they are dependent upon our thoughts about geometry or physics!

[All religious sects] dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight; and scowl on the fatal harbinger announcing the subversion of the duperies in which they live.

Whenever a man has cast a longing eye on offices, a rottenness begins in his conduct.

The most uninformed mind with a healthy body is happier than the wisest valetudinarian.