I had rather be shut up in a very modest cottage, with my books, my family, and a few old friends, dining on simple bacon, and letting the world roll on as it liked, than to occupy the most splendid post which any human power can give.

We did not raise armies for glory or for conquest.

I own that I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive.

Agreeable society is the first essential in constituting the happiness and of course the value of our existence.

In every free and deliberating society, there must, from the nature of man, be opposite parties, and violent dissensions and discords; and one of these, for the most part, must prevail over the other for a longer or shorter time.

Always take hold of things by the smooth handle grateful that they are not worse rather than the rough handle, bitter that they are not better.

Legislators invent too many devices for subdividing property, only taking care to let their subdivisions go hand in hand with the natural affections of the human mind.