My opinion is that there would never have been an infidel, if there had never been a priest. The artificial structures they have built on the purest of all moral systems, for the purpose of deriving from it pence and power, revolts those who think for themselves, and who read in that system only what is really there.

Knowing that religion does not furnish grosser bigots than law, I expect little from old judges.

We love and we value peace; we know its blessings from experience. We abhor the follies of war, and are not untried in its distresses and calamities.

The trifling economy of paper, as a cheaper medium, or its convenience for transmission, weighs nothing in opposition to the advantages of the precious metals it is liable to be abused, has been, is, and forever will be abused, in every country in which it is permitted.

If there is one principle more deeply rooted in the mind of every American, it is that we should have nothing to do with conquest.

Happiness is not being pained in body or troubled in mind.

Evil triumphs when good men do nothing.