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.

Government can do something for the people only in proportion as it can do something to the people.

No freeman shall be debarred the use of arms.

If I am to meet with a disappointment, the sooner I know it, the more of life I shall have to wear it off.

To make us one nation as to foreign concerns, and keep us distinct in Domestic ones gives the outline of the proper division of powers between the general [national] and particular [state] governments.

It is a principle that the right to a thing gives a right to the means without which it could not be used, that is to say, that the means follow their end.

It is wonderful how much may be done if we are always doing.