Only aim to do your duty, and mankind will give you credit where you fail.

There is a natural aristocracy among men. The grounds of this are virtue and talents.

By... [selecting] the youths of genius from among the classes of the poor, we hope to avail the State of those talents which nature has sown as liberally among the poor as the rich, but which perish without use if not sought for and cultivated.

I considered 4 of these bills [of the revised code of Virginia] as forming a system by which every fibre would be eradicated of antient or future aristocracy; and a foundation laid for a government truly republican.

A government is republican in proportion as every member composing it has his equal voice in the direction of its concerns, not indeed in person, which would be impracticable beyond the limits of a city or small township, but by representatives chosen by himself and responsible to him at short periods.

Every nation has a right to govern itself internally under what forms it pleases, and to change these forms at its own will.

They are nations of eternal war. All their energies are expended in the destruction of the labor, property, and lives of their people.