A generation may bind itself as long as its majority continues in life; when that has disappeared, another majority is in place, holds all the rights and powers their predecessors once held, and may change their laws and institutions to suit themselves. Nothing then is unchangeable but the inherent and inalienable rights of man.

Never was so much false arithmetic employed on any subject, as that which has been employed to persuade nations that it is in their interest to go to war.

Religious leaders will always avail themselves of public ignorance for their own purpose.

When we come to the moral principles on which the government is to be administered, we come to what is proper for all conditions of society. Liberty, truth, probity, honor, are declared to be the four cardinal principles of society. I believe that morality, compassion, generosity, are innate elements of the human constitution; that there exists a right independent of force.

As for what is not true, you will always find abundance in the newspapers.

Every human being must be viewed according to what it is good for. For not one of us, no, not one, is perfect. And were we to love none who had imperfection, this world would be a desert for our love.

I am a Christian in the only sense in which He wished anyone to be: sincerely attached to His doctrines in preference to all others.