In reviewing the history of the times through which we have passed, no portion of it gives greater satisfaction or reflection, than that which represents the efforts of the friends of religious freedom and the success with which they are crowned.

This I hope will be the age of experiments in government, and that their basis will be founded in principles of honesty, not of mere force.

Instead of that liberty which takes root and growth in the progress of reason, if recovered by mere force or accident, it becomes with an unprepared people a tyranny still of the many, the few, or the one.

A coward is much more exposed to quarrels than a man of spirit.

Reading, reflection and time have convinced me that the interests of society require the observation of those moral precepts only in which all religions agree.

They are exactly the persons who are to succeed to the government of our country and to rule its future enmities, its friendships and fortunes.

The art of life is the art of avoiding pain.