Taxes should be proportioned to what may be annually spared by the individual.

I feel much alarmed at the prospect of seeing General Jackson President. He is the most unfit man I know for such a place.

New York, like London, seems to be a cloacina [toilet] of all the depravities of human nature.

I have often thought that nothing would do more extensive good at small expense than the establishment of a small circulating library in every county, to consist of a few well-chosen books, to be lent to the people of the country under regulations as would secure their safe return in due time.

Difference of opinion leads to inquiry, and inquiry to the truth.

I feel a much greater interest in knowing what has passed two or three thousand years ago, than in what is now passing. I read nothing, therefore, but of the heroes of Troy, ... of Pompey and Caesar, and of Augustus too.

If there is a gratification which I envy any people in this world it is to your country [Italy] its music. This is the favorite passion of my soul, and fortune has cast my lot in a country where it is in a state of deplorable barbarism.