The small landholders are the most precious part of a state.

A lottery is a salutary instrument and a tax... laid on the willing only, that is to say, on those who can risk the price of a ticket without sensible injury, for the possibility of a higher prize.

History by apprising them [the people] of the past will enable them to judge of the future. . . . It will qualify them as judges of the actions and designs of men: it will enable them to know ambition under every disguise it may assume; and knowing it, to defeat its views.

Men of high learning and abilities are few in every country; and by taking in those who are not so, the able part of the body have their hands tied by the unable.

Taxation is, in fact, the most difficult function of government and that against which their citizens are most apt to be refractory.

It is a misnomer to call a government republican in which a branch of the supreme power is independent of the nation.

The hole and the patch should be commensurate.