Our minds were circumscribed within narrow limits by an habitual belief that it was our duty to be subordinate to the mother country.

No religious reading, instruction or exercise, shall be prescribed or practiced [in the elementary schools] inconsistent with the tenets of any religious sect or denomination.

Honesty, disinterestedness and good nature are indispensable to procure the esteem and confidence of those with whom we live, and on whose esteem our happiness depends.

I hope that we have not labored in vain, and that our experiment will still prove that men can be governed by reason.

In every government on earth is some trace of human weakness, some germ of corruption and degeneracy, which cunning will discover, and wickedness insensibly open, cultivate and improve.

The selfish spirit of commerce, which knows no country, and feels no passion or principle but that of gain.

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