Leave no authority existing not responsible to the people.

We never repent of having eaten too little.

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Whenever there are in any country uncultivated lands and unemployed poor, it is clear that the laws of property have been so far extended as to violate natural right. The earth is given as a common stock for man to labor and live on. The small landowners are the most precious part of a state

The happiest moments my heart knows are those in which it is pouring forth its affections to a few esteemed characters.

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

One of my favorite ideas is, never to keep an unnecessary soldier.