Thomas Paine Quotes

What is called a republic, is not any particular form of government ... it is naturally opposed to the word monarchy, which means arbitrary power.

It is from the Bible that man has learned cruelty, rapine, and murder; for the belief of a cruel God makes a cruel man.

If I do not believe as you believe, it proves that you do not believe as I believe, and that is all that it proves.

If those to whom power is delegated do well, they will be respected; if not, they will be despised.

A Constitution is not the act of a Government, but of a people constituting a government, and a government without a constitution is a power without right.

It is not in numbers, but in unity, that our great strength lies.

I prefer peace. But if trouble must come, let it come in my time, so that my children can live in peace.

Belief in a cruel God makes a cruel man.

It is the duty of every true Deist to vindicate the moral justice of God against the evils of the Bible.

Arms, like laws, discourage and keep the invader and plunderer in awe and preserve order.

In Deism our reason and our belief are happily united.

Of all the tyrannies that affect mankind, tyranny in religion is the worst.

An army of principles will penetrate where an army of soldiers cannot.

Government is best which governs least

Some people can be reasoned into sense, and others must be shocked into it.

He that rebels against reason is a real rebel, but he that in defence of reason rebels against tyranny has a better title to Defender of the Faith, than George the Third.

Time makes more converts than reason.

What is it the Bible teaches us? -- rapine, cruelty, and murder.

Prophesying is lying professionally.

As to the book called the bible, it is blasphemy to call it the Word of God. It is a book of lies and contradictions and a history of bad times and bad men.

What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; it is dearness only that gives everything its value.

From such beginnings of governments, what could be expected, but a continual system of war and extortion?

The trade of governing has always been monopolized by the most ignorant and the most rascally individuals of mankind.

To establish any mode to abolish war, however advantageous it might be to Nations, would be to take from such Government the most lucrative of its branches.

When men yield up the privilege of thinking, the last shadow of liberty quits the horizon.

To take away (voting) is to reduce a man to slavery.

The balance of power is the scale of peace.

Christianity is the strangest religion ever set up, for it committed a murder upon Jesus in order to redeem mankind from the sin of eating an apple.

The cunning of the fox is as murderous as the violence of the wolf.

The whole religious complexion of the modern world is due to the absence from Jerusalem of a lunatic asylum.

That which we obtain too easily, we esteem too lightly.

He is not affected by the reality of distress touching his heart, but by the showy resemblance of it striking his imagination. He pities the plumage, but forgets the dying bird.

Mutual fear is a principal link in the chain of mutual love.

That God cannot lie, is no advantage to your argument, because it is no proof that priests can not, or that the Bible does not.

'Tis the business of little minds to shrink; but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death.

I fear not, I see not reason for fear. In the end we will be the victors. For though at times the flame of liberty may cease to shine, the ember will never expire.

Europe, and not England, is the parent country of America. This new world hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty from every part of Europe.

Government without a constitution, is a power without a right.

My country is wherever liberty lives.

How necessary it is at all times to watch against the attempted encroachment of power, and to prevent its running to excess.

Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence.

Compassion, the fairest associate of the heart.

The instant formal government is abolished, society begins to act. A general association takes place, and common interest produces common security.

Beware the greedy hand of government thrusting itself into every corner and crevice of industry.

A single legislature, on account of the superabundance of its power, and the uncontrolled rabidity of its execution, becomes as dangerous to the principles of liberty as that of a despotic monarch.

It is not a God, just and good, but a devil, under the name of God, that the Bible describes.

Peace, which costs nothing, is attended with infinitely more advantage than any victory with all its expence.

Every science has for its basis a system of principles as fixed and unalterable as those by which the universe is regulated and governed. Man cannot make principles; he can only discover them.

The declaration which says that God visits the sins of the fathers upon the children is contrary to every principle of moral justice.

When my country, into which I had just set my foot, was set on fire about my ears, it was time to stir. It was time for every man to stir.