The multitude . . . have not a sufficient stock of reason and knowledge to guide them. . . . It is not safe to trust to the virtue of any people.

People sometimes attribute my success to my genius; all the genius I know anything about is hard work.

Give all the power to the many, they will oppress the few. Give all the power to the few, they will oppress the many.

When a government betrays the people by amassing too much power and becoming tyrannical, the people have no choice but to exercise their original right of self-defense — to fight the government.

One great error is that we suppose mankind more honest than they are.

I think the first duty of society is justice.

There is a certain enthusiasm in liberty, that makes human nature rise above itself, in acts of bravery and heroism.

Men often oppose a thing merely because they have had no agency in planning it, or because it may have been planned by those whom they dislike.

A nation which can prefer disgrace to danger is prepared for a master, and deserves one.

Foreign influence is truly the Grecian horse to a republic. We cannot be too careful to exclude its influence.

It's not tyranny we desire; it's a just, limited, federal government.

Love her but leave her wild.

I think it is a good thing that the Trinity is confusing If it weren't, we wouldn't have the desire to learn more.

Once I decided to write, to be published, I knew it would happen.

Laugh not too much; the witty man laughs least: For wit is news only to ignorance. Lesse at thine own things laugh; lest in the jest Thy person share, and the conceit advance.

Christianity is based on a book. It centers in a Person. It expresses itself in a message. It authenticates itself in an experience.

There are only a few bits of absolute knowledge in the world, people can learn only one or two fundamental facts about each other, the rest is decoration and prejudice.

Hell is not in torture; Hell is in an empty heart.

And light has no weight, / Yet one is lifted on its flood, /Swept high, /Running up white-golden light-shafts, /As if one were as weightless as light itself - /All gold and white and light.

She just keeps saying "He’s gone.

I think that political marriages are subject to more strain than most precisely because of the nature of politics.