Civil officials have no business meddling in private religious affairs.
Interpretation
Government should not interfere in individual's religious beliefs.
This quote by Thomas Jefferson emphasizes the importance of separating church and state, suggesting that civil authorities should not involve themselves in the personal religious practices and beliefs of individuals. It reflects a fundamental principle of religious freedom and the idea that personal faith is a private matter that should not be governed or influenced by the state.
In practice
In a debate about the role of government in education, one might quote Jefferson to argue for religious neutrality.
The firmness with which the (American) people have withstood the... abuses of the press, the discernment they have manifested between truth and falsehood, show that they may safely be trusted to hear everything true and false and to form a correct judgment between them.
I, place economy among the first & most important republican virtues, & public debt as the greatest of the dangers to be feared
βWe must make our choice between economy and liberty or confusion and servitude...If we run into such debts, we must be taxed in our meat and drink, in our necessities and comforts, in our labor and in our amusements...if we can prevent the government from wasting the labor of the people, under the pretense of caring for them, they will be happy.
Very many and very meritorious were the worthy patriots who assisted in bringing back our government to its republican tack. To preserve it in that, will require unremitting vigilance.
A nation, as a society, forms a moral person, and every member of it is personally responsible for his society.
Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of liberty.
Admiration is a very short-lived passion, that immediately decays upon growing familiar with its object.
Serious-minded people have few ideas. People with ideas are never serious.
Laurel and Hardy. That's John and Yoko, and we stand a better chance under that guise, because all the serious people, like Martin Luther King, and Kennedy, and Gandhi, got shot.
since some people had told me that I was ugly, I always preferred shade to the sun, darkness to light
We will walk on our own feet; we will work with our own hands; we will speak our own minds... A nation of men will for the first time exist, because each believes himself inspired by the Divine Soul which also inspires all men.
Aerodynamics are for people who can't build engines.
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