I am for freedom of religion, and against all maneuvers to bring about a legal ascendency of one sect over another.
Interpretation
The quote advocates for the freedom of religious expression and opposes any attempts to favor one religion over others.
Thomas Jefferson emphasizes the importance of religious freedom, arguing that no single religion should hold legal power or supremacy over others. This belief in equality among different faiths is foundational to a just and democratic society, where individuals can worship freely without fear of discrimination or persecution based on their beliefs.
In practice
In a discussion about the importance of religious pluralism.
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.
The commandment to refrain from placing blame on our parents, deeply imprinted in us by our upbringing, skillfully performs the function of hiding essential truths from us.
Truthfulness under oath is, by now, a matter of our civic religion, our relation to our fellow citizens rather than our relation to a nonhuman power.
One murder makes a villain; millions, a hero.
Dear incomprehension, it's thanks to you I'll be myself, in the end.
When life takes away, something of greater value is always given in return.
There are certain things that our age needs, and certain things that it should avoid. It needs compassion and a wish that mankind should be happy; it needs the desire for knowledge and the determination to eschew pleasant myths; it needs, above all, courageous hope and the impulse to creativeness.
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