When once a Republic is corrupted, there is no possibility of remedying any of the growing evils but by removing the corruption and restoring its lost principles; every other correction is either useless or a new evil.
Interpretation
Corruption in a Republic cannot be fixed without addressing the root causes and restoring foundational values.
This quote by Thomas Jefferson emphasizes that when a Republic becomes corrupted, the only effective solution is to eliminate the corruption and return to the core principles on which it was built. Jefferson warns that attempting to address the symptoms of corruption without tackling the underlying issues will either be ineffective or lead to further problems, stressing the importance of foundational values in governance.
In practice
In a speech discussing the importance of maintaining democratic values in society.
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
We 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.
There are worries that seem to me sustained by the love of worry. For example, that people are reading from screens, or listening to recorded books. Why scold the impulse to enjoy language and narrative in whatever form it takes?
To give a causal explanation of an event means to deduce a statement which describes it, using as premises of the deduction one or more universal laws, together with certain singular statements, the initial conditions ... We have thus two different kinds of statement, both of which are necessary ingredients of a complete causal explanation.
If women are not perceived to be fully within the structures of power, surely it is power that we need to redefine rather than women?
Sometimes," he sighed, "I think the things I remember are more real than the things I see.
Tension without cosmic pulsation to animate it is the transition to nothingness
It is an undeniable privilege of every man to prove himself right in the thesis that the world is his enemy; for if he reiterates it frequently enough and makes it the background of his conduct he is bound eventually to be right.
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