Quotes on Founding America

The doctrines of Jesus are simple, and tend to all the happiness of man.

Where the preamble declares, that coercion is a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, an amendment was proposed by inserting "Jesus Christ," so that it would read "A departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion;" the insertion was rejected by the great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mohammedan, the Hindoo and Infidel of every denomination.

And I have no doubt that every new example will succeed, as every past one has done, in showing that religion and Government will both exist in greater purity, the less they are mixed together.

We beseech [God] to pardon our national and other transgressions.

We have this day restored the Sovereign to Whom all men ought to be obedient. He reigns in heaven and from the rising to the setting of the sun, let His kingdom come.

The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.

...It would be more consistent that we call [the Bible] the work of a demon than the word of God. It is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind.

The rights essential to happiness. . . . We claim them from a higher source - from the King of kings and Lord of all the earth.

Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.

Take not from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned.