-- Andrew Jackson
Take time to deliberate; but when the time for action arrives, stop thinking and go
in.
One man with courage makes a majority.
-- William James
Acceptance of what has happened is the first step to overcoming the consequences of
any misfortune.
Be not afraid of life.
Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.
The art of becoming wise is the art of knowing what to overlook.
-- Japanese Proverb
When you have completed 95% of your journey you are halfway there.
--Thomas Jefferson
I wish it were possible to obtain a single amendment to our Constitution. I would
be willing to depend on that alone for the reduction of the administration of our
government; I mean an additional article taking from the Federal Government the power of
borrowing. I now deny their power of making paper money or anything else a legal tender. I
know that to pay all proper expenses within the year would, in case of war, be hard on us.
But not so hard as ten wars instead of one. For wars could be reduced in that proportion;
besides that the State governments would be free to lend their credit in borrowing quotas.
I place economy among the first and important virtues, and public debt as the greatest of
dangers. To preserve our independence, we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual
debt. We must make our choice between economy and liberty, or profusion and servitude. If
we can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of
caring for them, they will be happy.
Shake off all the fears of servile prejudices, under which weak minds are servility
crouched. Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call on her tribunal for every fact, every
opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he
must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear.
A wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which
shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and
improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is
the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicity.
I never submitted the whole system of my opinions to the creed of any party of men
whatever, in religion, in philosophy, in politics or in anything else, where I was capable
of thinking for myself. Such an addiction is the last degradation of a free and moral
agent. If I could not go to Heaven but with a party, I would not go there at all.
We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable; that all men are created equal and
independent, that from that equal creation they derive rights inherent and inalienable,
among which are the preservation of life, and liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Above all things I hope the education of the common people will be attended to, convinced
that on their good sense we may rely with the most security for the preservation of a due
degree of liberty.
If the children are untaught, their ignorance and vices will in future life cost us much
dearer in their consequences than it would have done in their correction by a good
education.
I sincerely believe... that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity under
the name of funding is but swindling futurity on a large scale.
It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes. A principle which if
acted on would save one-half the wars of the world.
I think we have more machinery of government than is necessary, to many parasites living
on the labor of the industrious.
Nothing gives one person so much advantage over another as to remain always cool and
unruffled under all circumstances.
A little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world
as storms in the physical.
The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but
newspapers.
The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it
to be always kept alive.
That government is best which governs the least, because its people discipline themselves.
I am a great believer in luck, and I find that the harder I work, the more I have of it.
When angry, count to ten before you speak. If very angry, a hundred.
Only aim to do your duty, and mankind will give you credit where you fail.
Honesty is the first chapter in the book of wisdom.
Be polite to all, but intimate with few.
I cannot live without books.
-- Jerome K. Jerome
It is always the best policy to tell the truth, unless, of course, you are an
exceptionally good liar.
-- Pope John XXIII
Men are like wine - some turn to vinegar, but the best improve with age.
-- Samuel Johnson
Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome.
-- Donald P. Jones
The quickest and shortest way to crush whatever laurels you have won is for you to
rest on them.
-- W. Alton Jones
The man who gets the most satisfactory results is not always the man with the most
brilliant single mind, but rather the man who can best coordinate the brains and talents
of his associates.
-- Erica Jong
Take your life in your own hands and what happens? A terrible thing: no one to
blame.
Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn't.
And the trouble is, if you don't risk anything, you risk even more.
-- Joakim Jonsson
Don't do today what you can put off till tomorrow
