Quotes of Life

When the people find they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic. — Benjamin Franklin

I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion of the means. I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. — Benjamin Franklin

Our Constitution is in actual operation; everything appears to promise that it will last; but in this world nothing is certain but death and taxes. — Benjamin Franklin

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. — Benjamin Franklin

It would be a hard government that should tax its people one-tenth part of their income — Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard’s Almanac, 1758

The farther backward you can look, the farther forward you are likely to see. — Winston Churchill

A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse (generous gifts) from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, (which is) always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world’s greatest civilization has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through this sequence. From bondage to spiritual faith; from spiritual faith to great courage; from courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance, from abundance to complacency; from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependence, from dependence back into bondage. — Professor Alexander Tyler

Wise men say, and not without reason, that whosoever wished to foresee the future might consult the past. — Nicolo Machiavelli, The Prince

If we’re ignorant of the historical sacrifices that made our liberties possible, we will be less likely to make the sacrifices again so that those liberties are preserved for future generations. And, if we’re ignorant, we won’t even know when government infringes on our liberties. Moreover, we’ll happily cast our votes for those who’d destroy our liberties. — Walter E. Williams

On every question of construction (of the Constitution) let us carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates, and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text, or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed. — Thomas Jefferson, Letter to William Johnson, June 12, 1823, The Complete Jefferson, p322.

A generation which ignores history has no past and no future. — Robert A. Heinlein, The Notebooks of Lazarus Long

You need only reflect that one of the best ways to get yourself a reputation as a dangerous citizen these days is to go about repeating the very phrases which our founding fathers used in the struggle for independence — Charles Austin Beard, The Blue Press

History teaches us many things; we learn very few of them. — Will Spencer

The deterioration of every government begins with the decay of the principles on which it was founded. — Charles-Louis De Secondat

The past is a source of knowledge, and the future is a source of hope. Love of the past implies faith in the future — Stephen Ambrose

No man’s life, liberty, or property is safe while the legislature is in session. — Mark Twain

My body is my own, at least I have always so regarded it. If I do harm … it is I who suffers, not the state — Mark Twain

There is no distinctly native American criminal class – save Congress. — Mark Twain

If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you; that is the principal difference between a dog and a man. — Mark Twain

That’s the difference between governments and individuals. Governments don’t care, individuals do. — Mark Twain

Each of you, for himself, by himself and on his own responsibility, must speak. — Mark Twain

The only difference between a tax man and a taxidermist is that the taxidermist leaves the skin. — Mark Twain

Don’t go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first. — Mark Twain

All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence, and then success is sure. — Mark Twain, Notebook, 1887

My kind of loyalty was to one’s country, not to its institutions or its officeholders. The country is the real thing, the substantial thing, the eternal thing; it is the thing to watch over, and care for, and be loyal to; institutions are extraneous, they are its mere clothing, and clothing can wear out, become ragged, cease to be comfortable, cease to protect the body from winter, disease, and death. — Mark Twain

In the beginning of a change, the patriot is a scarce man, brave, hated, and scorned. When his cause succeeds however, the timid join him, for then it cost nothing to be a patriot. — Mark Twain