Inspiration Quote by Thomas Jefferson — Inspiring Words on Life, Love & Wisdom

“Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle.”

“Do you want to know who you are? Don't ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you.”

“Honesty is the first chapter of the book wisdom.”

“Reason and free inquiry are the only effectual agents against error.”

“No government ought to be without censors: and where the press is free, no one ever will. If virtuous, it need not fear the fair operation of attack and defence. Nature has given to man no other means of sifting out the truth either in religion, law, or politics. I think it as honorable to the government neither to know, nor notice, it’s sycophants or censors, as it would be undignified and criminal to pamper the former and persecute the latter.”

“… the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them, inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors.”

“All difficult things have their origin in that which is easy, and great things in that which is small.”

“You do not become good by trying to be good, but by finding the goodness that is already within you.”

“Setting an example is not the main means of influencing another, it is the only means.”

“Just as a flower, which seems beautiful has color but no perfume, so are the fruitless words of a man who speaks them but does them not.”

“If you have no respect for your own values how can you be worthy of respect from others.”

“What you give is what you get.”