Thomas Jefferson Quotes About Affairs

• May I never get too busy in my own affairs that I fail to respond to the needs of others with kindness and compassion.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Kindness, Helping Others, Compassion

• If once the people become inattentive to the public affairs, you and I, and Congress and Assemblies, Judges and Governors, shall all become wolves. It seems to be the law of our general nature, in spite of individual exceptions.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Law, Tyrants, People

  Thomas Jefferson, Jerry Holmes (2002). “Thomas Jefferson: A Chronology of His Thoughts”, p.82, Rowman & Littlefield

• The true theory of our Constitution is surely the wisest and best, that the States are independent as to everything within themselves, and united as to everything respecting foreign affairs. Let the General Government be reduced to foreign concerns only, and let our affairs be disentangled from those of all other nations, except as to commerce, which the merchants will manage the better, the more they are left free to manage for themselves, and our General Government may be reduced to a very simple organization, and a very inexpensive one; a few plain duties to be performed by a few servants.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Independent, Simple, Government

  Thomas Jefferson (1854). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence, contin”, p.331

• Exercise and application produce order in our affairs, health of body, cheerfulness of mind, and these make us precious to our friends

  Thomas Jefferson

  Motivational, Fitness, Exercise

  Thomas Jefferson (2010). “The Works of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence 1786-1787”, p.265, Cosimo, Inc.

• Our country is too large to have all its affairs directed by a single government. Public servants at such a distance, and from under the eye of their constituents, must, from the circumstance of distance, be unable to administer and overlook all the details necessary for the good government of the citizens; and the same circumstance, by rendering detection impossible to their constituents, will invite public agents to corruption, plunder and waste.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Country, Distance, Eye

  Thomas Jefferson (1829). “Memoir, correspondence, and miscellanies from the papers of T. Jefferson”, p.437

• A noiseless course, not meddling with the affairs of others, unattractive of notice, is a mark that society is going on in happiness. If we can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them, they must become happy.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Government, People, Unattractive

  Thomas Jefferson (1854). “The writings of Thomas Jefferson: being his autobiography, correspondence, reports, messages, addresses, and other writings, official and private”, p.453

• A government regulating itself by what is wise and just for the many, uninfluenced by the local and selfish views of the few who direct their affairs, has not been seen, perhaps, on earth. Or if it existed for a moment at the birth of ours, it would not be easy to fix the term of its continuance. Still, I believe it does exist here in a greater degree than anywhere else; and for its growth and continuance... I offer sincere prayers.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Wise, Prayer, Selfish

  Thomas Jefferson (1829). “Memoirs, 4: Correspondence and Private Papers”, p.293

• The ordinary affairs of a nation offer little difficulty to a person of any experience.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Political, Experience, Ordinary

  Thomas Jefferson (1861). “Correspondence”, p.252

• I leave the world and its affairs to the young and energetic, and resign myself to their care, of whom I have endeavored to take care when young.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Care, Inexperience, World

  Thomas Jefferson (1854). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson”, p.180

• Public employment contributes neither to advantage nor happiness. It is but honorable exile from one's family and affairs.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Happiness, Employment, Affair

  Thomas Jefferson, Andrew M. Allison (1983). “The Real Thomas Jefferson”, Natl Center for Constitutional

• From breakfast, or noon at the latest, to dinner, I am mostly on horseback, Attending to My Farm or other concerns, which I find healthful to my body, mind, and affairs.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Agriculture, Mind, Noon

  Thomas Jefferson, Jerry Holmes (2002). “Thomas Jefferson: A Chronology of His Thoughts”, p.233, Rowman & Littlefield

• Civil officials have no business meddling in private religious affairs.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Religious, Religion, Atheism

• I hold it to be one of the distinguishing excellences of elective over hereditary successions that the talents which nature has provided in sufficient proportion, should be selected by the society for the govenment of their affairs, rather than that this should be be transmitted through the loins of knaves and fools passing from the debauches of the table to those of the bed.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Nature, Excellence, Bed

  Thomas Jefferson, Henry Augustine Washington (1859). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence”, p.466

• In the constitution of Spain as proposed by the late Cortes, there was a principle entirely new to me:... that no person born after that day should ever acquire the rights of citizenship until he could read and write. It is impossible sufficiently to estimate the wisdom of this provision. Of all those which have been thought of for securing fidelity in the administration of the government, constant reliance to the principles of the constitution, and progressive amendments with the progressive advances of the human mind or changes in human affairs, it is the most effectual.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Writing, Rights, Government

• We abhor the follies of war, and are not untried in its distresses and calamities. Unmeddling with the affairs of other nations, we had hoped that our distance and our dispositions would have left us free, in the example and indulgence of peace with all the world.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Distance, War, Example

  Thomas Jefferson, Brett F. Woods (2009). “Thomas Jefferson: Thoughts on War and Revolution : Annotated Correspondence”, p.115, Algora Publishing

• It is a happy circumstance in human affairs that evils which are not cured in one way will cure themselves in some other.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Evil, Advice, Way

  Thomas Jefferson (2004). “Light and Liberty: Reflections on the Pursuit of Happiness”, p.17, Modern Library

• Man ... feels that he is a participator in the government of affairs not merely at an election, one day in the year, but every day.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Men, Years, One Day

  Thomas Jefferson “Selected letters of Thomas Jefferson”, Lulu.com

• Where everyman is participator in the government of affairs, not merely at an election one day in the year but everyday, he will let the heart be torn out of his body sooner than his power be wrested from him by a Caesar or a Bonaparte.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Heart, Government, Years

  Thomas Jefferson “Selected letters of Thomas Jefferson”, Lulu.com

• No man complains of his neighbor for ill management of his affairs, for an error in sowing his land, or marrying his daughter, for consuming his substance in taverns ... in all these he has liberty; but if he does not frequent the church, or then conform in ceremonies, there is an immediate uproar.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Daughter, Men, Land

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