Founders Quotes - Page 14

• The notion of a rigid separation between church and state has no basis in either the text of the Constitution or the writings of our Founding Fathers. On the contrary, our Founders’ political views were strongly informed by their religious beliefs.

  Ron Paul

  Religious, Father, Writing

  "The War on Religion" by Ron Paul, www.lewrockwell.com. December 30, 2003.

  6 Copy quote

  Show source

• The founder of every ex-gay ministry in America has proved to be an extraordinary failure. The two founders of Exodus International, [the world's largest 'ex-gay' organization], divorced their wives to move in together.

  Wayne Besen

  Moving, Gay, Organization

  7 Copy quote

• Let your gun therefore be your constant companion of your walks.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Gun, Second Amendment, Mind Games

  "Jefferson: The face of the modern gun debate" by Christina Zdanowicz, www.cnn.com. July 19, 2013.

  70 Copy quote

  Show source

• I have always taken as the standard of the mode of teaching and writing, not the abstract, particular, professional philosopher, but universal man, that I have regarded man as the criterion of truth, and not this or that founder of a system, and have from the first placed the highest excellence of the philosopher in this, that he abstains, both as a man and as an author, from the ostentation of philosophy, i. e., that he is a philosopher only in reality, not formally, that he is a quiet philosopher, not a loud and still less a brawling one.

  Ludwig Feuerbach

  Philosophy, Teaching, Taken

  "The Essence of Christianity". Book by Ludwig Feuerbach (1841), Preface to Second Edition, 1843.

  26 Copy quote

  Show source

• Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can exist apart from religious principle.

  George Washington

  Religious, Truth, Freedom

  26 Copy quote

• A man-made thing that produces pleasure (and criticism) by somehow taping into the order of the universe is beautiful. Making beautiful things makes our lives worthwhile. My teacher, and one of the founders of the Pratt industrial design program, Rowena Reed Kostellow, said, "Pure, unadulterated beauty should be the goal of civilization." From a pragmatic point of view, for something to be beautiful, it has to work. In order to make this idea clearer I have combined the ideas of beauty and function into one word: Beautility.

  Tucker Viemeister

  Beautiful, Teacher, Men

  52 Copy quote

• We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Government Welfare, Government Debt, Historical

  Thomas Jefferson (2011). “Jefferson on Freedom: Wisdom, Advice, and Hints on Freedom, Democracy, and the American Way”, p.26, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

  44 Copy quote

  Show source

• Commemoration of Richard Meux Benson, Founder of the Society of St John the Evangelist, 1915 Our critical day is not the very day of our death, but the whole course of our life; I thank him, that prays for me when my bell tolls; but I thank him much more, that catechizes me, or preaches to me, or instructs me how to live.

  John Donne

  Life, Tolls, Bells

  4 Copy quote

• Our wise founders seemed to understand, better than most of us, our own scripture, which states that ‘it is the nature and disposition of almost all men, as soon as they get a little authority … they will immediately begin to exercise unrighteous dominion.’

  Ezra Taft Benson

  Wise, Exercise, Men

  Ezra Taft Benson (1974). “God, family, country: our three great loyalties”

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• If we remember that God loves us, and that we can love others as He loves us, then America can become a sign of peace for the world. From here, a sign of care for the weakest of the weak - the unborn child - must go out to the world. If you become a burning light of justice and peace in the world, then really you will be true to what the founders of this country stood for. God bless you!

  Mother Teresa

  Country, Children, Light

  Mother Teresa (2010). “Where There Is Love, There Is God: A Path to Closer Union with God and Greater Love for Others”, p.99, Image

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• As founder and co-chair of the upper Mississippi River Congressional task force, I have long sought to preserve the river's health and historical multiple uses, including as a natural waterway and a home to wildlife, for the benefit of future generations of Americans.

  Ron Kind

  Home, Rivers, Long

  55 Copy quote

• I cannot imagine any condition which would cause a ship to founder. I cannot conceive of any vital disaster happening to this vessel. Modern shipbuilding has gone beyond that . . .

  Edward Smith

  Safety, Gone, Ships

  37 Copy quote

• The decline of witch-belief was . . . entirely the product of religious skepticism. . . . The Catholic Church did not reform itself on this matter; it was forced by outside pressure to reform. To be sure, the Protestant churches were no better in this regard; it is simply that they had less time - only two or three centuries - to engage in the torching of witches. After all, John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, stated quite correctly that disbelief in witches meant a disbelief in the Bible.

  S. T. Joshi

  Religious, Two, Catholic

  9 Copy quote

• Of all the potential perils to the new American republic, the prospect of concentrated power . . . troubled the intellectual leaders of the Revolutionary generation. Familiar as the founders were with old Europe . . . they understood why the accumulation of inherited wealth led to inequities and imbalances that inevitably corrupted any system of government.

  Joe Conason

  Government, Europe, Leader

  Joe Conason (2007). “It Can Happen Here: Authoritarian Peril in the Age of Bush”, p.135, Macmillan

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• The Founders of the U.S. gave the senators a term of office three times longer than that of a representative precisely to encourage a reflective frame of mind, a distance from the passions of the voters, and a capacity for deliberative consideration.

  Al Gore

  Distance, Passion, Office

  Al Gore (2007). “The Assault on Reason”, p.263, Penguin

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Out of these troubled times, our fifth objective - a New World Order - can emerge. . . Now, we can see a New World Order coming into view. A world in which there is a very real prospect for a New World Order. . .A world where the United Nations, freed from a Cold War stalemate, is poised to fulfill the historic vision of its founders.

  George H. W. Bush

  Real, War, Views

  8 Copy quote

• The Congo Free State is unique in its kind. It has nothing to hide and no secrets and is not beholden to anyone except its founder.

  Leopold II of Belgium

  Unique, Secret, Kind

  "The Tyrants: 2500 Years of Absolute Power and Corruption". Book by Clive Foss, 2006.

  25 Copy quote

  Show source

• Any property may now be taken for the benefit of another private party, but the fallout from this decision will not be random. The beneficiaries are likely to be those citizens with disproportionate influence and power in the political process, including large corporations and development firms. As for the victims, the government now has license to transfer property from those with fewer resources to those with more. The Founders cannot have intended this perverse result.

  Sandra Day O'Connor

  Taken, Party, Influence And Power

  4 Copy quote

• Perhaps the efforts of the true poets, founders, religions, literatures, all ages, have been, and ever will be, our time and times to come, essentially the same - to bring people back from their present strayings and sickly abstractions, to the costless, average, divine, original concrete.

  Walt Whitman

  Average, People, Effort

  Walt Whitman (1963). “Prose works 1892”

  11 Copy quote

  Show source

• That government is best which governs the least, so taught the courageous founders of this nation. This simple declaration is diametrically opposed to the all too common philosophy that the government should protect and support one from the cradle to the grave. The policy of the Founding Fathers has made our people and our nation strong. The opposite leads inevitably to moral decay.

  Ezra Taft Benson

  Courage, Strong, Father

  9 Copy quote

• Go back to what our founders and our founding documents meant. They're quite clear that we would create law based on the God of the Bible and the 10 Commandments.

  Sarah Palin

  Silly, Law, Conservative

  "Sarah Palin on National Day of Prayer Controversy". "The O'Reilly Factor" with Bill O'Reilly, www.foxnews.com. May 6, 2010.

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• In my view, the Christian religion is the most important and one of the first things in which all children, under a free government ought to be instructed.

  Noah Webster

  Christian, Children, Government

  Noah Webster (1843). “A Collection of Papers on Political, Literary, and Moral Subjects”, p.291

  20 Copy quote

  Show source

• Not one of the first six [U.S.] presidents was an orthodox Christian. Most of the founders were Deists, who "doubted that Christ was a god" and equated God with "the power behind nature, as discerned by science."

  Robert Sherrill

  God, Christian, Religion

  4 Copy quote

• Every new and successful example of a perfect separation between ecclesiastical and civil matters is of importance.

  James Madison

  Successful, Perfect, Presidential

  James Madison, David B. Mattern (1997). “James Madison's "Advice to My Country"”, p.89, University of Virginia Press

  13 Copy quote

  Show source

• Most of the founders of this country had day jobs for years. They were not career politicians. ... We need leaders with experience in the real world, not experience in the phony world of politics.

  Thomas Sowell

  Country, Jobs, Real

  43 Copy quote