Thomas Paine Quotes

Panics, in some cases, have their uses; they produce as much good as hurt.… Their peculiar advantage is, that they are the touchstones of sincerity and hypocrisy, and bring things and men to light, which might otherwise have lain forever undiscovered.

Thomas Paine · The source reads: “Panics, in some cases, have their uses; they produce as much good as hurt. Their duration is always short; the mind soon grows through them and acquires a firmer habit than before. But their peculiar advantage is, that they are the touchstones of sincerity and hypocrisy, and bring things and men to light, which might otherwise have lain forever undiscovered.” · The American Crisis, 1

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We fight not to enslave, but to set a country free, and to make room upon the earth for honest men to live in.

Moderation in temper is always a virtue; but moderation in principle is always a vice.

We have it in our power to begin the world over again.

Society in every state is a blessing, but Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.

War involves in its progress such a train of unforeseen and unsupposed circumstances… that no human wisdom can calculate the end. It has but one thing certain, and that is to increase taxes.

Panics, in some cases, have their uses; they produce as much good as hurt.… Their peculiar advantage is, that they are the touchstones of sincerity and hypocrisy, and bring things and men to light, which might otherwise have lain forever undiscovered.

When authors and critics talk of the sublime, they see not how nearly it borders on the ridiculous.

I believe in one God and no more, and I hope for happiness beyond this life. I believe in the equality of man; and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and endeavoring to make our fellow creatures happy.

My own mind is my own church.

He who dares not offend cannot be honest.

As he rose like a rocket, he fell like the stick.

Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.

He pities the plumage, but forgets the dying bird.

My country is the world, and my religion is to do good.

He who is the author of a war lets loose the whole contagion of hell and opens a vein that bleeds a nation to death.

Any system of religion that has any thing in it that shocks the mind of a child cannot be a true system.

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