The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations Preface

All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all
cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal
rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.
First Inaugural Address, 4 March 1801
Would the honest patriot, in the full tide of successful experiment, abandon a government
which has so far kept us free and firm?
First Inaugural Address, 4 March 1801
Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations—entangling alliances with none.
First Inaugural Address, 4 March 1801
Freedom of religion; freedom of the press, and freedom of person under the protection of
habeas corpus, and trial by juries impartially selected. These principles form the bright
constellation which has gone before us, and guided our steps through an age of revolution and
reformation.
First Inaugural Address, 4 March 1801
Experience declares that man is the only animal which devours its own kind; for I can apply no
milder term to the governments of Europe, and to the general prey of the rich on the poor.
Letter to Colonel Edward Carrington, 16 January 1787
A little rebellion now and then is a good thing.
Letter to James Madison, 30 January 1787, in Thomas Jefferson Randolph (ed.) ‘Memoirs, Correspondence
and Private Papers of Thomas Jefferson’ (1829) vol. 2, p. 87
The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It
is its natural manure.
Letter to W. S. Smith, 13 November 1787, in Thomas Jefferson Randolph (ed.) ‘Memoirs, Correspondence
and Private Papers of Thomas Jefferson’ (1829) vol. 2, p. 269
Whenever a man has cast a longing eye on them, a rottenness begins in his conduct.
Letter to Tench Coxe, 1799 (on official positions)
If the principle were to prevail of a common law [i.e a single government] being in force in the
United States...it would become the most corrupt government on the earth.
Letter to Gideon Granger, 13 August 1800, in Thomas Jefferson Randolph (ed.) ‘Memoirs, Correspondence
and Private Papers of Thomas Jefferson’ (1829) vol. 3, p. 445
I agree with you that there is a natural aristocracy among men. The grounds of this are virtue
and talents.
Letter to John Adams, 28 October 1813
If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was
and never will be.
Letter to Colonel Charles Yancey, 6 January 1816
I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and
if we think of them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion,
the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion.
Letter to William Charles Jarvis, 28 September 1816