“America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.” ―Abraham Lincoln
ATHEISTS
I can see how it might be possible for a man to look down upon the earth and be an atheist, but I cannot conceive how a man could look up into the heavens and say there is no God. –Abraham Lincoln
THE BIBLE
It is impossible to rightly govern the world without God and the Bible. –George Washington
The Bible is the cornerstone of liberty. A student’s perusal of the sacred volume will make him a better citizen, a better father, a better husband. –Thomas Jefferson
That book, sir, is the rock on which our republic rests. –Andrew Jackson
I believe the Bible is the best gift God has ever given to man. All the good from The Savior of the world is communicated to us through this Book. ―Abraham Lincoln
Take all that you can of this book upon reason, and the balance on faith, and you will live and die a happier man. (When a skeptic expressed surprise to see him reading a Bible) ―Abraham Lincoln
But for this Book we could not know right from wrong. All things desirable for man’s welfare … are to be found portrayed in it. –Abraham Lincoln
All the miseries and evils which men suffer from, vice, crime, ambition, injustice, oppression, slavery, and war proceed from their despising or neglecting of the precepts contained in the Bible. –Noah Webster, the Schoolmaster of the Republic
The foundations of our society and our government rest so much on the teachings of the Bible that it would be difficult to support them if faith in these teachings would cease to be practically universal in our country. –Calvin Coolidge
If truth be not diffused, error will be; If God and His Word are not known and received, the devil and his works will gain the ascendancy; If the evangelical volume does not reach every hamlet, the pages of a corrupt and licentious literature will;
If the power of the Gospel is not felt throughout the length and breadth of the land, anarchy and misrule, degradation and misery, corruption and darkness will reign without mitigation or end. –Daniel Webster
It is impossible to enslave, mentally or socially, a Bible-reading people. The principles of the Bible are the groundwork of human freedom. –Horace Greeley
The Bible, when not read in schools, is seldom read in any subsequent period of life. –Dr. Benjamin Rush, the youngest signer of the Declaration of Independence
CHARACTER
In selecting men for office, let principle be your guide. Regard not the particular sect or denomination of the candidate–look to his character. … It is alleged by men of loose principles, or defective views of the subject, that religion and morality are not necessary or important qualifications for public stations. –Noah Webster
It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions, but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ. For this very reason peoples of other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity, and freedom of worship here. –Patrick Henry
Whatever makes men good Christians makes them good citizens. –Daniel Webster
Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers, and it is the duty, as well as the privilege and interest of our Christian nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers. –John Jay, first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court
The religion which has introduced civil liberty, is the religion of Christ and his apostles, which enjoins humility, piety, and benevolence: which acknowledges in every person a brother, or a sister, and a citizen with equal rights. This is the genuine Christianity, and to this we owe our free constitution of government. –Noah Webster
No nation has ever existed or been governed without religion. Nor can be. The Christian religion is the best religion that has been given to man and I, as Chief Magistrate of this nation, am bound to give it the sanction of my example. –Thomas Jefferson
The highest glory of the American Revolution was this; it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity. –John Quincy Adams
To the kindly influence of Christianity we owe that degree of civil freedom, and political and social happiness which mankind now enjoys. … Whenever the pillars of Christianity shall be overthrown, our present republican forms of government, and all blessings which flow from them, must fall with them. –Jedediah Morse
COMMUNISM
The theory of Communism may be summed up in one sentence: Abolish all private property. –Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto
Communism is the exploitation of the strong by the weak. In communism, inequality springs from placing mediocrity on a level with excellence. –Proudhon
My object in life is to dethrone God and destroy capitalism. –Karl Marx
How do you tell a Communist? Well, it’s someone who reads Marx and Lenin. And how do you tell an anti-Communist? It’s someone who understands Marx and Lenin. –Ronald Reagan
The years ahead will be great ones for our country, for the cause of freedom and the spread of civilization. The west will not contain Communism, it will transcend Communism. We will not bother to denounce it, we’ll dismiss it as a sad, bizarre chapter in human history whose last pages are even now being written. –Ronald Reagan
CONGRESS
Now, more than ever before, the people are responsible for the character of their Congress. If that be body be ignorant, reckless and corrupt, it is because the people tolerate ignorance, recklessness, and corruption. If it be intelligent, brave and pure, it is because the people demand these high qualities to represent them in the national legislature. – James A. Garfield, President of the United States, and a Minister of the Gospel
THE CONSTITUTION
God is our creator. He has created us with rights that some governments manage to violate, but no man can change or erase the essence of those rights being a part of us. Our founding fathers understood that in writing the Bill of Rights. The Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights must be accepted on the whole as the foundation of our government. –Benjamin Franklin
We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution. ―Abraham Lincoln
The culmination of men’s dreams for 6,000 years were formalized with the Constitution, probably the most unique document ever drawn in the long history of man’s relation to man. I know there have been other constitutions, new ones are being drawn today by newly emerging nations. Most of them, even the one of the Soviet Union, contains many of the same guarantees as our own Constitution, and still there is a difference.
The difference is so subtle that we often overlook it, but it is so great that it tells the whole story. Those other constitutions say, “Government grants you these rights” and ours says, “You are born with these rights, they are yours by the grace of God, and no government on earth can take them from you.” –Ronald Reagan
DEBT
There are two ways to conquer and enslave a country. One is by the sword. The other is by debt. –John Adams
ECONOMICS
I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around the banks will deprive the people of all property – until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. –Thomas Jefferson
EDUCATION
The only foundation for a useful education in a republic is to be laid in religion. Without this there can be no virtue, and without virtue there can be no liberty. –Dr. Benjamin Rush
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… No truth is more evident to my mind that the Christian religion must be the basis of any government intended to secure the rights and privileges of a free people. –Noah Webster, Preface to the American Dictionary of the English Language
Let the children who are sent to those schools be taught to read and write and above all, let both sexes be carefully instructed in the principles and obligations of the Christian religion. This is the most essential part of education. –Dr. Benjamin Rush
No people will tamely surrender their Liberties, nor can any be easily subdued, when knowledge is diffused and Virtue is preserved. On the Contrary, when People are universally ignorant, and debauched in their Manners, they will sink under their own weight without the Aid of foreign Invaders. –Sam Adams
Education ought everywhere to be religious education. Parents are bound to employ instructors who will educate their children religiously. To commit our children to the care of irreligious persons is to commit lambs to the superintendency of wolves. –Timothy Dwight, President of Yale University (1795 -1817)
I am much afraid that the schools and universities will prove to be the great gates to hell unless they diligently labour to explain the Holy Scriptures and engrave them upon the hearts of youth. I advise no one to send their child where the Scriptures do not reign paramount. Every institution that does not unceasingly occupy its students with the Word of God must become corrupt. –Martin Luther
Children who know how to think for themselves spoil the harmony of the collective society which is coming where everyone is interdependent. –John Dewey
How is it that little children are so intelligent and men so stupid? It must be education that does it. –Alexandre Dumas
Education is a weapon, whose effect depends on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed. –Joseph Stalin
The philosophy in the classroom of this generation is the philosophy of government in the next. –Abraham Lincoln
FREEDOM
Freedom is not a gift bestowed upon us by other men, but a right that belongs to us by the laws of God and nature. –Benjamin Franklin
It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires of freedom in minds of men . . . –Samuel Adams
Freedom is a fragile thing and is never more than one generation away from extinction. It is not ours by inheritance; it must be fought for and defended constantly by each generation, for it comes only once to a people. Those who have known freedom and lost it, have never known it again. –Ronald Reagan
“We the people” tell the government what to do, it doesn’t tell us. “We the people” are the driver, the government is the car. And we decide where it should go, and by what route, and how fast.
Almost all the world’s constitutions are documents in which governments tell the people what their privileges are. Our constitution is a document in which “We the people” tell the government what it is allowed to do. “We the People are free. –Ronald Reagan
If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom; and the wrong of it is that if it is comfort or money that it values most; it will lose that too. –Somerset Maugham
If we become a people who are willing to give up our money and our freedom in exchange for rhetoric and promises, then nothing can save us. –Thomas Sowell
If we lose freedom here, there’s no place to escape to. This is the last stand on earth. –Ronald Reagan
In the end, more than they wanted freedom, they wanted security. They wanted a comfortable life, and they lost it all—security, comfort, and freedom. –Sir Edward Gibbon
I hope we have once again reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. –Ronald Reagan
GOD
The God who gave us life gave us liberty at the same time. –Thomas Jefferson
Three millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. Besides , sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations, and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us. The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. –Patrick Henry
Sir, my concern is not whether God is on our side; my greatest concern is to be on God’s side, for God is always right. –Abraham Lincoln
In the beginning of the Contest with G. Britain, when we were sensible of danger we had daily prayer in this room for the divine protection.- Our prayers, Sir, were heard, & they were graciously answered. All of us who were engaged in the struggle must have observed frequent instances of a superintending providence in our favor.
To that kind providence we owe this happy opportunity of consulting in peace on the means of establishing our future national felicity. And have we now forgotten that powerful friend? or do we imagine that we no longer need his assistance?
I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth- that God Governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the sacred writings, that “except the Lord build the House they labour in vain that build it.
I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without his concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better, than the Builders of Babel: We shall be divided by our little partial local interests; our projects will be confounded, and we ourselves shall become a reproach and bye word down to future ages. –Benjamin Franklin, Request for daily prayer at the Constitutional Convention
And yet the same revolutionary belief for which our forebears fought is still at issue around the globe, the belief that the rights of man come not from generosity of the state but from the hand of God. –John F. Kennedy
GOVERNMENT
That government is best which governs least. –Thomas Paine
Government’s first duty is to protect the people, not run their lives. –Ronald Reagan
The government is merely a servant—merely a temporary servant; it cannot be its prerogative to determine right and wrong, and decide who is a patriot and who isn’t. Its function is to obey orders, not originate them. –Mark Twain
If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there’d be a shortage of sand. –Milton Friedman
In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.
From time to time we’ve been tempted to believe that society has become too complex to be managed by self-rule, that government by an elite group is superior to government for, by, and of the people.
Well, if no one among us is capable of governing himself, then who among us has the capacity to govern someone else? –Ronald Reagan
The issue today is the same as it has been throughout all history, whether man shall be allowed to govern himself or be ruled by a small elite. –Thomas Jefferson
INFLATION
I do not think it is an exaggeration to say history is largely a history of inflation, usually inflations engineered by governments for the gain of governments. –Friedrich August von Hayek
The best way to destroy the capitalist system is to debauch the currency. By a continuous process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of its citizens . … The process engages all of the forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner that not one man in a million can diagnose.” –John Maynard Keynes
LIBERALISM
Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they’re ignorant; it’s just that they know so much that isn’t so. –Ronald Reagan
LIBERTY
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. –The Declaration of Independence
And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are a gift of God? –Thomas Jefferson
But you must remember, my fellow citizens, that eternal vigilance by the people is the price of liberty, and that you must pay the price, if you wish to secure the blessing. It behooves you, therefore, to be watchful in your state as well as in the federal government. –Andrew Jackson
When the American spirit was in its youth, the language of America was different: Liberty, sir, was the primary object. –Patrick Henry
Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it. –Justice Learned Hand
And so it is written, the first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening Spirit. (1 Corinthians 15:45)
Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. (2 Corinthians 3:17)
LOVE
Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne, and I myself have founded empires; but upon what do these creations of our genius depend? Upon force. Jesus alone founded his empire upon love; and to this very day, millions would die for him. –Napoleon
MONEY
When the people find out they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic. –Benjamin Franklin
The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not. –Thomas Jefferson
MORALITY
And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion…reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle. –George Washington (Farewell Address, 1796)
Statesmen, my dear Sir, may plan and speculate for liberty, but it is religion and morality alone, which can establish the Principles upon which Freedom can securely stand. –John Adams (letter, 1776)
The foundation of national morality must be laid in private families… In vain are Schools, Academies, and Universities instituted, if loose principles and licentious habits are impressed upon children in their earliest years… The vices and examples of the parents cannot be concealed from the children.
How is it possible that children can have any just sense of the Sacred Obligations of Morality or Religion if, from their earliest Infancy, they learn their mothers live in habitual infidelity to their fathers, and their fathers in constant infidelity to their mothers? –John Adams
To preserve the government we must also preserve morals. Morality rests on religion; if you destroy the foundation, the superstructure must fall. When the public mind becomes vitiated and corrupt, laws are a nullity and constitutions are waste paper. –Daniel Webster (4th of July oration, 1800)
PATRIOTS
In the beginning of a change the patriot is a scarce man, and brave, and hated, and scorned. When his cause succeeds, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot. –Mark Twain
POLITICS
The Church must take the right ground in regard to politics. … Politics are a part of religion in such a country as this, and Christians must do their duty to the country as part of their duty to God. God will bless or curse this nation , according to the course Christians take in politics. –Charles Finny, Evangelist
One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors. –Plato
RELIGION
Every civil goverment is based upon some religon or philosophy of life. Education in a nation will propagate the religion of that nation. In America, the foundational religion was Christianity. And it was sown in the hearts of Americans through the home and private and public schools for centuries.
Our liberty, growth, and prosperity was the result of a Biblical philosophy of life. Our continued freedom and succcss is dependent on our educating the youth of America in the principles of Christianity. –Noah Webster
By our form of government, the Christian religion is the established religion; and all sects and denominations of Christians are placed upon the same equal footing, and are equally entitled to protection in their religious liberty. –Samuel Chase
Religion is the basis and Foundation of Government. We have staked the whole future of American civilization, not upon the power of government, far from it.
We have staked the future of all of our political institutions upon the capacity of mankind for self-government; upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments. –James Madison, The Father of the Constitution
SOCIALISM
Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery. –Winston Churchill
The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism, but under the name Liberalism they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program until America will one day be a Socialist nation without knowing how it happened. –Norman M. Thomas, Perennial Presidential Candidate for the Socialist Party
One of the traditional methods of imposing statism or socialism on a people has been by way of medicine. It’s very easy to disguise a medical program as a humanitarian project. –Ronald Reagan
TYRANTS
Those who will not be governed by God will be ruled by tyrants. –William Penn
It is when people forget God that tyrants forge their chains. –Patrick Henry
TYRANNY
When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty. –Thomas Jefferson
The greatest tyrannies are always perpetrated in the name of the noblest causes. –Thomas Paine
These are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.
Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as freedom should not be highly rated. –Thomas Paine
VOTING
When you become entitled to exercise the right of voting for public officers, let it be impressed on your mind that God commands you to choose for rulers just men who will rule in the fear of God. The preservation of a republican government depends on the faithful discharge of this duty.
If the citizens neglect their duty and place unprincipled men in office, the government will soon be corrupted; laws will not be made for the public good so much as for the selfish or local purposes;
Corrupt or incompetent men will be appointed to execute the laws; the public revenue will be squandered on unworthy men; and the rights of the citizens will be violated or disregarded.
If a republican government fails to secure public prosperity and happiness, it must be because the citizens neglect the divine commands, and elect bad men to make and administer the laws. –Noah Webster
The problems we face today are there; because the people who work for a living are now outnumbered by those who vote for a living. –Anonymous
