More Quotes by Thomas Paine
Reason obeys itself; and ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it.
A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody ought not to be trusted by anybody.
The trade of governing has always been monopolized by the most ignorant and the most rascally individuals of mankind.
The greatest tyrannies are always perpetuated in the name of the noblest causes.
A constitution defines and limits the powers of the government it creates. It therefore follows, as a natural and also a logical result, that the governmental exercise of any power not authorized by the constitution is an assumed power, and therefore illegal.
There are two distinct classes of men - those who pay taxes and those who receive and live upon taxes.
Men who look upon themselves born to reign, and others to obey, soon grow insolent; selected from the rest of mankind their minds are early poisoned by importance; and the world they act in differs so materially from the world at large, that they have but little opportunity of knowing its true interests, and when they succeed to the government are frequently the most ignorant and unfit of any throughout the dominions.
It is not in numbers, but in unity, that our great strength lies.
Our greatest enemies, the ones we must fight most often, are within.
He who dares not offend cannot be honest.
