A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right.
Thomas PaineRead
Arms, like laws, discourage and keep the invader and plunderer in awe and preserve order.
Interpretation
Arms and laws create a sense of order and deter those who would disrupt peace.
This quote by Thomas Paine highlights the importance of both physical strength and legal frameworks in maintaining societal order. Just as laws serve to discourage wrongdoing by instilling fear of consequences, so too do arms provide a means of protection and deterrence against those who would invade or steal. Together, they create a balance that preserves peace and safety within a community.
In practice
In a discussion on the importance of law enforcement, this quote can illustrate how laws and public safety systems protect society.
A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right.
That God cannot lie, is no advantage to your argument, because it is no proof that priests can not, or that the Bible does not.
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Had the news of salvation by Jesus Christ been inscribed on the face of the sun and the moon, in characters that all nations would have understood, the whole earth had known it in twenty-four hours, and all nations would have believed it; whereas, though it is now almost two thousand years since, as they tell us, Christ came upon earth, not a twentieth part of the people of the earth know anything of it, and among those who do, the wiser part do not believe it.
The end of all political associations is the preservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man; and these rights are liberty, property, security, and resistance of oppression.
To reason with goverments, as they have existed for ages, is to argue with brutes. It is only from the nations themselves that reforms can be expected
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I have deep faith that the principle of the universe will be beautiful and simple
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