Error indeed has often prevailed by the assistance of power or force. Truth is the proper and sufficient antagonist to error.
Interpretation
Power can often support falsehoods, but truth is the ultimate counter to error.
In this quote, Thomas Jefferson asserts that while mistakes and falsehoods may be perpetuated by those in positions of power, the most effective way to combat such inaccuracies is through the pursuit and promotion of truth. He emphasizes the importance of truth as a fundamental force that can challenge and overcome error, suggesting a moral responsibility to seek out and uphold what is true, especially in the face of misleading ideologies supported by authority.
In practice
During a speech advocating for social justice, one might use this quote to emphasize the importance of truth in fighting against systemic errors.
The firmness with which the (American) people have withstood the... abuses of the press, the discernment they have manifested between truth and falsehood, show that they may safely be trusted to hear everything true and false and to form a correct judgment between them.
I, place economy among the first & most important republican virtues, & public debt as the greatest of the dangers to be feared
βWe must make our choice between economy and liberty or confusion and servitude...If we run into such debts, we must be taxed in our meat and drink, in our necessities and comforts, in our labor and in our amusements...if we can prevent the government from wasting the labor of the people, under the pretense of caring for them, they will be happy.
Very many and very meritorious were the worthy patriots who assisted in bringing back our government to its republican tack. To preserve it in that, will require unremitting vigilance.
A nation, as a society, forms a moral person, and every member of it is personally responsible for his society.
Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of liberty.
There is nothing like death to say what is always such an artificial thing to say: The End.
Our repugnance to death increases in proportion to our consciousness of having lived in vain.
From the point of view of the pharmaceutical industry, the AIDS problem has already been solved. After all, we already have a drug which can be sold at the incredible price of $8,000 an annual dose, and which has the added virtue of not diminishing the market by actually curing anyone.
Evil people naturally assume that you will use that power exactly as they would use it.
Being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned.
There are always two deaths, the real one and the one people know about.
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