What a stupendous, what an incomprehensible machine is man! Who can endure toil, famine, stripes, imprisonment & death itself in vindication of his own liberty, and the next moment ... inflict on his fellow men a bondage, one hour of which is fraught with more misery than ages of that which he rose in rebellion to oppose.
Interpretation
This quote reflects on the paradox of human nature, highlighting the capacity for both resilience and cruelty.
Thomas Jefferson's quote delves into the complexities of humanity, pointing out the contradiction that individuals who fight for their freedom can simultaneously impose suffering on others. It suggests that the same spirit that drives people to seek liberty can also lead them to enslave and oppress their fellow beings, revealing a troubling duality in human behavior.
In practice
This quote can be used in a discussion about the complexities of freedom and oppression.
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
We 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.
It is the hallmark of any deep truth that its negation is also a deep truth.
No writing on the solitary, meditative dimensions of life can say anything that has not already been said better by the wind in the pine trees.
If you haven't got any charity in your heart, you have the worst kind of heart trouble.
I greatly fear some of America's greatest and most dangerous enemies are such as think themselves her best friends.
I have always eaten animal flesh with a somewhat guilty conscience.
As geographers, Sosius, crowd into the edges of their maps parts of the world which they do not know about, adding notes in the margin to the effect that beyond this lies nothing but sandy deserts full of wild beasts, and unapproachable bogs.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.