Whatever enables us to go to war, secures our peace
Interpretation
The quote suggests that the ability to defend oneself or go to war is essential for maintaining peace.
Thomas Jefferson emphasizes the paradoxical relationship between war and peace, asserting that the readiness to engage in conflict is a vital component of securing peace. This viewpoint reflects a philosophical stance that suggests peace is often safeguarded by the ability and willingness to confront aggressors or threats, indicating that strength can prevent chaos and disorder.
In practice
Use this quote in a discussion about military strategies during a history class.
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.
My films are expressive of a culture that has had the possibility of attaining material fulfillment while at the same time finding itself unable to accomplish the simple business of conducting human lives. We have been sold a bill of goods as a substitute for life. What is needed is reassurance in human emotions; a re-evaluation of our emotional capacities.
Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resigns his conscience to the legislator? Why has every man a conscience then? I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward.
The beneficial effect of state intervention, especially in the form of legislation, is direct, immediate, and so to speak, visible, while its evil effects are gradual and indirect and lay out of sight ... Hence the majority of mankind must almost of necessity look with undue favor upon governmental intervention.
So I should be aware of the dangers of self-consciousness, but at the same time, Iβll be plowing through the fog of all these echoes, plowing through mixed metaphors, noise, and will try to show the core, which is still there, as a core, and is valid, despite the fog. The core is the core is the core. There is always the core, that canβt be articulated. Only caricatured.
A minority is only thought of as a minority when it constitutes some kind of threat to the majority, real or imaginary. And no threat is ever quite imaginary.
He is unworthy of the name of man who is ignorant of the fact that the diagonal of a square is incommensurable with its side.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.