1. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — …” – Declaration of Independence
2. "Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual." – Thomas Jefferson
3. "Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear." – Thomas Jefferson
4. “Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!" – Patrick Henry
5. “Abhorrent!” -- George Washington, when asked to be king of the USA
6. “No.” -- Abraham Clark, when dragooned to renounce his signature on the Declaration of Independence for the release of his two sons, officers in the Continental Army, captured and tortured by the British
7. “A wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.” – Thomas Jefferson
8. “A is A.” -- Aristotle
9. “What reason shows to be true is absolutely true, so that the opposite is absolutely false and impossible.” – Thomas Aquinas
“If religion, therefore, teaches something that is opposed to reason, … it would teach what is absolutely false and impossible.” – The Radical Academy
10. "... Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church & State..." -- Thomas Jefferson, On New Year's Day in 1802
11. “The very atmosphere of firearms anywhere and everywhere restrains evil interference - they deserve a place of honor with all that's good.” – George Washington
12. “Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.” -- William Pitt the Younger
13. “Definitions are the guardians of rationality, the first line of defense against the chaos of mental disintegration… A concept or mental integration is not arbitrary; it has a basis in reality… Definitions are determined by the facts of reality within the context of one’s knowledge.” - Ayn Rand
"... But soberly, it is now no child's play to save the principles of Jefferson from total overthrow in this nation. One would state with great confidence that he could convince any sane child that the simpler propositions of Euclid are true, but nevertheless he would fail, utterly, with one who should deny the definitions and axioms. The principles of Jefferson are the definitions and axioms of free society...
All honor to Jefferson -- to the man who, in the concrete pressure of a struggle for national independence by a single people, had the coolness, forecast, and sagacity to introduce into a merely revolutionary document, an abstract truth, applicable to all men and all times, and so to embalm it there, that today, and in all coming days, it shall be a rebuke and a stumbling-block to the very harbingers of reappearing tyranny and oppression." – Abraham Lincoln
14. “My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute.” -- Ayn Rand
15. “The only good which men can do to one another and the only statement of their proper relationship is — Hands off!” -- Howard Roark, The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand
16. "If it is ever proper for men to kneel, we should kneel when we read the Declaration of Independence… the greatest document in human history, both philosophically and literarily." -- Ayn Rand
“It is in this context — from the perspective of the bloody millennia of mankind's history — that I want you to look at the birth of a miracle: the United States of America. If it is ever proper for men to kneel, we should kneel when we read the Declaration of Independence.
The concept of individual rights is so prodigious a feat of political thinking that few men grasp it fully—and two hundred years have not been enough for other countries to understand it. But this is the concept to which we owe our lives—the concept which made it possible for us to bring into reality everything of value that any of us did or will achieve or experience.” – Ayn Rand
17. “If I were to speak your kind of language, I would say that man’s only moral commandment is: Thou shalt think. But a “moral commandment” is a contradiction in terms. The moral is the chosen, not the forced; the understood, not the obeyed. The moral is the rational, and reason accepts no commandments.
My morality, the morality of reason, is contained in a single axiom: existence exists — and in a single choice: to live. The rest proceeds from these. To live, man must hold three things as the supreme and ruling values of his life: Reason — Purpose — Self-esteem. Reason, as his only tool of knowledge — Purpose, as his choice of the happiness which that tool must proceed to achieve — Self-esteem, as his inviolate certainty that his mind is competent to think and his person is worthy of happiness, which means: is worthy of living. These three values imply and require all of man’s virtues, and all his virtues pertain to the relation of existence and consciousness: rationality, independence, integrity, honesty, justice, productiveness, pride.” -- John Galt, Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
18. "I swear, by my life and my love of it that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine." -- John Galt, Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
19. “Thomas Jefferson said: ‘Reason and persuasion are the only practicable instruments.’ To remove the use of force from citizen interactions so that individuals may deal with each other only by reason and persuasion, citizens delegate their right to self-defense to their government. Citizens cannot delegate a right they do not possess – hence, the government has no right to regulate inherent inalienable Rights, including the rights of individuals who hold that selfishness is a virtue.” – Apollo, Royal Serf
20. “Don’t you want to be better than Toni?” Lola replied, “I don’t compare myself to anyone. I want to be good – period. I want to be the best I can be. I also admire intelligent people, like Toni.” -- Ten-year-old girls, Reason Reigns
21. “Good can exist without evil, whereas evil cannot exist without good.” -- Thomas Aquinas
22. “Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.” -- Thomas Edison
23. “I will build a motor car for the great multitude. It will be large enough for the family, but small enough for the individual to run and care for. It will be constructed of the best materials, by the best men to be hired, after the simplest designs that modern engineering can devise. But it will be so low in price that no man making a good salary will be unable to own one.” -- Henry Ford
24. Property is the fruit of labor... property is desirable... is a positive good in the world. That some should be rich shows that others may become rich, and hence is just encouragement to industry and enterprise. Let not him who is houseless pull down the house of another; but let him labor diligently and build one for himself, thus by example assuring that his own shall be safe from violence when built. –
Abraham Lincoln
