"I believe that justice is instinct and..." - Quote by Thomas Jefferson
I believe that justice is instinct and innate, that the moral sense is as much a part of our constitution as that of feeling, seeing, or hearing; as a wise Creator must have seen to be necessary in an animal destined to live in society.
More by Thomas Jefferson
“I am not myself apt to be alarmed at innovations recommended by reason. That dread belongs to those whose interests or prejudices shrink from the advance of truth and science.”
“So much of the presidency is a matter of standing in the path of a Newsham Engine for Quenching Fires, opening one's mouth, and attempting to get a drink.”
“He who knows nothing is closer to the truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors.”
More on Justice
“If Sara had been a boy and lived a few centuries ago, her father used to say, 'she would have gone about the country with her sword drawn, rescuing and defending everyone in distress. She always wants to fight when she sees people in trouble.”
“Our federal tax system is, in short, utterly impossible, utterly unjust and completely counterproductive . . . [It] reeks with injustice, and is fundamentally un-American”
“The wise and just man will always feel that he stands on his own feet; that he imparts strength to the state, not receives security from it; and if all went down, he and such as he would quite easily combine in a new and better constitution.”
More on Morality
“In art the end does not sanctify the means: but sacred means employed here can sanctify the end.”
“Do we call this the land of the free? What is it to be free from King George the Fourth and continue the slaves of prejudice? What is it to be born free and equal, and not to live? What is the value of any political freedom, but as a means to moral freedom?”
“As a nation, we must choose between the sanctity of life ethic and the quality of life ethic. I have no trouble identifying the answer our nation has always given to this basic question, and the answer that I hope and pray it will give in the future.”