I cannot live without books.
Politicians
Thomas Jefferson
Third U.S. president (1743-1826) and the primary author of the Declaration of Independence. He wrote "all men are created equal" while owning more than 600 enslaved people over his lifetime and fathering at least six children with Sally Hemings, an enslaved teenager in his household. As secretary of state, vice president, and president he authored the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, doubled the country's territory through the Louisiana Purchase, dispatched the Lewis and Clark expedition, and founded the University of Virginia. He died on July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of independence, only hours before his lifelong rival and friend John Adams.
View this figure's profile
Thomas Jefferson's Other Quotes
The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.
I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that his justice cannot sleep for ever.
I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.
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.
Related Quotes
As in all things, we suffer from excess in reading too. Many books are a burden, not an ornament.
-- Seneca
I fear the man of a single book.
-- Thomas Aquinas
All life is problem solving.
-- Karl Popper
I want to see Mount Fuji.
-- Shigeru Yoshida
What I wanted was simple: to preserve what existed.
-- Klemens von Metternich
I have long known how much of an oddity we are in today's world.
-- Franz Joseph I of Austria