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Quotes from The Lost World of Thomas Jefferson — Daniel J. Boorstin

1914–2004 United States

← All quotes by Daniel J. Boorstin

7 quotes

While the Jeffersonian did not flatly deny the Creator's power to perform miracles, he admired His refusal to do so.

The Lost World of Thomas Jefferson (1948)

Since the Creator had made the facts of the after-life inaccessible to man, He must not have required that man understand death in order to live fruitfully.

The Lost World of Thomas Jefferson (1948)

The institutional scene in which American man has developed has lacked that accumulation from intervening stages which has been so dominant a feature of the European landscape.

The Lost World of Thomas Jefferson (1948)

While the easiest way in metaphysics is to condemn all metaphysics as nonsense, the easiest way in morals is to elevate the common practice of the community into a moral absolute.

The Lost World of Thomas Jefferson (1948)

The variety of minds served the economy of nature in many ways. The Creator, who designed the human brain for activity, had insured the restlessness of all minds by enabling no single one to envisage all the qualities of the creation. Since no one by himself could aspire to a serene knowledge of the whole truth, all men had been drawn into an active, exploratory and cooperative attitude.

The Lost World of Thomas Jefferson (1948)

Jefferson refused to pin his hopes on the occasional success of honest and unambitious men; on the contrary, the great danger was that philosophers would be lulled into complacence by the accidental rise of a Franklin or a Washington. Any government which made the welfare of men depend on the character of their governors was an illusion.

The Lost World of Thomas Jefferson (1948)

Jeffersonian isolationism expressed an essentially cosmopolitan spirit. The Jeffersonian was determined — even at the expense of separating himself from the rest of the globe, and even though he be charged with provincial selfishness — to preserve America as an uncontaminated laboratory.

The Lost World of Thomas Jefferson (1948)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Daniel J. Boorstin (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.