54 quotes
Government seems to me to be a part of religion itself — a thing sacred in its institutions and ends.
Frame of Government (1682)
I have great love and regard toward you, and I desire to win and gain your love and friendship by a kind just, and peaceable life; and the people I send are of the same mind, and shall in all things behave themselves accordingly.
Liberty without obedience is confusion, and obedience without liberty is slavery.
Religion it self is nothing else but Love to God and Man. He that lives in Love lives in God, says the Beloved Disciple: And to be sure a Man can live no where better.
Fruits of Solitude (1682)
Time is what we want most, but what, alas! we use worst; and for which God will certainly most strictly reckon with us, when Time shall be no more.
Fruits of Solitude (1682)
As Puppets are to Men, and Babies to Children, so is Man’s Workmanship to God’s: We are the Picture, he the Reality.
Fruits of Solitude (1682)
The Country is both the Philosopher’s Garden and his Library, in which he Reads and Contemplates the Power, Wisdom and Goodness of God.
Fruits of Solitude (1682)
For we put the power in the people.
Nothing does Reason more Right, than the Coolness of those that offer it: for Truth often suffers more by the heat of its defenders than from the arguments of its opposers.
Fruits of Solitude (1682)
Passion is a sort of fever in the mind, which ever leaves us weaker than it found us.
Fruits of Solitude (1682)
It were endless to dispute upon everything that is disputable.
Fruits of Solitude (1682)
Rex & Tyrannus are very different Characters: One Rules his People by Laws, to which they consent; the other by his absolute Will and Power.
Fruits of Solitude (1682)
Zeal ever follows an appearance of truth, and the assured are too apt to be warm; but it is their weak side in argument; zeal being better shown against sin than persons, or their mistakes.
Fruits of Solitude (1682)
Let the People think they Govern and they will be Governed.
Fruits of Solitude (1682)
It is admirable to consider how many Millions of People come into, and go out of the World, Ignorant of themselves, and of the World they have lived in.
Fruits of Solitude (1682)
Make few resolutions, but keep them strictly.
Advice to his children (1699)
If thou wouldst rule well, thou must rule for God; and to do that, thou must be ruled by him who has given to kings his grace to command themselves and their subjects, and to the people the grace to obey God and their kings.
You are now fixed at the mercy of no governor that comes to make his fortune great; you shall be governed by laws of your own making and live a free, and if you will, a sober and industrious life. I shall not usurp the right of any, or oppress his person. God has furnished me with a better resolution and has given me his grace to keep it.
Letter to those already residing in Pennsylvania (1681)
Fidelity has enfranchised slaves, and adopted servants to be sons
Fruits of Solitude (1682)
Children, Fear God; that is to say, have an holy awe upon your minds to avoid that which is evil, and a strict care to embrace and do that which is good.
Advice to his children (1699)