Quotes from Thomas Paine

It is painful to behold a man employing his talents to corrupt himself.

[A]ll churches, whether Jewish, Christian or Muslim, are simply human inventions. They use fear to enslave us. They are a monopoly for power and profit.

The strength and power of despotism consists wholly in the fear of resistance.

When extraordinary power and extraordinary pay are allotted to any individual in a government, he becomes the center, round which every kind of corruption generates and forms.

What is called a republic, is not any particular form of government ... it is naturally opposed to the word monarchy, which means arbitrary power.

If those to whom power is delegated do well, they will be respected; if not, they will be despised.

A Constitution is not the act of a Government, but of a people constituting a government, and a government without a constitution is a power without right.

The balance of power is the scale of peace.

How necessary it is at all times to watch against the attempted encroachment of power, and to prevent its running to excess.

A single legislature, on account of the superabundance of its power, and the uncontrolled rabidity of its execution, becomes as dangerous to the principles of liberty as that of a despotic monarch.

Belief in a cruel God makes a cruel man.

It is not a God, just and good, but a devil, under the name of God, that the Bible describes.

The declaration which says that God visits the sins of the fathers upon the children is contrary to every principle of moral justice.

I die in perfect composure and resignation to the will of my Creator, God.

But where, says some, is the King of America? I'll tell you. Friend, he reigns above, and doth not make havoc of mankind like the Royal Brute of Britain.

The moral duty of man consists of imitatingthe moral goodness and beneficence of God,manifested in the creation, toward all His creatures.

Suspicion is the companion of mean souls, and the bane of all good society.

Better fare hard with good men than feast it with bad.

A nation under a well regulated government, should permit none to remain uninstructed. It is monarchical and aristocratical government only that requires ignorance for its support.

That government is best which governs least.

Government is best which governs least

The trade of governing has always been monopolized by the most ignorant and the most rascally individuals of mankind.

To establish any mode to abolish war, however advantageous it might be to Nations, would be to take from such Government the most lucrative of its branches.

Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence.