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Some Non-Political Jefferson Quotes
"I had rather be deceived than live without hope." --Thomas Jefferson
"The way to heaven has always been said to be strewed with thorns." --Thomas Jefferson
"Nothing betrays imbecility so much as the being insensible of it." --Thomas Jefferson to Benjamin Rush, 1811.
"Something pursued with ardor is necessary to guard us from the tedium-viatae, and the active pursuits lessen most our sense of the infirmities of age." --Thomas Jefferson to J. Garland Jefferson, 1810.
"We are always equal to what we undertake with resolution." --Thomas Jefferson to Martha Jefferson, 1787.
"A wise man, even if nature has not formed him honest, will yet act as if he were honest; because he will find it the most advantageous and wise part in the long run." --Thomas Jefferson to James Monroe, 1785.
"Give about two of [the hours you have free] every day to exercise; for health must not be sacrificed to learning. A strong body makes the mind strong... Walking is the best possible exercise." --Thomas Jefferson to Peter Carr, 1785.
"Never think of taking a book with you [on your walks]. The object of walking is to relax the mind. You should therefore not permit yourself even to think while you walk; but divert yourself by the objects surrounding you." --Thomas Jefferson to Peter Carr, 1785.
"I am not a friend to placing young men in populous cities, because they acquire there habits and partialities which do not contribute to the happiness of their after life." --Thomas Jefferson to Caspar Wistar, 1807. ME 11:242
"There is no degree of affliction produced by the loss of those dear to us which experience has not taught me to estimate. I have ever found time and silence the only medicine, and these but assuage, they never can suppress, the deep drawn sigh which recollection forever brings up, until recollection and life are extinguished together." --Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, 1813. ME 13:394
"I have lived temperately, eating little animal food, and that not as an aliment, so much as a condiment for the vegetables, which constitute my principal diet... I have not yet lost a tooth by age." --Thomas Jefferson to Vine Utley, 1819. ME 15:187
"I am a friend to neology. It is the only way to give to a language copiousness and euphony." --Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, 1820. ME 15:272
"It is not every heavy-seeming boy which makes a man of judgment, but I never yet saw a man of judgment who had not been a heavy-seeming boy, nor knew a boy of what are called sprightly parts become a man of judgment." --Thomas Jefferson to Martha Jefferson Randolph, 1801.
"I set much less store by talents than good dispositions." --Thomas Jefferson to Martha Jefferson Randolph, 1801.
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