When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
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. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
...taken from the Declaration of Independence.
Thomas Jefferson is my hero. My fucking Saviour.
Why don't people write like that anymore!?
Anonymous
July 29 2005, 20:56:11 UTC 6 years ago
July 29 2005, 22:15:53 UTC 6 years ago
July 30 2005, 00:28:23 UTC 6 years ago
"But if a long train of abuses, prevarications, and artifices, all tending the same way, make the design visible to the people, and they cannot but feel what they lie under, and see whither they are going, it is not to be wondered that they should then rouse themselves, and endeavor to put the rule into such hands which may secure to them the end for which government was at first erected" (John Locke, Concerning Civil Government.
"Life, liberty, and property" was the original formula, from Locke's Second Treatise on Government.
Jefferson was anything but original... he stole from Hume too.
July 31 2005, 20:33:01 UTC 6 years ago
Some say Jefferson was an INTJ. I am an INTJ myself. If I were to know you personally, or even to see you out in public, I could emulate your character pretty well.