"We have no government armed with power capable of contending with
human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition,
revenge or gallantry would break the strongest cords of our
Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution is
designed only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate
for any other."
-- John Adams
"Sir, no nation has ever yet existed or been governed without religion.
Nor can be. The Christian religion is the best religion that has been
given to man, and I as chief magistrate of this nation am bound to give
it the sanction of my example."
-- Thomas Jefferson
"Had the people
been less independent, less virtuous, would we have been blessed with
the same success? It is only when the people become ignorant and
corrupt" that they can't choose competent and faithful representatives
for office, and "usurpation becomes an easy attainment, and an usurper
soon found."
-- James Monroe
"A nation of well-informed men who have been taught to know and prize
the rights which God has given them cannot be enslaved. It is in the
religion of ignorance that tyranny begins."
-- Benjamin Franklin |