Ray > Ray's Quotes

“These are the times that try men's souls.”
― Thomas Paine, The American Crisis

“We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.”
― Benjamin Franklin

“They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house? Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot? Sir, we are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power.”
― Patrick Henry

“A general dissolution of principles and manners will more surely overthrow the liberties of America than the whole force of the common enemy. While the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but when once they lose their virtue then will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader.”
― Samuel Adams

“Give me liberty or give me death."

[From a speech given at Saint John's Church in Richmond, Virginia on March 23, 1775 to the Virginia House of Burgesses; as first published in print in 1817 in William Wirt's Life and Character of Patrick Henry.]”
― Patrick Henry, Give Me Liberty Or Give Me Death

“Without Thomas Jefferson and his Declaration of Independence, there would have been no American revolution that announced universal principles of liberty. Without his participation by the side of the unforgettable Marquis de Lafayette, there would have been no French proclamation of The Rights of Man. Without his brilliant negotiation of the Louisiana treaty, there would be no United States of America. Without Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, there would have been no Virginia Statute on Religious Freedom, and no basis for the most precious clause of our most prized element of our imperishable Bill of Rights - the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.”
― Christopher Hitchens

“The distinctions between Virginians, Pennsylvanians, New Yorkers, and New Englanders are no more. I Am Not A Virginian, But An American!”
― Patrick Henry

“I have not yet begun to fight.”
― John Paul Jones

“There! His Majesty can now read my name without glasses. And he can double the reward on my head!”
― John Hancock

“Let a crown be placed thereon, by which the world may know, that so far as we approve of monarcy, that in America the law is King. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be King; and there ought to be no other.”
― Thomas Paine

“Our cruel and unrelenting Enemy leaves us no choice but a brave resistance, or the most abject submission; this is all we can expect - We have therefore to resolve to conquer or die: Our own Country's Honor, all call upon us for a vigorous and manly exertion, and if we now shamefully fail, we shall become infamous to the whole world. Let us therefore rely upon the goodness of the Cause, and the aid of the supreme Being, in whose hands Victory is, to animate and encourage us to great and noble Actions - The Eyes of all our Countrymen are now upon us, and we shall have their blessings, and praises, if happily we are the instruments of saving them from the Tyranny meditated against them. Let us therefore animate and encourage each other, and shew the whole world, that a Freeman contending for Liberty on his own ground is superior to any slavish mercenary on earth.”
― George Washington

“Three millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. Beside, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of Nations, and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us.”
― Patrick Henry

“Don’t fire unless fired upon, but if they mean to have a war, let it begin here.”
― John Parker

“If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace.”
― Tom Paine

“I wish to have no connection with any ship that does not sail fast; for I intend to go in harm's way.”
― John Paul Jones

“[L]iberty must at all hazards be supported. We have a right to it, derived from our Maker. But if we had not, our fathers have earned and bought it for us, at the expense of their ease, their estates, their pleasure, and their blood.”
― John Adams

“In questions of power, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the constitution.”
― Thomas Jefferson

“Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.”
― Tom Paine

“The battle, Sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, Sir, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery! Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable; and let it come! I repeat, Sir, let it come!”
― Patrick Henry

“Patriotism is as much a virtue as justice, and is as necessary for the support of societies as natural affection is for the support of families.”
― Benjamin Rush

“Lincoln once said that America was founded on a proposition that was written by Jefferson in 1776. We are really founded on an argument about what that proposition means.”
― Joseph J. Ellis, Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation

“Our properties within our own territories [should not] be taxed or regulated by any power on earth but our own.”
― Thomas Jefferson

“These are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their county; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny like hell is not easily conquered yet we have this consolation with us, the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; it is dearness only that gives everything its value.”
― Tom Paine

“That these are our grievances which we have thus laid before his majesty, with that freedom of language and sentiment which becomes a free people claiming their rights as derived from the laws of nature, and not as the gift of their chief magistrate.”
― Thomas Jefferson

“Remove yourself, sir!”
― David McCullough, John Adams

“Don't fire until you see the whites of their eyes! Then fire low!”
― Israel Putnam

“Nevertheless, to the persecution and tyranny of his cruel ministry we will not tamely submit -- appealing to Heaven for the justice of our cause, we determine to die or be free.”
― Joseph Warren

“One of the most essential branches of English liberty is the freedom of one's house. A man's house is his castle.”
― James Otis

“Yonder are the Hessians. They were bought for seven pounds and tenpence a man. Are you worth more? Prove it. Tonight the American flag floats from yonder hill or Molly Stark sleeps a widow!”
― John Stark