Thomas Jefferson, "I have always said and always will say that the studious perusal of the sacred volume will make better citizens, better fathers and better husbands."

We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion ... Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
John Adams

Is life so dear, or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!
Patrick Henry

No people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the Invisible Hand which conducts the affairs of men more than the people of the United States. Every step by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency.
George Washington

I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth - that God governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid?
Benjamin Franklin (spoken in 1787 when he was 81, as part of a speech he gave to the Constitutional Convention during a bitter debate - the beginning of morning prayer at both houses of Congress ever since)

The Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer's mission upon earth [and] laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity.
John Quincy Adams

It is in the man of piety and inward principle, that we may expect to find the uncorrupted patriot, the useful citizen, and the invincible soldier. - God grant that in America true religion and civil liberty may be inseparable, and that the unjust attempts to destroy the one, may in the issue tend to the support and establishment of both.
John Witherspoon

Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers, and it is the duty, as well as the privilege and interest of our Christian nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers.
John Jay, 1745-1829, First Chief Justice of the Supreme Court

No people ought to feel greater obligations to celebrate the goodness of the Great Disposer of Events and of [the] Destiny of Nations than the people of the United States ... And to the same Divine Author of every good and perfect gift we are indebted for all those privileges and advantages, religious as well as civil, which are so richly enjoyed this favored land.
James Madison

President John Quincy Adams: "I speak as a man of the world to men of the world and I say to you, search the scriptures, the Bible is the book of all others to be read at all ages and in all conditions of human life; not to be read once or twice or thrice through and then laid aside, but to be read in small portions of one or two chapters every day and never to be intermitted unless by some overruling necessity."

Daniel Webster, speaking about the Bible, said, "I have read it through many times. I now make a practice of going through it once a year. It is the book of all others for lawyers as well as divine, and I pity the man who cannot find in it a rich supply of thought and rules for conduct."

On July 2, 1776 . . .

. . . the Thirteen Colonies voted to separate from Great Britain. A hush fell over the room. The late afternoon sun fired a brass candlestick on the green felt tablecloth, a pair of spectacles, the silver knob of a walking stick. Men gazed out the window, some with tears in their eyes. A few prayed. Their chairman, John Hancock, broke the silence: "Gentlemen, the price on my head has just doubled!"

A wry chuckle followed, then Sam Adams rose: "We have this day restored the sovereign, to Whom alone men ought to be obedient. He reigns in Heaven and . . . from the rising to the setting of the sun, may His Kingdom come!"

(Marshall & Manuel, The Light & the Glory, 309)

Lessons from Valley Forge

Modern historians have said that the greatest miracle of Valley Forge was that the army held together. Despite the lack of food and total absence of pay, despite the illness which was taking more than a dozen lives a day, despite the utter hopelessness of their situation, the men stayed. And one smuggled the following in to the Philadelphia paper:

"Our attention is now drawn to one point: the enemy grows weaker every day, and we are growing stronger. Our work is almost done, and with the blessing of heaven, and the valor of our worthy General, we shall soon drive these plunderers out of our country!"

Sayings of Abraham Lincoln

The best thing about the future is that it comes only one day at a time.

It is true that you can fool all of the people some of the time; you can even fool some of the people all the time; but you can't fool all of the people all the time.

Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

God did not place good and evil before man, telling him to make his choice. On the contrary, he did tell him there was one tree of the fruit of which he should not eat, upon pain of certain death.