My old master was as neat a hand as ever you see to make keys & locks & small chains, iron & brass

Old master had abundance of books: sometimes would have twenty of ’em down on the floor at once: read fust one, then tother.

He often made us little presents. I remember his giving us “Parents’ Assistant,” and that we drew lots, and that she who drew the longest straw had the first reading of the book—the next longest straw entitled the drawer to the second reading—the shortest, to the last reading and the ownership of...

when it grew too dark to read, in the half hour that passed before candles came in, as we all sat round the fire, he taught us several childish games, and would play them with us ... When the candles were brought, all was quiet immediately, for he took up his book to read, and we would not speak...

Your age of 84. and mine of 81. years ensure us a speedy meeting. we may then commune at leisure, and more fully, on the good and evil which, in the course of our long lives, we have both witnessed

the Creator has made the earth for the living, not the dead. rights and powers can only belong to persons, not to things, the dead are not even things. not to mere matter, unendowed with will. the dead are not even things. the particles of matter which composed their bodies, make part now of the...

With respect to our state and federal governments, I do not think their relations correctly understood by foreigners. they generally suppose the former subordinate to the latter. but this is not the case. they are co-ordinate departments of one simple, and integral whole. to the State governments...

the constitutions of most of our states assert that all power is inherent in the people; that they may exercise it by themselves, in all cases to which they think themselves competent, (as in electing their functionaries executive and legislative, and deciding by a jury of themselves, both fact...

Our revolution commenced on more favorable ground. it presented us an Album on which we were free to write what we pleased. we had no occasion to search into musty records, to hunt up Royal parchments, or to investigate the laws & institutions of a semi-barbarous ancestry. we appealed to...

I turned to neither book or pamphlet while writing it. I did not consider it as any part of my charge to invent new ideas altogether & to offer no sentiment which had ever been expressed before.