Top 106 Quotes & Sayings by William Jennings Bryan - Page 2

If we steal a man's purse we are thieves. If we steal twelve hundred islands we are patriots. If you steal a man's money you will be sent to the penitentiary. If you steal his liberty you will be sent to the White House.

If God himself was not willing to use coercion to force man to accept certain religious views, man, uninspired and liable to error, ought not to use the means that Jehovah would not employ.

If evolution wins, Christianity goes!

If matter mute and inanimate, though changed by the forces of Nature into a multitude of forms, can never die, will the spirit of man suffer annihilation when it has paid a brief visit, like a royal guest, to this tenement of clay?

Belief in God is almost universal and the effect of this belief is so vast that one is appalled at the thought of what social conditions would be if reverence for God were erased from every heart.

The people of Nebraska are for free silver and I am for free silver. I will look up the arguments later.

On Thanksgiving Day we acknowledge our dependence.

The real question is, Did God use evolution as His plan? If it could be shown that man, instead of being made in the image of God, is a development of beasts we would have to accept it, regardless of its effort, for truth is truth and must prevail. But when there is no proof we have a right to consider the effect of the acceptance of an unsupported hypothesis.

The human measure of a human life is its income; the divine measure of a life is its outgo, its overflow its contribution to the welfare of all.... If every word spoken in behalf of truth has its influence and every deed done for the right weighs in the final account, it is immaterial to the Christian whether his eyes behold victory or whether he dies in the midst of conflict.

In our election manifesto is: we keep the right to create money and to bring in circulation, for the cause of the government ... Those who do not share this view, reply us to the issue of paper money is for the banks, the government should stay out of the banking business. I agree with Jefferson's opinion ... and just like him I say again: the issue of money is a matter for the government and the banks should stay out of government activity.

Next to the ministry I know of no more noble profession than the law. The object aimed at is justice, equal and exact, and if it does not reach that end at once it is because the stream is diverted by selfishness or checked by ignorance. Its principles ennoble and its practice elevates.

If it weren't for the lawyers we wouldn't need them.

The Old Testament gave us the law; the New Testament reveals the love upon which the law rests.

The wisdom of the Bible writers is more than human; the prophecies proclaim a Supreme Ruler who, though inhabiting all space, deigns to speak through the hearts and minds and tongues of His children.

You shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns; you shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.

When we advocate a thing which we believe will be successful we are not compelled to raise a doubt as to our own sincerity by trying to show what we will do if we are wrong.

Our government, conceived in liberty and purchased with blood, can be preserved only by constant vigilance. May we guard it as our children's richest legacy, for what shall it profit our nation if it shall gain the whole world and lose “the spirit that prizes liberty as the heritage of all men in all lands everywhere”?

The great political questions are in their final analysis great moral questions.

Patriotism is a mystery-intangible, invisible, and yet eternal.

There is no more reason to believe that man descended from an inferior animal than there is to believe that a stately mansion has descended from a small cottage.

If the Bible and the microscope do not agee, the microscope is wrong

A man who murders another shortens by a few brief years the life of a human being; but he who votes to increase the burden of debts upon the people of the United States assumes a graver responsibility.

I can not wish you success in your effort to reject the treaty because while it may win the fight it may destroy our cause. My plan cannot fail if the people are with us and we ought not to succeed unless we do have the people with us.

If there is no God there is no hereafter. When, therefore, one drives God out of the universe he closes the door of hope upon himself.

If we desire rules to govern our spiritual development we turn back to the Sermon on the Mount.

Real estate is the best investment for small savings. More money is made from the rise in real estate values than from all other causes combined.

Atheists have just as much civil right to teach atheism as Christians have to teach Christianity; agnostics have just as much right to teach agnosticism as Christians have to teach their religion.

Agnosticism is the natural attitude of the evolutionist. How can a brute mind comprehend spiritual things?

In commemoration of the fact that France was our ally in securing independence the citizens of that nation joined with the citizens of the United States in placing in New York harbor an heroic statue representing Liberty enlightening the world. What course shall our nation pursue? Send the statue of Liberty back to France and borrow from England a statue of William the Conqueror?

We spend months inside them, then the rest of our lives getting babied by them.

This nation is able to legislate for its own people on every question, without waiting for the aid or consent of any other nation on earth.

That is the one thing in my public career that I regret--my work to secure the enactment of the Federal Reserve Law.

We can exterminate Ku Kluxism better by recognizing their honesty and teaching them that they are wrong.

If it be true, as I believe it is, that morality is dependent upon religion, then religion is not only the most practical thing in the world, but the first essential.

Darwin begins by assuming life upon the earth; the Bible reveals the source of life and chronicles its creation.

The chief duty of governments, in so far as they are coercive, is to restrain those who would interfere with the inalienable rights of the individual, among which are the right to life, the right to liberty, the right to the pursuit of happiness and the right to worship God according to the dictates of ones conscience.

The large banking interests were deeply interested in the World War because of the wide opportunities for large profits.

The first thing to understand is the difference between the natural person and the fictitious person called a corporation. They differ in the purpose for which they are created, in the strength which they possess, and in the restraints under which they act.

We have our thoughts, our hopes, our fears, and yet we know that in a moment a change may come over any one of us that will convert a living, breathing human being into a mass of lifeless clay.

If you want criticisms, read the dissenting opinions of the Court. That will give you criticisms.

I have been so satisfied with the Christian religion that I have spent no time trying to find arguments against it. I am not afraid now that you will show me any. I feel that I have enough information to live and die by.

A belief in God is fundamental; upon it rest the influences that control life.

Christ has made of death a narrow starlit strip between the companionships of yesterday and the reunions of tomorrow.

You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.

The money problem facing the country from 1789 to 1896 existed because Congress never exercised is authority to "coin money or regulate the value thereof" - but rather delegated that authority, sometimes by charter and sometimes by default, to the banking system. This despite the provision in the Constitution that charged Congress with the power to 'coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standards of weight and Measures.'

God may be a matter of indifference to the evolutionists, and a life beyond may have no charm for them, but the mass of mankind will continue to worship their creator and continue to find comfort in the promise of their Savior that he has gone to prepare a place for them.