“The religion which has introduced civil liberty is the religion of Christ and his apostles, which enjoins humility, piety, and benevolence; which acknowledges in every person a brother, or a sister, and a citizen with equal rights. This is the genuine Christianity, and to this we owe our free Constitution of government.”
— Noah Webster (1758-1843)  Father of the Dictionary & American Patriot

"The reason that Christianity is the best friend of Government is because Christianity is the only religion that changes the heart."
— Thomas Jefferson, Author of the Declaration of Independence, 3rd President of the U. S

“Liberty can no more exist without virtue and independence than the body can live and move without a soul.” "Public virtue cannot exist in a nation without private, and public virtue is the only foundation of republics."
— John Adams (1797-1801) Second President of the United States and Patriot

"I had the honor of being one among many who framed that Constitution. … In order effectually to accomplish these great ends, it is incumbent upon us to begin wisely, and to proceed in the fear of God; and it is especially the duty of those who bear rule, to promote and encourage piety and virtue, and to discountenance every degree of vice and immorality.”
— Henry Laurens (1724-1796 ) President of Congress, Delegate to the Constitutional Convention

“The virtues of men are of more consequence to society than their abilities; and for this reason, the heart should be cultivated with more assiduity than the head.”
— Noah Webster (1758-1843)  Father of the Dictionary & American Patriot

“As the safety and prosperity of nations ultimately and essentially depend on the protection and the blessing of Almighty God, and the national acknowledgment of this truth is not only an indispensable duty which the people owe to Him, but a duty whose natural influence is favorable to the promotion of that morality and piety without which social happiness can not exist nor the blessings of a free government be enjoyed.”
— John Adams (1797-1801) Second President of the United States and Patriot

“The religion which has introduced civil liberty is the religion of Christ and His apostles, which enjoins humility, piety, and benevolence; which acknowledges in every person a brother, or a sister, and a citizen with equal rights. This is genuine Christianity, and to this we owe our free Constitutions of Government.”
— Benjamin Rush (1745-1813) Founding Father& signer of the Declaration of Independence

“Suppose a nation in some distant region should take the Bible for their only law book, and every member should regulate his conduct by the precepts there exhibited!  Every member would be obliged in conscience, to temperance, frugality, and industry; to justice, kindness, and charity towards his fellow man; and to piety, love, and reverence toward Almighty God. In this commonwealth, no man would impair his health by gluttony, drunkenness, or lust; no man would sacrifice his most precious time to cards or any other trifling and mean amusement; no man would steal, or lie, or in any way defraud his neighbor, but would live in peace and good will with all men; no man would blaspheme his Maker or profane his worship; but a rational and manly, a sincere and unaffected piety and devotion would reign in all hearts. What a Utopia; what a Paradise would this region be!"
— John Adams (1797-1801) Second President of the United States and Patriot

“When virtue is banished, ambition invades the minds of those who are disposed to receive it, and avarice possesses the whole community. The objects of their desires are changed; what they were fond of before has become indifferent; they were free while under the restraint of laws, but they would fain now be free to act against law.”
— Thomas Jefferson, Author of the Declaration of Independence, 3rd President of the U. S

"Revelations assures us that ‘righteousness exalteth a nation.’ He rewards or punishes them according to the general character. The diminution of public virtue is usually attended with that of public happiness, and the public liberty will not long survive the total extinction of morals." 
— Samuel Adams (1722–1803) Father of the American Revolution, Patriot and Statesman

“He asks how the evil is to be remedied. I tell him that there seems to be little chance for avoiding the extremes of despotism or anarchy; that the only ground of hope must be the morals of the people, but that these are, I fear, too corrupt.”
— Gouverneur Morris (1752-1816) Statesman, Diplomat, writer of the final draft of the Constitution

"A good moral character is the first essential in a man, and that the habits contracted at your age are generally indelible, and your conduct here may stamp your character through life. It is therefore highly important that you should endeavor not only to be learned but virtuous." 
— George Washington (1732-1799) Father of the Country, 1st President of the United States

"Without morals a republic cannot subsist any length of time; they therefore who are decrying the Christian religion…are undermining the solid morals, the best security for the duration of free government.”
— Charles Carroll (1737-1832) Founding Father

"It is only when the people become ignorant and corrupt, when they degenerate into a populace, that they are incapable of exercising their sovereignty. Usurpation is then an easy attainment, and an usurper soon found. The people themselves become the willing instruments of their own debasement and ruin. …Let us, by all wise and constitutional measures, promote intelligence among the People, as the best means of preserving our liberties."
— James Monroe (1758-1831) Fifth President of the United States

“I go on this great republican principle, that the people will have virtue and intelligence to select men of virtue and wisdom. Is there no virtue among us? If there is not, we are in a wretched situation. No theoretical checks, no form of government, can render us secure. To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical (imaginary; fanciful or vainly conceived) idea. If there be sufficient virtue and intelligence in the community, it will be exercised in the selection of these men; so that we do not depend on their virtue, or put confidence in our rulers, but in the people who are to choose them.”
— James Madison (1751-1836) Father of the Constitution, 4th President of the United States

“Ours is a kind of struggle designed, I dare say, by Providence to try the patience, fortitude, and virtue of men. None, therefore, who is engaged in it, will suffer himself, I trust, to sink under difficulties, or be discouraged by hardships. If he cannot do as he wishes, he must do what he can.”
— George Washington (1732-1799) Father of the Country, 1st President of the United States

"Neither the wisest constitution nor the wisest laws will secure the liberty and happiness of a people whose manners are universally corrupt. He therefore is the truest friend to the liberty of his country who tries most to promote its virtue, and who, so far as his power and influence extend, will not suffer a man to be chosen into any office of power and trust who is not a wise and virtuous man. We must not conclude merely upon a man's haranguing upon liberty, and using the charming sound, that he is fit to be trusted with the liberties of his country.”
— Samuel Adams (1722–1803) Father of the American Revolution, Patriot and Statesman

“Sensible of the importance of Christian piety and virtue to the order and happiness of a state, I cannot but earnestly commend to you every measure for their support and encouragement … Manners, by which not only the freedom, but the very existence of the republics, are greatly affected, depend much upon the public institutions of religion and the good education of youth; in both these instances our fathers laid wise foundations, for which their posterity have had reason to bless their memory.”
— John Hancock, (1737-1793) Boston Merchant, Founding Father & Patriot

“Our liberty depends on our education, our laws and habits, to which even prejudices yield; on the dispersion of our people on farms, and on the almost equal diffusion of property; it is founded on morals and religion, whose authority reigns in the heart; and on the influence all these produce on public opinion, before that opinion governs rulers.”
— Fisher Ames (1758-1808) Founding Father and framer of the First Amendment to the Constitution

“Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. … Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.”
— George Washington (1732-1799) Father of the Country, 1st President of the United States

"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." The Amor Patriae (love of ones country) is both a moral duty and a religious duty. It comprehends not only the love of our neighbors but of millions of our fellow creatures, not only of the present but of future generations. This virtue we find constitutes a part of the first characters of history.”
— Benjamin Rush (1745-1813) Founding Father& signer of the Declaration of Independence

"The happiness of man, as well as his dignity, consists in virtue."
— John Adams (1797-1801) Second President of the United States and Patriot

“The virtues of men are of more consequence to society than their abilities; and for this reason, the heart should be cultivated with more assiduity than the head.”
— Noah Webster (1758-1843)  Father of the Dictionary & American Patriot

“It is the manners and spirit of a people which preserve a republic in vigor. A degeneracy in these is a canker which soon eats to the heart of its laws and constitution.”
— Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) Third President of the United States

"It is the manners and spirit of a people which preserve a republic in vigor. A degeneracy in these is a canker which soon eats to the heart of its laws and constitution."
— Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) Third President of the United States

“Never did a Government commence under auspices so favorable, nor ever was success so complete. If we look to the history of other nations, ancient or modern, we find no example of a growth so rapid— gigantic: of a people so prosperous and happy, Ini contemplating what we have still to perform, the heart of every citizen must expand with joy, when he reflects how near our Government has approached to perfection; that, in respect to it, we have no essential improvement to make; that the great object is, to preserve it in the essential principles and features which characterize it, and that that is to be done by preserving the virtue and enlightening the minds of the people; and, as a security against foreign dangers, to adopt such arrangements as are indispensable to the support of our independence, our rights, and liberties. If we persevere in the career in which we bare advanced so far, and in the path already traced, we cannot fail, under the favor of a gracious Providence, to attain the high destiny which seems to await us …

I enter on the trust to which I have been called by the suffrage of my fellow-citizens with my fervent prayers to the Almighty that He will be graciously pleased to continue to us that protect which He has already so conspicuously displayed in our favor."
— James Monroe (1758-1831) Fifth President of the United States

“If we cherish the virtues and the principles of our fathers, Heaven will assist us to carry on the work of human liberty and human happiness. Auspicious omens cheer us. Great examples are before us. Our own firmament now shines brightly upon our path.”
— Daniel Webster (1782-1852) Author, Lawyer and Patriot

"A state is nothing more than a reflection of its citizens; the more decent the citizens, the more decent the state.”
— Ronald Reagan (1911-2004) 40th President of the United States

“Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.”
— Proverbs 14:34

 “History fails to record a single precedent in which nations subject to moral decay have not passed into political and economic decline. There has been either a spiritual awakening to overcome the moral lapse, or a progressive deterioration leading to ultimate national disaster.”
— Douglas MacArthur (1880-1964) Army General, involved in war in the Philippines, World War I, II & Korean War

“Liberty considers religion as the safeguard of morality, and morality as the best security of law and the surest pledge of the duration of freedom.”
— Alexis de Toqueville (1805-1859) French Author

“But what is liberty without wisdom, and without virtue? It is the greatest of all possible evils; for it is folly, vice, and madness, without tuition or restraint.”
— Edmund Burke (1729-1797) British Statesman, Lawyer, Writer, and Philosopher

“Jesus is the purest among the mighty, and the mightiest among the pure, who, with his pierced hand has raised empires from their foundations, turned the stream of history from its old channel, and still continues to rule and guide the ages”
— Jean Paul Friedrich Richter (1763-1825) German writer

“Warn my children to avoid the precipices of pride and haughtiness, and to walk in the pleasant meadows of modesty; not to be dazzled by the sight of gold; not to lament that they do not possess what they erroneously admire in others; not to think more of themselves for gaudy trappings, nor less for the want of them; neither to deform the beauty that nature has given them by neglect, nor to try to heighten it by artifice; to put virtue in the first place, learning in the second; and in their studies to esteem most whatever may teach them piety towards God, charity to all, and Christian humility in themselves. …These I consider the real and genuine fruits of learning, and I would maintain that those who give themselves to study with such intent will easily attain their end and become perfect.”
— Saint Thomas More (1478–1535) English lawyer, author, statesman and martyr

“Among a people generally corrupt, liberty cannot long exist”
— Edmund Burke (1729-1797) British Statesman, Lawyer, Writer, and Philosopher

"No people can be great who have ceased to be virtuous."
— Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) English Author and Journalist

"The United States is only one superpower. Today they lead the world. Nobody has doubts about it. Militarily. They also lead economically but they're getting weak. But they don't lead morally and politically anymore. The world has no leadership. The United States was always the last resort and hope for all other nations. There was the hope, whenever something was going wrong, one could count on the United States. Today, we lost that hope." 
— Lech Walesa (1943-   ) Polish electrican, rights activist who co-founded Solidarity, later became President of Poland