Monday, August 23, 2010

Some Great Founders Quotes Reflecting on the Times

John Adams:
"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." 

Samuel Adams:

"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 they will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader. . . . If virtue and knowledge are diffused among the people, they will never be enslaved. This will be their great security."
 
Dear Readers, the root problem in this country today is not that we have gone too far left or that we have too many laws or that we have allowed abortion or gone off the gold standard.  It is this:  We have forgotten God.  We have turned away from the wisdom of the Creator who gave us this country, and toward the wisdom of the created (which, indeed, is no wisdom at all).


So the solution to our problems today is simple in concept, yet vast in its implementation.  As the Bible has it:  "Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you." (Jas 4:7-10)  

Or, if you prefer the Old Testament:  "Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths." (Proverbs 3:5-6)

Much has been written to discredit the founders, calling them deists, slave owners, or 18th century dimwits trapped in their outdated cultural strictures.  The truth is that they were more enlightened, more educated, more widely read, and more insightful than 99% of what passes for leadership in this country today.  They were for the most part NOT deists.  Indeed, those who are most often cited as belonging to that sect (like Franklin or Jefferson) give no evidence of it when their lives are examined in detail.



So if you are reading this, I exhort you to investigate for yourself what these men believed, what influenced their thinking, and how they took all that and turned it into the most unique nation ever on the face of the earth.  You will see how far we have strayed from their vision.