The Rights of Men

"May [the Declaration of Independence] be to the world, what I believe
it will be (to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally to all),
the signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish
ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves,
and to assume the blessings and security of self-government. That form
which we have substituted, restores the free right to the unbounded
exercise of reason and freedom of opinion. All eyes are opened,
or opening, to the rights of man."

-- Thomas Jefferson
(1743-1826), US Founding Father, drafted the Declaration of Independence,
3rd US President, June 24, 1826