Last words (Jefferson died on 4 July 1826, the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence)
A few accounts declare that he asked on the night of the third: "Is it the fourth?" Most accounts declare the cited words were his last, and that he died a few hours before John Adams, whose last words are reported to have been: "Thomas — Jefferson — still surv — " or "Thomas Jefferson still survives.".
1820s
“Good teaching is one-fourth preparation and three-fourths theater.”
“Government! Three fourths parasitic and the other fourth Stupid fumbling.”
Source: Stranger in a Strange Land
“The world may be full of fourth-rate writers but it's also full of fourth-rate readers.”
Occasionally attributed to Walters; actually coined by Stan Barstow.
Misattributed
“The fourth is freedom from fear”
1940s, State of the Union Address — The Four Freedoms (1941)
Context: In the future days which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms.
The first is freedom of speech and expression — everywhere in the world.
The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way — everywhere in the world.
The third is freedom from want, which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants — everywhere in the world.
The fourth is freedom from fear, which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor — anywhere in the world.
That is no vision of a distant millennium. It is a definite basis for a kind of world attainable in our own time and generation.
“For the fortunate amongst us, the fourth danger”
Day of Affirmation Address (1966)
Context: For the fortunate amongst us, the fourth danger, my friends, is comfort, the temptation to follow the easy and familiar paths of personal ambition and financial success so grandly spread before those who have the privilege of an education. But that is not the road history has marked out for us. There is a Chinese curse which says, "May he live in interesting times." Like it or not we live in interesting times. They are times of danger and uncertainty; but they are also more open to the creative energy of men than any other time in history. And everyone here will ultimately be judged — will ultimately judge himself — on the effort he has contributed to building a new world society and the extent to which his ideals and goals have shaped that effort.
“On this fourth day of July, 1962, we”
1962, Address at Independence Hall
Context: On this fourth day of July, 1962, we who are gathered at this same hall, entrusted with the fate and future of our States and Nation, declare now our vow to do our part to lift the weights from the shoulders of all, to join other men and nations in preserving both peace and freedom, and to regard any threat to the peace or freedom of one as a threat to the peace and freedom of all.
“Delirium, dream, death—Three-D. What was the fourth?”
Source: Natural History (2003), Chapter 3 “Uluru” (p. 45)
“I'm in the fourth row, signing autographs at your show.”
"Cum On Everybody" (Track 13).
1990s, The Slim Shady LP (1999)
“The fourth Beast was the empire which succeeded that of the Greeks, and this was the Roman.”
Vol. I, Ch. 4: Of the vision of the four Beasts
Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel, and the Apocalypse of St. John (1733)
Context: The fourth Beast was the empire which succeeded that of the Greeks, and this was the Roman. This beast was exceeding dreadful and terrible, and had great iron teeth, and devoured and brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with its feet; and such was the Roman empire. It was larger, stronger, and more formidable and lasting than any of the former.... it became greater and more terrible than any of the three former Beasts. This Empire continued in its greatness till the reign of Theodosius the great; and then brake into ten kingdoms, represented by the ten horns of this Beast; and continued in a broken form, till the Ancient of days sat in a throne like fiery flame, and the judgment was set, and the books were opened, and the Beast was slain and his body destroyed, and given to the burning flames; and one like the son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and received dominion over all nations, and judgment was given to the saints of the most high, and the time came that they possessed the kingdom.
Opening lines of Ch. 1
The Garden of Cyrus (1658)
