Without Attending

He who permits himself to tell a lie once, finds it much easier to do it a second and third time, till at length it becomes habitual; he tells lies without attending to it, and truths without the world's believing him.  This falsehood of tongue leads to that of the heart, and in time depraves all its good dispositions.

-- Thomas Jefferson (1743 - 1826), author of the Declaration of Independence (1776), the third president of the United States (1801–1809), and political philosopher, letter to his nephew Peter Carr from Paris, France (19 August 1785)