Yoohoo! Thomas Jefferson left a message:

[alc]

18. the founding fathers disagreed with each other like people now

And none of them had philosophies that can be summed up in a single quote or were consistent with all of their actions.

Hamilton thought the general welfare clause gave the government the authority to do ANYTHING the "rulers" thought best. He stayed away from the "state's rights" sections of the federalist papers. he didn't publicly argue against the enumerated powers. He knew those arguments would kill the chances of ratification. But he did think the general welfare clause trumped the enumerated powers and 10th amendment and argued that way for his banking bills (which congress passed based on those arguments and which likely saved the government)

Adams was ok with the alien and sedition acts (since they only targeted his political foes)

Jefferson was ok with the embargo acts (suspension of the 4th amendment) and with trying Burr for treason without the constitutionally necessary facts (which Jay went along with).

Jefferson and Adams were ok with personally funding the major newspaper editors and using tricks and government resources to get "their" paper delivered (e.g. ordering government postal riders to deliver the presidents newspapers and bribing those riders to throw them away and deliver the other newspaper) Free press was a nice theory but not a good practice if you want to remain or become president.

Washington went against congress's orders and picked DC for the capital (near his land) rather than one of the locations congress told him to pick. Then played some legislative tricks (threatening vetos) to get congress to approve in a way that looked like he didn't do that.

You don't see many quotes from these leaders that mesh with some of the actions they thought were necessary once they got power.