The state is the great fiction by which everybody tries to live at the expense of everybody else.

The state is the great fiction by which everybody tries to live at the expense of everybody else.

If the small minority of enlightened citizens who are able to conceive sound principles of political management do not succeed read more

If the small minority of enlightened citizens who are able to conceive sound principles of political management do not succeed in winning the support of their fellow citizens and converting them to the endorsement of policies that bring and preserve prosperity, the cause of mankind and civilization is hopeless. There is no other means to safeguard a propitious development of human affairs than to make the masses of inferior people adopt the ideas of the elite. This has to be achieved by convincing them. It cannot be accomplished by a despotic regime that instead of enlightening the masses beats them into submission. In the long run the ideas of the majority, however detrimental they may be, will carry on. The future of mankind depends on the ability of the elite to influence public opinion in the right direction.

We live in a world in which politics has replaced philosophy.

We live in a world in which politics has replaced philosophy.

The most successful career must show a waste of strength that might have removed mountains, and the most unsuccessful is read more

The most successful career must show a waste of strength that might have removed mountains, and the most unsuccessful is not that of the man who is taken unprepared, but of him who has prepared and is never taken. On a tragedy of that kind our national morality is duly silent.

By taking this action, I hope that I will have hastened the start of the healing.

By taking this action, I hope that I will have hastened the start of the healing.

All revolutions...have been led by persons who knew oppression well, but not on their own skin.

All revolutions...have been led by persons who knew oppression well, but not on their own skin.

A Canadian is someone who knows how to make love in a canoe.

A Canadian is someone who knows how to make love in a canoe.

Taxes are not levied for the benefit of the taxed.

Taxes are not levied for the benefit of the taxed.

The worst evils which mankind has ever had to endure were inflicted by bad governments. The state can be and read more

The worst evils which mankind has ever had to endure were inflicted by bad governments. The state can be and has often been in the course of history the main source of mischief and disaster.