The law giver, of all beings, most owes the law allegiance. He of all men should behave as though the read more

The law giver, of all beings, most owes the law allegiance. He of all men should behave as though the law compelled him. But it is the universal weakness of mankind that what we are given to administer we presently imagine we own.

The New Deal began, like the Salvation Army, by promising to save humanity. It ended, again like the Salvation Army, read more

The New Deal began, like the Salvation Army, by promising to save humanity. It ended, again like the Salvation Army, by running flop-houses and disturbing the peace.

I am extraordinarily patient, provided I get my own way in the end.

I am extraordinarily patient, provided I get my own way in the end.

It is much safer to obey, than to govern.

It is much safer to obey, than to govern.

Peace is liberty in tranquillity.

Peace is liberty in tranquillity.

It is a dangerous and idle dream to think that the state can become rule by philosophers turned kings or read more

It is a dangerous and idle dream to think that the state can become rule by philosophers turned kings or scientists turned commissars. For if philosophers become kings or scientists commissars, they become politicians, and the powers given to the state are powers given to men who are rulers of states, men subject to all the limitations and temptations of their dangerous craft. Unless this is borne in mind, there will be a dangerous optimistic tendency to sweep aside doubts and fears as irrelevant, since, in the state that the projectors have in mind, power will be exercised by men of a wisdom and degree of moral virtue that we have not yet seen. It won't. It will be exercised by men who will be men first and rulers next and scientists and saints long after.

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed [and hence clamorous to be led to safety] read more

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed [and hence clamorous to be led to safety] by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

Commencement speakers have a good deal in common with grandfather clocks: Standing usually some six feet tall, typically ponderous in read more

Commencement speakers have a good deal in common with grandfather clocks: Standing usually some six feet tall, typically ponderous in construction, more traditional than functional, their distinction is largely their noisy communication of essentially commonplace information.

Force is the antithesis of freedom, but force must be used, if only to defend against other force.

Force is the antithesis of freedom, but force must be used, if only to defend against other force.