Under democracy one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party is unfit to read more

Under democracy one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party is unfit to rule--and both commonly succeed, and are right.

There is no slavery but ignorance.

There is no slavery but ignorance.

No matter how disastrously some policy has turned out, anyone who criticizes it can expect to hear: "But what would read more

No matter how disastrously some policy has turned out, anyone who criticizes it can expect to hear: "But what would you replace it with?" When you put out a fire, what do you replace it with?

All that Communism needs to make it successful is someone to feed and clothe it.

All that Communism needs to make it successful is someone to feed and clothe it.

Absolute power turns its possessors not into a God but an anti-God. For God turned clay into men, while the read more

Absolute power turns its possessors not into a God but an anti-God. For God turned clay into men, while the absolute despot turns men into clay.

Political history is largely an account of mass violence and of the expenditure of vast resources to cope with mythical read more

Political history is largely an account of mass violence and of the expenditure of vast resources to cope with mythical fears and hopes.

Absolute power corrupts even when exercised for humane purposes. The benevolent despot who sees himself as a shepherd of the read more

Absolute power corrupts even when exercised for humane purposes. The benevolent despot who sees himself as a shepherd of the people still demands from others the submissiveness of sheep.

Unless a man has talents to make something of himself, freedom is an irksome burden. Of what avail is freedom read more

Unless a man has talents to make something of himself, freedom is an irksome burden. Of what avail is freedom to choose if the self be ineffectual? We join a mass movement to escape individual responsibility, or, in the words of the ardent young Nazi, "to be free from freedom.".

The basic test of freedom is perhaps less in what we are free to do than in what we are read more

The basic test of freedom is perhaps less in what we are free to do than in what we are free not to do.