Envy is the basis of democracy.

The best of all rulers is but a shadowy presence to his subjects.

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.

You have all the characteristics of a popular politician: a horrible voice, bad breeding, and a vulgar manner.

I am invariably of the politics of the people at whose table I sit, or beneath whose roof I sleep.

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Television has made dictatorship impossible, but democracy unbearable.

I shall be an autocrat: that’s my trade. And the good Lord will forgive me: that’s his.

All the ills of democracy can be cured by more democracy.

The more corrupt the republic, the more numerous the laws.

Natural rights is simple nonsense: natural and imprescriptible rights, rhetorical nonsense—nonsense upon stilts.

The affairs of the world are no more than so much trickery, and a man who toils for money or honor or whatever else in deference to the wishes of others, rather than because his own desire or needs lead him to do so, will always be a fool.

Why has the government been instituted at all? Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice without constraint.