There is no method by which men can be both free and equal.
—Walter Bagehot, 1863Quotes
The best of all rulers is but a shadowy presence to his subjects.
—LaoziNo human life, not even the life of a hermit, is possible without a world which directly or indirectly testifies to the presence of other human beings.
—Hannah Arendt, 1958You should never have your best trousers on when you go out to fight for freedom and truth.
—Henrik Ibsen, 1882What experience and history teach is this—that nations and governments have never learned anything from history or acted upon any lessons they might have drawn from it.
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, 1830On the loftiest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own rump.
—Michel de Montaigne, 1580Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
—Lord Acton, 1887You campaign in poetry. You govern in prose.
—Mario Cuomo, 1985The first requirement of a statesman is that he be dull.
—Dean Acheson, 1970Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them.
—Paul Valéry, 1943I am no courtesan, nor moderator, nor tribune, nor defender of the people: I am myself the people.
—Maximilien Robespierre, 1792What, to the American slave, is your Fourth of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him your celebration is a sham.
—Frederick Douglass, 1855You have all the characteristics of a popular politician: a horrible voice, bad breeding, and a vulgar manner.
—Aristophanes, c. 424 BC