I work for a government I despise for ends I think criminal.

It is impossible to tell which of the two dispositions we find in men is more harmful in a republic, that which seeks to maintain an established position or that which has none but seeks to acquire it.

There is nothing more tyrannical than a strong popular feeling among a democratic people.

Television has made dictatorship impossible, but democracy unbearable.

Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time.

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

You should never have your best trousers on when you go out to fight for freedom and truth.

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.

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

Out of the crooked timber of humanity no straight thing was ever made.

Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them.

The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure it is right.

Written laws are like spiderwebs: they will catch, it is true, the weak and poor but would be torn in pieces by the rich and powerful.