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.

In politics, what begins in fear usually ends in folly.

No free man shall be taken or imprisoned or dispossessed or outlawed or exiled, or in any way destroyed, nor will we go upon him, nor will we send against him except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land.

An appeal to the reason of the people has never been known to fail in the long run.

The Revolution is made by man, but man must forge his revolutionary spirit from day to day.

O citizens, first acquire wealth; you can practice virtue afterward.

The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all.

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.

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.

What 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.

The most hateful torment for men is to have knowledge of everything but power over nothing.

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

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