Archive

Quotes

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

—Tacitus, c. 117

There is no method by which men can be both free and equal.

—Walter Bagehot, 1863

Every country has the government it deserves.

—Joseph de Maistre, 1811

A riot is at bottom the language of the unheard.

—Martin Luther King Jr., c. 1967

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

—Lord Acton, 1887

A real leader is somebody who can help us overcome the limitations of our own individual laziness and selfishness and weakness and fear and get us to do better, harder things than we can get ourselves to do on our own.

—David Foster Wallace, 2000

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.

—Niccolò Machiavelli, c. 1515

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

—Catherine the Great, c. 1796

On the loftiest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own rump.

—Michel de Montaigne, 1580

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

—Herodotus, c. 425 BC

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

—Thomas Jefferson, 1787

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

—Judge Learned Hand, 1944

To be turned from one’s course by men’s opinions, by blame, and by misrepresentation shows a man unfit to hold office.

—Quintus Fabius Maximus, c. 203 BC