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.

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

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.

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

I am no courtesan, nor moderator, nor tribune, nor defender of the people: I am myself the people.

Do that which consists in taking no action, and order will prevail.

You campaign in poetry. You govern in prose.

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.

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

I’m president of the United States, and I’m not going to eat any more broccoli!

The vice presidency isn’t worth a pitcher of warm piss.

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