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A State Of Things In Which A Large Portion Of The Most Active And Inquiring Intellects Find It Advisable To Keep The Genuine Principles And Grounds Of Their Convictions Within Their Own Breasts, And Attempt, In What They Address To The Public, To Fit As Much As They Can Of Their Own Conclusions To Premises Which They Have Internally Renounced, Cannot Send Forth The Open, Fearless Characters, And Logical, Consistent Intellects Who Once Adorned The Thinking World.

-John Stuart Mill

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A State Of Things

John Stuart Mill

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A State Of Things In Which A Large Portion Of The Most Active And Inquiring Intellects Find It Advisable To Keep The Genuine Principles And Grounds Of Their Convictions Within Their Own Breasts, And Attempt, In What They Address To The Public, To Fit As Much As They Can Of Their Own Conclusions To Premises Which They Have Internally Renounced, Cannot Send Forth The Open, Fearless Characters, And Logical, Consistent Intellects Who Once Adorned The Thinking World.

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In Early Times, The Great Majority Of The Male Sex Were Slaves, As Well As The Whole Of The Female. And Many Ages Elapsed, Some Of Them Ages Of High Cultivation, Before Any Thinker Was Bold Enough To Question The Rightfulness, And The Absolute Social Necessity, Either Of The One Slavery Or Of The Other.

The Object Of Universities Is Not To Make Skillful Lawyers, Physicians Or Engineers. It Is To Make Capable And Cultivated Human Beings

A Man Who Has Nothing For Which He Is Willing To Fight, Nothing Which Is More Important Than His Own Personal Safety, Is A Miserable Creature And Has No Chance Of Being Free Unless Made And Kept So By The Exertions Of Better Men Than Himself.

Money Is A Machine For Doing Quickly And Commodiously What Would Be Done, Though Less Quickly And Commodiously, Without It.

What Little Recognition The Idea Of Obligation To The Public Obtains In Modern Morality, Is Derived From Greek And Roman Sources, Not From Christian; As, Even In The Morality Of Private Life, Whatever Exists Of Magnanimity, High-mindeness, Personal Dignity, Even The Sense Of Honour, Is Derived From The Purely Human, Not The Religious Part Of Our Education, And Never Could Have Grown Out Of A Standard Of Ethics In Which The Only Worth, Professedly Recognized, Is That Of Obedience.

Men And Governments Must Act To The Best Of Their Ability. There Is No Such Thing As Absolute Certainty But There Is Assurance Sufficient For The Purposes Of Human Life.

...it Is Not Only The General Principles Of Justice That Are Infringed, Or At Least Set Aside, By The Exclusion Of Women, Merely As Women, From Any Share In The Representation; That Exclusion Is Also Repugnant To The Particular Principles Of The British Constitution. It Violates One Of The Oldest Of Our Constitutional Maxims...that Taxation And Representation Should Be Co-extensive. Do Not Women Pay Taxes?

Words Of Wisdom

Genius Can Only Breathe Freely In An Atmosphere Of Freedom.

Over One's Mind And Over One's Body The Individual Is Sovereign.

Human Nature Is Not A Machine To Be Built After A Model, And Set To Do Exactly The Work Prescribed For It, But A Tree, Which Requires To Grow And Develop Itself On All Sides, According To The Tendency Of The Inward Forces Which Make It A Living Thing.

He Who Lets The World Choose His Plan Of Life For Him Has Need Of No Other Faculty Than That Of Ape-like Imitation.

Popular Opinions, On Subjects Not Palpable To Sense, Are Often True, But Seldom Or Never The Whole Truth.

It Is Better To Be Socrates Dissatisfied Than A Pig Satisfied.

Eloquence Is Heard; Poetry Is Overheard ... All Poetry Is Of The Nature Of The Soliloquy.

It Is Part Of The Irony Of Life That The Strongest Feelings Of Devoted Gratitude Of Which Human Nature Seems To Be Susceptible, Are Called Forth In Human Beings Towards Those Who, Having The Power Entirely To Crush Their Earthly Existence, Voluntarily Refrain From Using That Power.

It Is Not Because Men's Desires Are Strong That They Act Ill; It Is Because Their Consciences Are Weak.

It Is Conceivable That Religion May Be Morally Useful Without Being Intellectually Sustainable.

Positive Atheism

In The Human Mind, One-sidedness Has Always Been The Rule, And Many-sidedness The Exception. Hence, Even In Revolutions Of Opinion, One Part Of The Truth Usually Sets While Another Rises.

In Its Narrowest Acceptation, Order Means Obedience. A Government Is Said To Preserve Order If It Succeeds In Getting Itself Obeyed.

A Person's Taste Is As Much His Own Peculiar Concern As His Opinion Or His Purse.

The Ne Plus Ultra Of Wickedness ... Is Embodied In What Is Commonly Presented To Mankind As The Creed Of Christianity.

A General State Education Is A Mere Contrivance For Moulding People To Be Exactly Like One Another, And As The Mould In Which It Casts Them Is That Which Pleases The Dominant Power In The Government.

School Education

Education And Freedom

The Idea That Truth Always Triumphs Over Persecution Is One Of Those Pleasant Falsehoods, Which Most Experience Refutes. History Is Teeming With Instances Of Truth Put Down By Persecution. If Not Put Down Forever, It May Be Set Back For Centuries.

Everyone Who Receives The Protection Of Society Owes A Return For The Benefit.

Stupidity Is Much The Same All The World Over. A Stupid Person's Notions And Feelings May Confidently Be Inferred From Those Which Prevail In The Circle By Which The Person Is Surrounded. Not So With Those Whose Opinions And Feelings Are An Emanation From Their Own Nature And Faculties.

It Is A Law, That Every Event Depends On Some Law.

The Habit Of Analysis Has A Tendency To Wear Away The Feelings.

With Equality Of Experience And Of General Faculties, A Woman Usually Sees Much More Than A Man Of What Is Immediately Before Her.

Though It Is Only In A Very Imperfect State Of The World's Arrangements That Anyone Can Best Serve The Happiness Of Others By The Absolute Sacrifice Of His Own, Yet, So Long As The World Is In That Imperfect State, I Fully Acknowledge That The Readiness To Make Such A Sacrifice Is The Highest Virtue Which Can Be Found In Man.

The Only Part Of The Conduct Of Any One, For Which He Is Amenable To Society, Is That Which Concerns Others. In The Part Which Merely Concerns Himself, His Independence Is, Of Right, Absolute. Over Himself, Over His Own Body And Mind, The Individual Is Sovereign.

The Natural Tendency Of Representative Government, As Of Modern Civilisation, Is Towards Collective Mediocrity: And This Tendency Is Increased By All Reductions And Extensions Of The Franchise, Their Effect Being To Place The Principal Power In The Hands Of Classes More And More Below The Highest Level Of Instruction In The Community.

On Religion In Particular, The Time Appears To Me To Have Come, When It Is A Duty Of All Who, Being Qualified In Point Of Knowledge, Have, On Mature Consideration, Satisfied Themselves That The Current Opinions Are Not Only False, But Hurtful, To Make Their Dissent Known.

The Duty Of Man Is The Same In Respect To His Own Nature As In Respect To The Nature Of All Other Things, Namely Not To Follow It But To Amend It.

It Is Only In The Backward Countries Of The World That Increased Production Is Still An Important Object.

Countries Of The World

The Love Of Power And The Love Of Liberty Are In Eternal Antagonism.

A Man Of Clear Ideas Errs Grievously If He Imagines That Whatever Is Seen Confusedly Does Not Exist; It Belongs To Him, When He Meets With Such A Thing, To Dispel The Midst, And Fix The Outlines Of The Vague Form Which Is Looming Through It.

No Great Improvements In The Lot Of Mankind Are Possible Until A Great Change Takes Place In The Fundamental Constitution Of Their Modes Of Thought.

It Is Useful That While Mankind Are Imperfect There Should Be Different Opinions, So Is It That There Should Be Different Experiments Of Living; That Free Scope Should Be Given To Varieties Of Character, Short Of Injury To Others.

Different Opinions

A State Which Dwarfs Its Men, In Order That They May Be More Docile Instruments In Its Hands Even For Beneficial Purposes--will Find That With Small Men No Great Thing Can Really Be Accomplished.

I Know Tolerably Well What Ireland Was, But Have A Very Imperfect Idea Of What Ireland Is.

The Validity Of All The Inductive Methods Depends On The Assumption That Every Event, Or The Beginning Of Every Phenomenon, Must Have Some Cause; Some Antecedent, Upon The Existence Of Which It Is Invariably And Unconditionally Consequent.

In This Age, The Man Who Dares To Think For Himself And To Act Independently Does A Service To His Race.

The Struggle Between Liberty And Authority Is The Most Conspicuous Feature In The Portions Of History With Which We Are Earliest Familiar; Particularly In That Of Greece, Rome, And England

There Is A Limit To The Legitimate Interference Of Collective Opinion With Individual Independence: And To Find That Limit, And Maintain It Against Encroachment, Is As Indispensable To A Good Condition Of Human Affairs, As Protection Against Political Despotism.

[my Father] Impressed Upon Me From The First, That The Manner In Which The World Came Into Existence Was A Subject On Which Nothing Was Known: That The Question, "who Made Me?" Cannot Be Answered, Because We Have No Experience Or Authentic Information From Which To Answer It; And That Any Answer Only Throws The Difficulty A Step Further Back, Since The Question Immediately Presents Itself, "who Made God?

All Women Are Brought Up From The Very Earliest Years In The Belief That Their Ideal Of Character Is The Very Opposite To That Of Men; Not Self-will, And Government By Self-control, But Submission And Yielding To The Control Of Others. All The Moralities Tell Them That It Is Their Nature To Live For Others; To Make Complete Abnegation Of Themselves, And To Have No Life But In Their Affections.

All Social Inequalities Which Have Ceased To Be Considered Expedient, Assume The Character Not Of Simple Inexpediency, But Of Injustice, And Appear So Tyrannical, That People Are Apt To Wonder How They Ever Could Have. Been Tolerated; Forgetful That They Themselves Perhaps Tolerate Other Inequalities Under An Equally Mistaken Notion Of Expediency, The Correction Of Which Would Make That Which They Approve Seem Quite As Monstrous As What They Have At Last Learnt To Condemn.

Mankind Are Greater Gainers By Suffering Each Other To Live As Seems Good To Themselves, Than By Compelling Each To Live As Seems Good To The Rest.

That So Few Now Dare To Be Eccentric, Marks The Chief Danger Of The Time.

The Successful Conduct Of An Industrial Enterprise Requires Two Quite Distinct Qualifications: Fidelity And Zeal.

The Perpetual Obstacle To Human Advancement Is Custom.

He Who Knows Only His Own Side Of The Case (argument) Knows Little Of That. His Reasons May Be Good, And No One May Have Been Able To Refute Them. But If He Is Equally Unable To Refute The Reasons On The Opposite Side, If He Does Not So Much As Know What They Are, He Has No Ground For Preferring Either Opinion

A Democratic Constitution, Not Supported By Democratic Institutions In Detail, But Confined To The Central Government, Not Only Is Not Political Freedom, But Often Creates A Spirit Precisely The Reverse, Carrying Down To The Lowest Grade In Society The Desire And Ambition Of Political Domination.

The Guesses Which Serve To Give Mental Unity And Wholeness To A Chaos Of Scattered Particulars, Are Accidents Which Rarely Occur To Any Minds But Those Abounding In Knowledge And Disciplined In Intellectual Combinations.

Was There Ever Any Domination That Did Not Appear Natural To Those Who Possessed It?

Ask Yourself Whether You Are Happy And You Cease To Be So. The Only Chance Is To Treat Not Happiness, But Some End External To It, As The Purpose Of Life.

In Proportion To The Development Of His Individuality, Each Person Becomes More Valuable To Himself, And Is Therefore Capable Of Being More Valuable To Others. . . .

I Well Knew That To Propose Something Which Would Be Called Extreme, Was The True Way Not To Impede But To Facilitate A More Moderate Experiment.

As For Charity, It Is A Matter In Which The Immediate Effect On The Persons Directly Concerned, And The Ultimate Consequence To The General Good, Are Apt To Be At Complete War With One Another.

‎a General State Education Is A Mere Contrivance For Moulding People To Be Exactly Like One Another; And As The Mould In Which It Casts Them Is That Which Pleases The Dominant Power In The Government, Whether This Be A Monarch, An Aristocracy, Or A Majority Of The Existing Generation; In Proportion As It Is Efficient And Successful, It Establishes A Despotism Over The Mind, Leading By A Natural Tendency To One Over The Body.

To Say That Secular Means Irreligious Implies That All The Arts And Sciences Are Irreligious, And Is Very Like Saying That All Professions Except That Of The Law Are Illegal.

The Majority, Being Satisfied With The Ways Of Mankind As They Now Are (for It Is They Who Make Them What They Are), Cannot Comprehend Why Those Ways Should Not Be Good Enough For Everybody; And What Is More, Spontaneity Forms No Part Of The Ideal Of The Majority Of Moral And Social Reformers, But Is Rather Looked On With Jealousy, As A Troublesome And Perhaps Rebellious Obstruction To The General Acceptance Of What These Reformers, In Their Own Judgment, Think Would Be Best For Mankind.

The Liberty Of The Individual Must Be Thus Far Limited; He Must Not Make Himself A Nuisance To Other People.

Co-operation, Like Other Difficult Things, Can Be Learned Only By Practice: And To Be Capable Of It In Great Things, A People Must Be Gradually Trained To It In Small. Now The Whole Course Of Advancing Civilization Is A Series Of Such Training.

When The Land Is Cultivated Entirely By The Spade And No Horses Are Kept, A Cow Is Kept For Every Three Acres Of Land.

There Is The Greatest Difference Between Presuming An Opinion To Be True, Because, With Every Opportunity For Contesting It, It Has Not Been Refuted, And Assuming Its Truth For The Purpose Of Not Permitting Its Refutation.

Truth Gains More Even By The Errors Of One Who, With Due Study And Preparation, Thinks For Himself, Than By The True Opinions Of Those Who Only Hold Them Because They Do Not Suffer Themselves To Think.

No Longer Enslaved Or Made Dependent By Force Of Law, The Great Majority Are So By Force Of Property; They Are Still Chained To A Place, To An Occupation, And To Conformity With The Will Of An Employer, And Debarred By The Accident Of Birth To Both The Enjoyments, And From The Mental And Moral Advantages, Which Others Inherit Without Exertion And Independently Of Desert. That This Is An Evil Equal To Almost Any Of Those Against Which Mankind Have Hitherto Struggles, The Poor Are Not Wrong In Believing.

When The People Are Too Much Attached To Savage Independence, To Be Tolerant Of The Amount Of Power To Which It Is For Their Good That They Should Be Subject, The State Of Society Is Not Yet Ripe For Representative Government.

The United States Is No More A Christian Nation Because Most Of Its Citizens Are Christians Than It Is A 'white' Nation Because Most Of Its Citizens Are White. We Are Americans Because We Practice Democracy And Believe In Republican Government, Not Because We Practice Revealed Religion And Believe In Bible-based Government.

A Party Of Order Or Stability, And A Party Of Progress Or Reform, Are Both Necessary Elements Of A Healthy State Of Political Life.

There Are Many Truths Of Which The Full Meaning Cannot Be Realized Until Personal Experience Has Brought It Home.

In Proportion To The Development Of His Individuality, Each Person Becomes More Valuable To Others. There Is A Greater Fullness Of Life About His Own Existence, And When There Is More Life In The Units There Is More In The Mass Which Is Composed Of Them.

Fullness Of Life

Induction Is A Process Of Inference; It Proceeds From The Known To The Unknown.

How Can Great Minds Be Produced In A Country Where The Test Of Great Minds Is Agreeing In The Opinion Of Small Minds?

The Only Way In Which A Human Being Can Make Some Approach To Knowing The Whole Of A Subject, Is By Hearing What Can Be Said About It By Persons Of Every Variety Of Opinion, And Studying All Modes In Which It Can Be Looked At By Every Character Of Mind. No Wise Man Ever Acquired His Wisdom In Any Mode But This; Nor Is It In The Nature Of Human Intellect To Become Wise In Any Other Manner.

The Individual Is Not Accountable To Society For His Actions In So Far As These Concern The Interests Of No Person But Himself.

There Is An Imaginary Circle Drawn Around Every Human Being, Over Which No Government Should Be Able To Step.

Photography Is A Brief Complicity Between Foresight And Luck.

Whatever Crushes Individuality Is Despotism.

There Is One Characteristic Of The Present Direction Of Public Opinion, Peculiarly Calculated To Make It Intolerant Of Any Marked Demonstration Of Individuality. The General Average Of Mankind Are Not Only Moderate In Intellect, But Also Moderate In Inclinations: They Have No Tastes Or Wishes Strong Enough To Incline Them To Do Anything Unusual, And They Consequently Do Not Understand Those Who Have, And Class All Such With The Wild And Intemperate Whom They Are Accustomed To Look Down Upon.

Political Economy, In Truth, Has Never Pretended To Give Advice To Mankind With No Lights But Its Own; Though People Who Knew Nothing But Political Economy (and Therefore Knew It Ill) Have Taken Upon Themselves To Advise, And Could Only Do So By Such Lights As They Had.

[i] Put The Question Directly To Myself: "suppose That All Your Objects In Life Were Realized; That All The Changes In Institutions And Opinions Which You Are Looking Forward To, Could Be Completely Effected At This Very Instant: Would This Be A Great Joy And Happiness To You?" And An Irrepressible Self-consciousness Distinctly Answered, "no!

What A Country Wants To Make It Richer Is Never Consumption, But Production. Where There Is The Latter, We May Be Sure That There Is No Want Of The Former. To Produce, Implies That The Producer De_sires To Consume; Why Else Should He Give Himself Useless Labor? He May Not Wish To Consume What He Himself Produces, But His Motive For Producing And Selling Is The Desire To Buy. Therefore, If The Producers Generally Produce And Sell More And More, They Certainly Also Buy More And More.

The Peculiar Evil Of Silencing The Expression Of An Opinion Is, That It Is Robbing The Human Race; Posterity As Well As The Existing Generation; Those Who Dissent From The Opinion, Still More Than Those Who Hold It. If The Opinion Is Right, They Are Deprived Of The Opportunity Of Exchanging Error For Truth: If Wrong, They Lose, What Is Almost As Great A Benefit, The Clearer Perception And Livelier Impression Of Truth, Produced By Its Collision With Error.

The Philosophy Of Reasoning, To Be Complete, Ought To Comprise The Theory Of Bad As Well As Of Good Reasoning.

This Is What Writers Mean When They Say That The Notion Of Cause Involves The Idea Of Necessity. If There Be Any Meaning Which Confessedly Belongs To The Term Necessity, It Is Unconditionalness. That Which Is Necessary, That Which Must Be, Means That Which Will Be, Whatever Supposition We May Make In Regard To All Other Things.

A People Among Whom There Is No Habit Of Spontaneous Action For A Collective Interest - Who Look Habitually To Their Government To Command Or Prompt Them In All Matters Of Joint Concern - Who Expect To Have Everything Done For Them, Except What Can Be Made An Affair Of Mere Habit And Routine - Have Their Faculties Only Half Developed; Their Education Is Defective In One Of Its Most Important Branches.

The Only Power Deserving The Name Is That Of Masses, And Of Governments While They Make Themselves The Organ Of The Tendencies And Instincts Of Masses.

To Do As One Would Be Done By, And To Love One's Neighbour As Oneself, Constitute The Ideal Perfection Of Utilitarian Morality

Belief, Thus, In The Supernatural, Great As Are The Services Which It Rendered In The Early Stages Of Human Development, Cannot Be Considered To Be Any Longer Required, Either For Enabling Us To Know What Is Right And Wrong In Social Morality, Or For Supplying Us With Motives To Do Right And To Abstain From Wrong.

Language Is The Light Of The Mind

Art Is The Employent Of The Powers Of Nature For An End.

All Desirable Things... Are Desirable Either For The Pleasure Inherent In Themselves, Or As A Means To The Promotion Of Pleasure And The Prevention Of Pain.

No Slave Is A Slave To The Same Lengths, And In So Full A Sense Of The Word, As A Wife Is.

It Might Be Plausibly Maintained, That In Almost Every One Of The Leading Controversies, Past Or Present, In Social Philosophy, Both Sides Were In The Right In What They Affirmed, Though Wrong In What They Denied.

A Stationary Condition Of Capital And Population Implies No Stationary State Of Human Improvement. There Could Be As Much Scope As Ever For All Kinds Of Mental Culture, And Moral And Social Progress.

A Profound Conviction Raises A Man Above The Feeling Of Ridicule.

There Is Never Any Fair And Thorough Discussion Of Heretical Opinions... The Greatest Harm Done Is To Those Who Are Not Heretics, And Whose Whole Mental Development Is Cramped And Their Reason Cowed, By The Fear Of Heresy.

The English, Of All Ranks And Classes, Are At Bottom, In All Their Feelings, Aristocrats. They Have Some Concept Of Liberty, And Set Some Value On It, But The Very Idea Of Equality Is Strange And Offensive To Them. They Do Not Dislike To Have Many People Above Them As Long As They Have Some Below Them.

The Dictum That Truth Always Triumphs Over Persecution Is One Of The Pleasant Falsehoods Which Men Repeat After One Another Till They Pass Into Commonplaces, But Which All Experience Refutes.

When One's Ideas Are Not Challenged, One's Ability To Defend Them Weakens.

I Will Call No Being Good Who Is Not What I Mean When I Apply That Epithet To My Fellow Creatures; And If Such A Creature Can Sentence Me To Hell For Not So Calling Him, To Hell I Will Go .

The Human Faculties Of Perception, Judgment, Discriminative Feeling, Mental Activity, And Even Moral Preference, Are Exercised Only In Making A Choice. He Who Does Anything Because It Is The Custom, Makes No Choice.

He Who Lets The World, Or His Own Portion Of It, Choose His Plan Of Life For Him, Has No Need Of Any Other Faculty Than The Ape-like One Of Imitation. He Who Chooses His Plan For Himself, Employs All His Faculties. He Must Use Observation To See, Reasoning And Judgment To Foresee, Activity To Gather Materials For Decision, Discrimination To Decide, And When He Has Decided, Firmness And Self-control To Hold To His Deliberate Decision.

The Disease Which Inflicts Bureaucracy And What They Usually Die From Is Routine.

Hardly Any Original Thoughts On Mental Or Social Subjects Ever Make Their Way Among Mankind Or Assume Their Proper Importance In The Minds Even Of Their Inventors, Until Aptly Selected Words Or Phrases Have As It Were Nailed Them Down And Held Them Fast.

Original Thought

Persons Of Genius, It Is True, Are, And Are Always Likely To Be, A Small Minority; But In Order To Have Them, It Is Necessary To Preserve The Soil In Which They Grow.

Both Teachers And Learners Go To Sleep At Their Post As Soon As There Is No Enemy In The Field.

Everything Must Be Free To Be Written And Published Without Restraint.

All Errors Which A Man Is Likely To Commit Against Advice Are Far Outweighed By The Evil Of Allowing Others To Constrain Him For His Good.

[a] Man And Still More The Woman, Who Can Be Accused Either Of Doing "what Nobody Does," Or Of Not Doing "what Everybody Does," Is The Subject Of As Much Depreciatory Remark As If He Or She Had Committed Some Grave Moral Delinquency.

Human Existence Is Girt Round With Mystery: The Narrow Region Of Our Experience Is A Small Island In The Midst Of A Boundless Sea. To Add To The Mystery, The Domain Of Our Earthly Existence Is Not Only An Island Of Infinite Space, But Also In Infinite Time. The Past And The Future Are Alike Shrouded From Us: We Neither Know The Origin Of Anything Which Is, Nor Its Final Destination.

One Person With A Belief Is Equal To Ninety-nine Who Have Only Interests.

Originality Is The One Thing Which Unoriginal Minds Cannot Feel The Use Of.

There Is A Tolerably General Agreement About What A University Is Not. It Is Not A Place Of Professional Education.

The Feeling Of A Direct Responsibility Of The Individual To God Is Almost Wholly A Creation Of Protestantism.

Christian Morality (so Called) Has All The Characters Of A Reaction; It Is, In Great Part, A Protest Against Paganism. Its Ideal Is Negative Rather Than Positive; Passive Rather Than Action; Innocence Rather Than Nobleness; Abstinence From Evil, Rather Than Energetic Pursuit Of Good: In Its Precepts (as Has Been Well Said) "thou Shalt Not" Predominates Unduly Over "thou Shalt.

In A Really Equal Democracy, Every Or Any Section Would Be Represented, Not Disproportionately, But Proportionately. ... Unless They Are, There Is Not Equal Government, But A Government Of Inequality And Privilege: One Part Of The People Rule Over The Rest: There Is A Part Whose Fair And Equal Share Of Influence In The Representation Is Withheld From Them, Contrary To All Just Government, But, Above All, Contrary To The Principle Of Democracy, Which Professes Equality As Its Very Root And Foundation.

Each Undervalues That Part Of The Materials Of Thought With Which He Is Not Familiar.

Liberty Lies In The Rights Of That Person Whose Views You Find Most Odious.

The Principle Itself Of Dogmatic Religion, Dogmatic Morality, Dogmatic Philosophy, Is What Requires To Be Booted Out; Not Any Particular Manifestation Of That Principle.

To Mistake Money For Wealth, Is The Same Sort Of Error As To Mistake The Highway Which May Be The Easiest Way Of Getting To Your House Or Lands, For The House And Lands Themselves.

The Sole Evidence It Is Possible To Produce That Anything Is Desirable, Is That People Do Actually Desire It.

And It Is Not Difficult To Show, By Abundant Instances, That To Extend The Bounds Of What May Be Called Moral Police, Until It Encroaches On The Most Unquestionably Legitimate Liberty Of The Individual, Is One Of The Most Universal Of All Human Propensities.

The Price Paid For Intellectual Pacification Is The Sacrifice Of The Entire Moral Courage Of The Human Mind.

I Have A Hundred Times Heard Him Say, That All Ages And Nations Have Represented Their Gods As Wicked, In A Constantly Increasing Progression; That Mankind Have Gone On Adding Trait After Trait Till They Reached The Most Perfect Conception Of Wickedness Which The Human Mind Could Devise, And Have Called This God, And Prostrated Themselves Before It.

There Is Always Need Of Persons Not Only To Discover New Truths, And Point Out When What Were Once Truths Are True No Longer, But Also To Commence New Practices, And Set The Example Of More Enlightened Conduct, And Better Taste And Sense In Human Life.

In This Age, The Mere Example Of Nonconformity, The Mere Refusal To Bend The Knee To Custom, Is Itself A Service.

... The Besetting Danger Is Not So Much Of Embracing Falsehood For Truth, As Of Mistaking A Part Of The Truth For The Whole.

...there Ought To Exist The Fullest Liberty Of Professing And Discussing, As A Matter Of Ethical Conviction, Any Doctrine, However Immoral It May Be Considered.

Landlords Grow Rich In Their Sleep Without Working, Risking Or Economizing. The Increase In The Value Of Land, Arising As It Does From The Efforts Of An Entire Community, Should Belong To The Community And Not To The Individual Who Might Hold Title.

It Is Questionable If All The Mechanical Inventions Yet Made Have Lightened The Day's Toil Of Any Human Being.

We Have A Right, Also, In Various Ways, To Act Upon Our Unfavorable Opinion Of Anyone, Not To The Oppression Of His Individuality, But In The Exercise Of Ours.

The Legal Subordination Of One Sex To Another - Is Wrong In Itself, And Now One Of The Chief Hindrances To Human Improvement; And That It Ought To Be Replaced By A System Of Perfect Equality, Admitting No Power And Privilege On The One Side, Nor Disability On The Other.

The Art Of Music Is Good, For The Reason, Among Others, That It Produces Pleasure; But What Proof Is It Possible To Give That Pleasure Is Good? If, Then, It Is Asserted That There Is A Comprehensive Formula, Including All Things Which Are In Themselves Good, And That Whatever Else Is Good, Is Not So As An End, But As A Mean, The Formula May Be Accepted Or Rejected, But Is Not A Subject Of What Is Commonly Understood By Proof.

Since The General Or Prevailing Opinion On Any Subject Is Rarely Or Never The Whole Truth, It Is Only By The Collision Of Adverse Opinion That The Remainder Of The Truth Has Any Chance Of Being Supplied.

Society Can And Does Execute Its Own Mandates: And If It Issues Wrong Mandates Instead Of Right, Or Any Mandates At All In Things With It Ought Not To Meddle, It Practices A Social Tyranny More Formidable Than Many Kinds Of Political Oppression, Since, Though Not Usually Upheld By Such Extreme Penalties, It Leaves Fewer Means Of Escape, Penetrating Much More Deeply Into The Details Of Life, And Enslaving The Soul Itself.

Details Of Life

All Action Is For The Sake Of Some End; And Rules Of Action, It Seems Natural To Suppose, Must Take Their Whole Character And Color From The End To Which They Are Subservient.

Few Human Creatures Would Consent To Be Changed Into Any Of The Lower Animals For A Promise Of The Fullest Allowance Of A Beast's Pleasures; No Intelligent Human Being Would Consent To Be A Fool, No Instructed Person Would Be An Ignoramus, No Person Of Feeling And Conscience Would Be Selfish And Base, Even Though They Should Be Persuaded That The Fool, The Dunce, Or The Rascal Is Better Satisfied With His Lot Than They Are With Theirs.

So True Is That Unnatural Generally Means Only Uncustomary, And That Everything Which Is Usual Appears Natural.

Even If The Received Opinion Be Not Only True, But The Whole Truth; Unless It Is Suffered To Be, And Actually Is, Vigorously And Earnestly Contested, It Will, By Most Of Those Who Receive It, Be Held In The Manner Of A Prejudice, With Little Comprehension Or Feeling Of Its Rational Grounds

Strong Impulses Are But Another Name For Energy. Energy May Be Turned To Bad Uses; But More Good May Always Be Made Of An Energetic Nature, Than Of An Indolent And Impassive One.

Persons Of Genius Are, Ex Vi Termini, More Individual Than Any Other People - Less Capable, Consequently, Of Fitting Themselves, Without Hurtful Compression, Into Any Of The Small Number Of Moulds Which Society Provides In Order To Save Its Members The Trouble Of Forming Their Character.

The Tendency Has Always Been Strong To Believe That Whatever Received A Name Must Be An Entity Or Being, Having An Independent Existence Of Its Own. And If No Real Entity Answering To The Name Could Be Found, Men Did Not For That Reason Suppose That None Existed, But Imagined That It Was Something Peculiarly Abstruse And Mysterious.

All Attempts By The State To Bias The Conclusions Of Its Citizens On Disputed Subjects, Are Evil.

To Refuse A Hearing To An Opinion, Because They Are Sure That It Is False, Is To Assume That Their Certainty Is The Same Thing As Absolute Certainty. All Silencing Of Discussion Is An Assumption Of Infallibility.

Despotism Is A Legitimate Mode Of Government In Dealing With Barbarians, Provided The End Be Their Improvement.

A Person May Cause Evil To Others Not Only By His Actions But By His Inaction, And In Either Case He Is Justly Accountable To Them For The Injury.

Every Great Movement Must Experience Three Stages: Ridicule, Discussion, Adoption.

Solitude In The Presence Of Natural Beauty And Grandeur Is The Cradle Of Thought And Aspirations Which Are Not Only Good For The Individual, But Which Society Can Ill Do Without.

The Moral Influence Of Woman Over Man Is Almost Always Salutary.

Unfortunately For The Good Sense Of Mankind, The Fact Of Their Fallibility Is Far From Carrying The Weight In Their Practical Judgement, Which Is Always Allowed To It In Theory; For While Every One Well Knows Himself To Be Fallible, Few Think It Necessary To Take Any Precautions Against Their Own Fallibility.

The Only Purpose For Which Power Can Be Rightfully Exercised Over Any Member Of A Civilized Community, Against His Will, Is To Prevent Harm To Others. His Own Good, Either Physical Or Moral, Is Not Sufficient Warrant.

Libertarian Party

There Is One Plain Rule Of Life. Try Thyself Unweariedly Till Thou Findest The Highest Thing Thou Art Capable Of Doing, Faculties And Outward Circumstances Being Both Duly Considered, And Then Do It.

Life Has A Certain Flavor For Those Who Have Fought And Risked All That The Sheltered And Protected Can Never Experience.

Miracles Have No Claim Whatever To The Character Of Historical Facts And Are Wholly Invalid As Evidence Of Any Revelation.

Truth Emerges From The Clash Of Adverse Ideas.

God Is A Word To Express, Not Our Ideas, But The Want Of Them.

Ask Yourself Whether You Are Happy, And You Cease To Be So.

All The Good Of Which Humanity Is Capable Is Comprised In Obedience.

A Person Should Be Free To Do As He Likes In His Own Concerns; But He Ought Not To Be Free To Do As He Likes In Acting For Another, Under The Pretext That The Affairs Of The Other Are His Own Affairs.

If It Were Only That People Have Diversities Of Taste, That Is Reason Enough For Not Attempting To Shape Them All After One Model. But Different Persons Also Require Different Conditions For Their Spiritual Development, And Can No More Exist Healthily In The Same Moral, Than All The Varieties Of Plants Can In The Same Physical, Atmosphere And Climate.

Whatever Helps To Shape The Human Being - To Make The Individual What He Is, Or Hinder Him From Being What He Is Not - Is Part Of His Education.

Every Established Fact Which Is Too Bad To Admit Of Any Other Defence Is Always Presented To Us As An Injunction Of Religion.

The Best State For Human Nature Is That In Which, While No One Is Poor, No One Desires To Be Richer, Nor Has Any Reason To Fear From Thrust Back, By The Efforts Of Others To Push Themselves Forward.

...to Bring A Child Into Existence Without A Fair Prospect Of Being Able, Not Only To Provide Food For Its Body, But Instruction And Training For Its Mind Is A Moral Crime, Both Against The Unfortunate Offspring And Against Society

All Political Revolutions, Not Affected By Foreign Conquest, Originate In Moral Revolutions. The Subversion Of Established Institutions Is Merely One Consequence Of The Previous Subversion Of Established Opinions.

Political Revolution

The Peculiarity Of The Evidence Of Mathematical Truths Is That All The Argument Is On One Side.

Among The Works Of Man, Which Human Life Is Rightly Employed In Perfecting, The First In Importance Surely Is Man Himself.

The Pupil Who Is Never Required To Do What He Cannot Do, Never Does What He Can Do.

A Being Who Can Create A Race Of Men Devoid Of Real Freedom And Inevitably Foredoomed To Be Sinners, And Then Punish Them For Being What He Has Made Them, May Be Omnipotent And Various Other Things, But He Is Not What The English Language Has Always Intended By The Adjective Holy.

The Moment One Asks Himself Whether He Is Happy, He Ceases To Be So.

So Long As We Do Not Harm Others We Should Be Free To Think, Speak, Act, & Live As We See Fit, Without Molestation From Individuals, Law, Or Gov't.

But Society Has Now Fairly Got The Better Of Individuality; And The Danger Which Threatens Human Nature Is Not The Excess, But The Deficiency, Of Personal Impulses And Preferences.

War Is An Ugly Thing, But Not The Ugliest Of Things: The Decayed And Degraded State Of Moral And Patriotic Feeling Which Thinks Nothing Worth A War, Is Worse. A War To Protect Other Human Beings Against Tyrannical Injustice; A War To Give Victory To Their Own Ideas Of Right And Good, And Which Is Their Own War, Carried On For An Honest Purpose By Their Own Free Choice - Is Often The Means Of Their Regeneration.

Of Two Pleasures, If There Be One Which All Or Almost All Who Have Experience Of Both Give A Decided Preference, Irrespective Of Any Feeling Of Moral Obligation To Prefer It, That Is The More Desirable Pleasure.

Political Economy As A Branch Of Science Is Extremely Modern; But The Subject With Which Its Enquiries Are Conversant Has In All Ages Necessarily Constituted One Of The Chief Practical Interests Of Mankind.

Seeming Contentment Is Real Discontent, Combined With Indolence Or Self-indulgence, Which, While Taking No Legitimate Means Of Raising Itself, Delights In Bringing Others Down To Its Own Level.

What Distinguishes The Majority Of Men From The Few Is Their Inability To Act According To Their Beliefs.

Whether Moral And Social Phenomena Are Really Exceptions To The General Certainty And Uniformity Of The Course Of Nature; And How Far The Methods, By Which So Many Of The Laws Of The Physical World Have Been Numbered Among Truths Irrevocably Acquired And Universally Assented To, Can Be Made Instrumental To The Gradual Formation Of A Similar Body Of Received Doctrine In Moral And Political Science.

The Demand For Commodities Is Not The Demand For Labor.

Men Are Men Before They Are Lawyers, Or Physicians, Or Merchants, Or Manufacturers; And If You Make Them Capable And Sensible Men, They Will Make Themselves Capable And Sensible Lawyers Or Physicians.

Experience Has Taught Me That Those Who Give Their Time To The Absorbing Claims Of What Is Called Society, Not Having Leisure To Keep Up A Large Acquaintance With The Organs Of Opinion, Remain Much More Ignorant Of The General State Either Of The Public Mind, Or Of The Active And Instructed Part Of It, Than A Recluse Who Reads The Newspapers Need Be.

A Population May Be Too Crowded, Though All Be Amply Supplied With Food And Raiment. It Is Not Good For A Man To Be Kept Perforce At All Times In The Presence Of His Species.

Christian Morality (so Called) Has All The Characters Of A Reaction.... In Its Horror Of Sensuality, It Made An Idol Of Asceticism, Which Has Been Gradually Compromised Away Into One Of Legality. It Holds Out The Hope Of Heaven And The Threat Of Hell, As The Appointed And Appropriate Motives To A Virtuous Life - In This Falling Far Below The Best Of The Ancients, And Doing What Lies In It To Give To Human Morality An Essentially Selfish Character.... It Is Essentially A Doctrine Of Passive Obedience; It Inculcates Submission To All Authorities Found Established.

The Laws And Conditions Of The Production Of Wealth Partake Of The Character Of Physical Truths. There Is Nothing Optional Or Arbitrary In Them ... It Is Not So With The Distribution Of Wealth. That Is A Matter Of Human Institution Solely. The Things Once There, Mankind, Individually Or Collectively, Can Do With Them As They Like.

Is There Any Moral Enormity Which Might Not Be Justified By Imitation Of Such A Deity?

The Test Of Real And Vigorous Thinking, The Thinking Which Ascertains Truths Instead Of Dreaming Dreams, Is Successful Application To Practice.

I Have Observed That Not The Man Who Hopes When Others Despair, But The Man Who Despairs When Others Hope, Is Admired By A Large Class Of Persons As A Sage.

The Amount Of Eccentricity In A Society Has Generally Been Proportional To The Amount Of Genius, Mental Vigor, And Moral Courage It Contained. That So Few Now Dare To Be Eccentric Marks The Chief Danger Of The Time.

A People May Prefer A Free Government, But If, From Indolence, Or Carelessness, Or Cowardice, Or Want Of Public Spirit, They Are Unequal To The Exertions Necessary For Preserving It. They Are More Or Less Unfit For Liberty; And Although It May Be For Their Good To Have Had It Even For A Short Time, They Are Unlikely Long To Enjoy It

Men Do Not Desire To Be Rich, But To Be Richer Than Other Men.

When A Thing Is Bought Not For Its Use But For Its Costliness, Cheapness Is No Recommendation. As Sismondi Remarks, The Consequence Of Cheapening Articles Of Vanity, Is Not That Less Is Expended On Such Things, But That The Buyers Substitute For The Cheapened Article Some Other Which Is More Costly, Or A More Elaborate Quality Of The Same Thing; And As The Inferior Quality Answered The Purpose Of Vanity Equally Well When It Was Equally Expensive, A Tax On The Article Is Really Paid By Nobody: It Is A Creation Of Public Revenue By Which Nobody Loses.

A People May Prefer A Free Government, But If By Momentary Discouragement Or Temporary Panic, Or A Fit Of Enthusiasm For An Individual, They Can Be Induced To Lay Their Liberties At The Feet Of Even A Great Man, Or Trust Him With Powers To Subvert Their Institutions, In All These Cases They Are Unfit For Liberty.

The Maxim Is, That Whatever Can Be Affirmed (or Denied) Of A Class, May Be Affirmed (or Denied) Of Everything Included In The Class. This Axiom, Supposed To Be The Basis Of The Syllogistic Theory, Is Termed By Logicians The Dictum De Omni Et Nullo.

That A Thing Is Peculiar; Is No Argument For Its Being Blamable; Since The Most Criminal Actions Are To A Being Like Man Not More Unnatural Than Most Of The Virtues.

We Can Never Be Sure That The Opinion We Are Endeavoring To Stifle Is A False Opinion; And If We Were Sure, Stifling It Would Be An Evil Still.

Those Only Are Happy (i Thought) Who Have Their Minds Fixed On Some Object Other Than Their Own Happiness.

Those Only Are Happy Who Have Their Minds Fixed On Some Object Other Than Their Own Happiness; On The Happiness Of Others, On The Improvement Of Mankind, Even On Some Art Or Pursuit, Followed Not As A Means, But As Itself An Ideal End. Aiming Thus At Something Else, They Find Happiness By The Way.

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Pedro Almodovar

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