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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.

-John Stuart Mill

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If It Were Only

John Stuart Mill

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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.

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

If The Earth Must Lose That Great Portion Of Its Pleasantness Which It Owes To Things That The Unlimited Increase Of Wealth And Population Would Extirpate From It, For The Mere Purpose Of Enabling It To Support A Larger, But Not A Happier Or A Better Population, I Sincerely Hope, For The Sake Of Posterity, That They Will Be Content To Be Stationary, Long Before Necessity Compels Them To It.

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.

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.

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 Triumph Of The Confederacy... Would Be A Victory For The Powers Of Evil Which Would Give Courage To The Enemies Of Progress And Damp The Sprits Of Its Friends All Over The Civilized World... [the American Civil War] Is Destined To Be A Turning Point, For Good Or Evil, Of The Course Of Human Affairs.

Enemy Of Progress

Photography Is A Brief Complicity Between Foresight And Luck.

... All Ideas Need To Be Heard, Because Each Idea Contains One Aspect Of The Truth. By Examining That Aspect, We Add To Our Own Idea Of The Truth. Even Ideas That Have No Truth In Them Whatsoever Are Useful Because By Disproving Them, We Add Support To Our Own Ideas.

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.

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.

Complete Liberty Of Contradicting And Disproving Our Opinion, Is The Very Condition Which Justifies Us In Assuming Its Truth For Purposes Of Action.

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

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.

Actions Are Right In Proportion As They Tend To Promote Happiness; Wrong As They Tend To Produce The Reverse Of Happiness. By Happiness Is Intended Pleasure And The Absence Of Pain.

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.

... What Is Really Inspiriting And Ennobling In The Doctrine Of Freewill, Is The Conviction That We Have Real Power Over The Formation Of Our Own Character; That Our Will, By Influencing Some Of Our Circumstances, Can Modify Our Future Habits Or Capabilities Of Willing.

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

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

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. . . .

The Great Writers To Whom The World Owes What Religious Liberty It Possesses, Have Mostly Asserted Freedom Of Conscience As An Indefeasible Right, And Denied Absolutely That A Human Being Is Accountable To Others For His Religious Belief. Yet So Natural To Mankind Is Intolerance In Whatever They Really Care About, That Religious Freedom Has Hardly Anywhere Been Practically Realised, Except Where Religious Indifference, Which Dislikes To Have Its Peace Disturbed By Theological Quarrels, Has Added Its Weight To The Scale.

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.

Since The State Must Necessarily Provide Subsistence For The Criminal Poor While Undergoing Punishment, Not To Do The Same For The Poor Who Have Not Offended Is To Give A Premium On Crime.

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.

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.

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

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.

The Perpetual Obstacle To Human Advancement Is Custom.

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

What Citizens Of A Free Country Would Listen To Any Offers Of Good And Skillful Administration In Return For The Abdication Of Freedom?

Trade Is A Social Act.

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.

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

There Are No Means Of Finding What Either One Person Or Many Can Do, But By Trying - And No Means By Which Anyone Else Can Discover For Them What It Is For Their Happiness To Do Or Leave Undone

It Is Given To No Human Being To Stereotype A Set Of Truths, And Walk Safely By Their Guidance With His Mind's Eye Closed.

So Much Barbarism, However, Still Remains In The Transactions Of Most Civilized Nations, That Almost All Independent Countries Choose To Assert Their Nationality By Having, To Their Inconvenience And That Of Their Neighbors, A Peculiar Currency Of Their Own.

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

If Religious Belief Be Indeed So Necessary To Mankind, As We Are Continually Assured That It Is, There Is Great Reason To Lament, That The Intellectual Grounds Of It Should Require To Be Backed By Moral Bribery Or Subornation Of The Understanding.

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.

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

So Long As An Opinion Is Strongly Rooted In The Feelings, It Gains Rather Than Loses In Stability By Having A Preponderating Weight Of Argument Against It.

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

The Worth Of The State, In The Long Run, Is The Worth Of The Individuals Composing It.

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

Countries Of The World

The Cause, Then, Philosophically Speaking, Is The Sum Total Of The Conditions, Positive And Negative, Taken Together; The Whole Of The Contingencies Of Every Description, Which Being Realized, The Consequent Invariably Follows.

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.

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

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

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

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.

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

I Am Not Aware That Any Community Has A Right To Force Another To Be Civilized.

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.

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.

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.

In All The More Advanced Communities The Great Majority Of Things Are Worse Done By The Intervention Of Government Than The Individuals Most Interested In The Matter Would Do Them, Or Cause Them To Be Done, If Left To Themselves.

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

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.

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

As Long As Justice And Injustice Have Not Terminated Their Ever Renewing Fight For Ascendancy In The Affairs Of Mankind, Human Beings Must Be Willing, When Need Is, To Do Battle For The One Against The Other.

The Demand For Commodities Is Not The Demand For Labor.

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.

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

The Will Of The People, Moreover, Practically Means The Will Of The Most Numerous Or The Most Active Part Of The People; The Majority, Or Those Who Succeed In Making Themselves Accepted As The Majority; Type People, Consequently, May Desire To Oppress A Part Of Their Number; And Precautions Are As Much Needed Against This As Against Any Other Abuse Of Power.

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.

Any Society Which Is Not Improving Is Deteriorating, And The More So The Closer And More Familiar It Is. Even A Really Superior Man Almost Always Begins To Deteriorate When He Is Habitually King Of His Company.

All Acts Suppose Certain Dispositions, And Habits Of Mind And Heart, Which May Be In Themselves States Of Enjoyment Or Of Wretchedness, And Which Must Be Fruitful In Other Consequences Besides Those Particular Acts.

Such Are The Differences Among Human Beings In Their Sources Of Pleasure, Their Susceptibilities Of Pain, And The Operation On Them Of Different Physical And Moral Agencies, That Unless There Is A Corresponding Diversity In Their Modes Of Life, They Neither Obtain Their Fair Share Of Happiness, Nor Grow Up To The Mental, Moral, And Aesthetic Stature Of Which Their Nature Is Capable.

Landlords Grow Rich In Their Sleep Without Working, Risking Or Economising

Investing In Real Estate

The Industrial Economy Which Divides Society Absolutely Into Two Portions, The Payers Of Wages And The Receivers Of Them, The First Counted By Thousands And The Last By Millions, Is Neither Fit For, Nor Capable Of, Indefinite Duration: And The Possibility Of Changing This System For One Of Combination Without Dependence, And Unity Of Interest Instead Of Organized Hostility, Depends Altogether Upon The Future Developments Of The Partnership Principle.

Strange It Is That Men Should Admit The Validity Of The Arguments For Free Speech But Object To Their Being "pushed To An Extreme," Not Seeing That Unless The Reasons Are Good For An Extreme Case, They Are Not Good For Any Case.

Freedom Of Speech

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

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.

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.

No One Can Be A Great Thinker Who Does Not Recognize That As A Thinker It Is His First Duty To Follow His Intellect To Whatever Conclusions It May Lead.

Most Boys Or Youths Who Have Had Much Knowledge Drilled Into Them, Have Their Mental Capacities Not Strengthened, But Overlaid By It. They Are Crammed With Mere Facts, And With The Opinions And Phrases Of Other People, And These Are Accepted As A Substitute For The Power To Form Opinions Of Their Own. And Thus, The Sons Of Eminent Fathers, Who Have Spared No Pains In Their Education, So Often Grow Up Mere Parroters Of What They Have Learnt, Incapable Of Using Their Minds Except In The Furrows Traced For Them.

...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

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 Real Advantage Which Truth Has, Consists In This, That When An Opinion Is True, It May Be Extinguished Once, Twice, Or Many Times, But In The Course Of Ages There Will Generally Be Found Persons To Rediscover It

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.

The Ends Of Scientific Classification Are Best Answered, When The Objects Are Formed Into Groups Respecting Which A Greater Number Of General Propositions Can Be Made, And Those Propositions More Important, Than Could Be Made Respecting Any Other Groups Into Which The Same Things Could Be Distributed. ... A Classification Thus Formed Is Properly Scientific Or Philosophical, And Is Commonly Called A Natural, In Contradistinction To A Technical Or Artificial, Classification Or Arrangement.

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

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.

All That Makes Existence Valuable To Any One Depends On The Enforcement Of Restraints Upon The Actions Of Other People.

A Person Whose Desires And Impulses Are His Own - Are The Expression Of His Own Nature, As It Has Been Developed And Modified By His Own Culture - Is Said To Have A Character. One Whose Desires And Impulses Are Not His Own, Has No Character, No More Than A Steam-engine Has Character.

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.

[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!

In All Intellectual Debates, Both Sides Tend To Be Correct In What They Affirm, And Wrong In What They Deny.

It Would Not Be Easy Even For An Unbeliever, To Find A Better Translation Of The Rule Of Virtue From The Abstract Into The Concrete, Than To Endeavor So To Live That Christ Would Approve Our Life.

Although It Is Not True That All Conservatives Are Stupid People, It Is True That Most Stupid People Are Conservative.

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.

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.

Genius Can Only Breathe Freely In An Atmosphere Of Freedom.

If Opponents Of All Important Truths Do Not Exist, It Is Indispensable To Imagine Them And Supply Them With The Strongest Arguments Which The Most Skillful Devil's Advocate Can Conjure Up.

The Prevailing Tendency To Regard All The Marked Distinctions Of Human Character As Innate, And In The Main Indelible, And To Ignore The Irresistible Proofs That By Far The Greater Part Of Those Differences, Whether Between Individuals, Races, Or Sexes Are Such As Not Only Might But Naturally Would Be Produced By Differences In Circumstances, Is One Of The Chief Hinderances To The Rational Treatment Of Great Social Questions, And One Of The Greatest Stumbling Blocks To Human Improvement.

There Is Nothing Which An Untrained Mind Shows Itself More Hopelessly Incapable, Than In Drawing The Proper General Conclusions From Its Own Experience. And Even Trained Minds, When All Their Training Is On A Special Subject, And Does Not Extend To The General Principles Of Induction, Are Only Kept Right When There Are Ready Opportunities Of Verifying Their Inferences By Facts.

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

History Shows That Great Economic And Social Forces Flow Like A Tide Over Communities Only Half Conscious Of That Which Is Befalling Them. Wise Statesmen Foresee What Time Is Thus Bringing, And Try To Shape Institutions And Mold Men's Thoughts And Purposes In Accordance With The Change That Is Silently Coming On. The Unwise Are Those Who Bring Nothing Constructive To The Process, And Who Greatly Imperil The Future Of Mankind By Leaving Great Questions To Be Fought Out Between Ignorant Change On One Hand And Ignorant Opposition To Change On The Other.

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

Not Only The Grounds Of The Opinion Are Forgotten In The Absence Of Discussion, But Too Often The Meaning Of The Opinion Itself... Instead Of A Vivid Conception And A Living Belief, There Remain Only A Few Phrases Retained By Rote; Or, If Any Part, The Shell And Husk Only Of The Meaning Is Retained, The Finer Essence Being Lost.

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

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

Education Makes A Man A More Intelligent Shoemaker, If That Be His Occupation, But Not By Teaching Him How To Make Shoes; It Does So By The Mental Exercise It Gives, And The Habits It Impresses.

The Concessions Of The Privileged To The Unprivileged Are Seldom Brought About By Any Better Motive Than The Power Of The Unprivileged To Extort Them.

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.

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 .

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

It Must Be Granted That In Every Syllogism, Considered As An Argument To Prove The Conclusion, There Is A Petitio Principii. When We Say, All Men Are Mortal Socrates Is A Man Therefore Socrates Is Mortal; It Is Unanswerably Urged By The Adversaries Of The Syllogistic Theory, That The Proposition, Socrates Is Mortal.

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.

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

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

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.

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

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.

If The Universe Had A Beginning, Its Beginning, By The Very Condition Of The Cases, Was Supernatural; The Laws Of Nature Cannot Account For Their Own Origin.

Men Might As Well Be Imprisoned, As Excluded From The Means Of Earning Their Bread.

The General Tendency Of Things Throughout The World Is To Render Mediocrity The Ascendant Power Among Mankind.

The Reasons For Legal Intervention In Favour Of Children Apply Not Less Strongly To The Case Of Those Unfortunate Slaves And Victims Of The Most Brutal Part Of Mankind - The Lower Animals.

The Bad Workmen Who Form The Majority Of The Operatives In Many Branches Of Industry Are Decidedly Of Opinion That Bad Workmen Ought To Receive The Same Wages As Good.

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

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.

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.

Truth Emerges From The Clash Of Adverse Ideas.

Hitherto It Is Questionable If All The Mechanical Inventions Yet Made Have Lightened The Day's Toil Of Any Human Being. They Have Enabled A Greater Population To Live The Same Life Of Drudgery And Imprisonment, And An Increased Number Of Manufacturers And Others To Make Fortunes. They Have Increased The Comforts Of The Middle Classes. But They Have Not Yet Begun To Effect Those Great Changes In Human Destiny, Which It Is In Their Nature And In Their Futurity To Accomplish.

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.

The Principle Itself Of Dogmatic Religion, Dogmatic Morality, Dogmatic Philosophy, Is What Requires To Be Rooted Out; Not Any Particular Manifestation Of That Principle. The Very Corner-stone Of An Education Intended To Form Great Minds, Must Be The Recognition Of The Principle, That The Object Is To Call Forth The Greatest Possible Quantity Of Intellectual Power, And To Inspire The Intensest Love Of Truth.

The Most Cogent Reason For Restricting The Interference Of Government Is The Great Evil Of Adding Unnecessarily To Its Power.

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

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.

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.

There Is A Very Real Evil Consequent On Ascribing Supernatural Origin To The Received Maxilms Of Morality. That Origin Consecrates The Whole Of Them And Protects Them From Being Discussed Or Criticized.

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.

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.

...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.

My Father Never Permitted Anything Which I Learnt To Degenerate Into A Mere Exercise Of Memory. He Strove To Make The Understanding Not Only Go Along With Every Step Of The Teaching But...precede It.

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

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.

Human Beings Are No Longer Born To Their Place In Life...but Are Free To Employ Their Faculties And Such Favorable Chances As Offer, To Achieve The Lot Which May Appear To Them As Desirable.

Human Beings Are Not Like Sheep; And Even Sheep Are Not Undistinguishably Alike. A Man Cannot Get A Coat Or A Pair Oboots To Fit Him, Unless They Are Either Made To His Measure, Or He Has A Whole Warehouseful To Choose From: And Is It Easier To Fit Him With A Life Than With A Coat, Or Are Human Beings More Like One Another In Their Whole Physical And Spiritual Conformation Than In The Shape Of Their Feet? If It Were Only That People Have Diversities Of Taste, That Is Reason Enough For Not Attempting To Shape Them All After One Model.

Not The Violent Conflict Between Parts Of The Truth, But The Quiet Suppression Of Half Of It, Is The Formidable Evil; There Is Always Hope When People Are Forced To Listen To Both Sides; It Is When They Attend To Only One That Errors Harden Into Prejudices, And Truth Itself Ceases To Have The Effect Of Truth, By Being Exaggerated Into Falsehood.

So Natural To Mankind Is Intolerance ... That Religious Freedom Has Hardly Anywhere Been Practically Realized.

My Father Taught Me That The Question Who Made Me? Cannot Be Answered, Since It Immediately Suggests The Further Question, Who Made God?

It Is Historically True That A Large Proportion Of Infidels In All Ages Have Been Persons Of Distinguished Integrity And Honor.

The Strongest Of All Arguments Against The Interference Of The Public With Purely Personal Conduct, Is That When It Does Interfere, The Odds Are That It Interferes Wrongly, And In The Wrong Place.

If All Mankind Minus One Were Of One Opinion, Mankind Would Be No More Justified In Silencing That One Person Than He, If He Had The Power, Would Be Justified In Silencing Mankind.

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 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.

To Understand One Woman Is Not Necessarily To Understand Any Other Woman.

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

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

A Cultivated Mind Is One To Which The Fountains Of Knowledge Have Been Opened, And Which Has Been Taught, In Any Tolerable Degree, To Exercise Its Faculties.

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

The Great Creative Individual . . . Is Capable Of More Wisdom And Virtue Than Collective Man Ever Can Be.

The Study Of Science Teaches Young Men To Think, While Study Of The Classics Teaches Them To Express Thought.

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.

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.

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.

The Beliefs Which We Have Most Warrant For, Have No Safeguard To Rest On, But A Standing Invitation To The Whole World To Prove Them Unfounded.

It Appears, Then, To Be A Condition Of A Genuinely Scientific Hypothesis, That It Be Not Destined Always To Remain An Hypothesis, But Be Certain To Be Either Proved Or Disproved By.. .comparison With Observed Facts.

In This Age, The Mere Example Of Non-conformity, The Mere Refusal To Bend The Knee To Custom, Is Itself A Service. Precisely Because The Tyranny Of Opinion Is Such As To Make Eccentricity A Reproach, It Is Desirable, In Order To Break Through That Tyranny, That People Should Be Eccentric.

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.

Laws And Systems Of Polity Always Begin By Recognizing The Relations They Find Already Existing Between Individuals.

Marriage Is The Only Actual Bondage Known To Our Law. There Remain No Legal Slaves, Except The Mistress Of Every House.

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

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

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.

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.

Customs Are Made For Customary Circumstances, And Customary Characters.

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

There Should Be Perfect Freedom, Legal And Social, To Do The Action And Stand The Consequences. It Would Be A Great Misunderstanding Of This Doctrine To Suppose That It Is One Of Selfish Indifference, Which Pretends That Human Beings Have No Business With Each Other's Conduct In Life, And That They Should Not Concern Themselves About The Well-doing Or Well-being Of One Another, Unless Their Own Interest Is Involved.

The Doctrine Called Philosophical Necessity Is Simply This: That, Given The Motives Which Are Present To An Individual's Mind, And Given Likewise The Character And Disposition Of The Individual, The Manner In Which He Will Act Might Be Unerringly Inferred: That If We Knew The Person Thoroughly, And Knew All The Inducements Which Are Acting Upon Him, We Could Foretell His Conduct With As Much Certainty As We Can Predict Any Physical Event.

I Did Not Mean That Conservatives Are Generally Stupid; I Meant, That Stupid Persons Are Generally Conservative. I Believe That To Be So Obvious And Undeniable A Fact That I Hardly Think Any Hon. Gentleman Will Question It.

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.

The Principles Which Men Profess On Any Controverted Subject Are Usually A Very Incomplete Exponent Of The Opinions They Really Hold.

A Great Statesman Is He Who Knows When To Depart From Traditions, As Well As When To Adhere To Them.

Education Is One Of The Subjects Which Most Essentially Require To Be Considered By Various Minds, And From A Variety Of Points Of View. For, Of All Many-sided Subjects, It Is The One Which Has The Greatest Number Of Sides.

The Opening Of A Foreign Trade, By Making Them Acquainted With New Objects, Or Tempting Them By The Easier Acquisition Of Things Which They Had Not Previously Thought Attainable, Sometimes Works A Sort Of Industrial Revolution In A Country Whose Resources Were Previously Undeveloped For Want Of Energy And Ambition In The People: Inducing Those Who Were Satisfied With Scanty Comforts And Little Work, To Work Harder For The Gratification Of Their New Tastes, And Even To Save, And Accumulate Capital, For The Still More Complete Satisfaction Of Those Tastes At A Future Time.

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.

Stupidity Is Much The Same All The World Over

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.

Let Not Any One Pacify His Conscience By The Delusion That He Can Do No Harm If He Takes No Part, And Forms No Opinion. Bad Men Need Nothing More To Compass Their Ends, Than That Good Men Should Look On And Do Nothing.

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.

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

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.

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

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.

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

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.

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.

All Silencing Of Discussion Is An Assumption Of Infallibility.

Absolute Certainty

Whatever Crushes Individuality Is Despotism.

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.

He Who Cannot By His Labor Suffice For His Own Support Has No Claim To The Privilege Of Helping Himself To The Money Of Others. By Becoming Dependent On The Remaining Members Of The Community For Actual Subsistence, He Abdicates His Claim To Equal Rights For Them I Other Respects.

However Unwillingly A Person Who Has A Strong Opinion May Admit The Possibility That His Opinion May Be False, He Ought To Be Moved By The Consideration That, However True It May Be, If It Is Not Fully, Frequently, And Fearlessly Discussed, It Will Be Held As A Dead Dogma, Not A Living Truth.

A Government With All This Mass Of Favours To Give Or To Withhold, However Free In Name, Wields A Power Of Bribery Scarcely Surpassed By An Avowed Autocracy, Rendering It Master Of The Elections In Almost Any Circumstances But Those Of Rare And Extraordinary Public Excitement.

He Must Be Able To Hear Them [the Counter Arguments] From Persons Who Actually Believe Them; Who Defend Them In Earnest, And Do Their Very Utmost For Them. He Must Know Them In Their Most Plausible And Persuasive Form; He Must Feel The Whole Force Of The Difficulty Which The True View Of The Subject Has To Encounter And Dispose Of; Else He Will Never Really Possess Himself Of The Portion Of Truth Which Meets And Removes That Difficulty.

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