Quotes

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Great hair.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

He that thinks himself the happiest man really is so.  He that thinks himself the wisest is generally the greatest fool.

We hate some persons because we do not know them; and will not know them because we hate them.

There are truths some men despise because they have not examined, and which they will not examine because they despise.

Money is the most envied, but the least enjoyed. Health is the most enjoyed, but the least envied.

He that has energy enough in his constitution to root out a vice, should go a little farther, and try to plant in a virtue in its place. 

It is astonishing how much more anxious people are to lengthen life than to improve it.

The present time has one advantage over every other - it is our own.

Men will wrangle for religion; write for it; fight for it; die for it; anything but live for it.

War is a game, in which princes seldom win, the people never.

We ask advice, but we mean approbation. (praise)

Our wealth is often a snare to ourselves, and always a temptation to others.

Many speak the truth when they say that they despise riches, but they mean the riches possessed by others.

For one man who sincerely pities our misfortunes, there are a thousand who sincerely hate our success.

Our incomes are like our shoes, if to small, they will gall and pinch us, but, if too large, they will cause us to stumble, and to trip.

Those who have earned a fortune are usually more careful of it than those who have inherited one.

What we lend, we shall most probably lose.

It is always safe to learn, even from our enemies; seldom safe to venture to instruct, even our friends.

He who studies books alone will know how things ought to be, and he who studies men will know how they are.

We owe almost all our knowledge not to those who have agreed but to those who have differed.

Knowledge is twofold and consists not only in an affirmation of what is true, but in the negation of what is false.

To know a man, observe how he wins his object, rather than how he loses it; for, when we fail, our pride supports us, when we succeed, it betrays us.

In life we shall find many men that are great, and some that are good, but very few men that are both great and good.

He that is good will infallibly become better, and he that is bad, will as certainly become worse; for vice, virtue and time are three things that never stand still.

A youth without fire is followed by an old age without experience.

Liberty will not descend to a people, a people must raise themselves to liberty; it is a blessing that must be earned before it can be enjoyed.

The most important political office is that of the private citizen.

Publicity is justly commended as a remedy for social and industrial diseases. Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants; electric light the most efficient policeman.

Those who won our independence... valued liberty as an end and as a means. They believed liberty to be the secret of happiness and courage to be the secret of liberty.

The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in the insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding.

Experience teaches us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government's purposes are beneficent.

To declare that in the administration of criminal law the end justifies the means to declare that the Government may commit crimes in order to secure conviction of a private criminal would bring terrible retribution.

If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.

Our government... teaches the whole people by its example. If the government becomes the lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy.

If you would only recognize that life is hard, things would be so much easier for you.

In the frank expression of conflicting opinions lies the greatest promise of wisdom in governmental action.

Neutrality is at times a graver sin than belligerence.

“Official truth is not actual truth.”

 “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

“Progress, the religion of those who have none.”

 “Political atheism: End justifies the means. This is still the most widespread of all the opinions inimical to liberty.”

“Divided, or rather multiplied, authorities are the foundation of good government.”

 “Bureaucracy is undoubtedly the weapon and sign of a despotic government, inasmuch as it gives whatever government it serves, despotic power.”

“Bureaucracy tries to establish so many administrative maxims that the minister is as narrowly controlled and guided as the judge.”

“It is bad to be oppressed by a minority, but it is worse to be oppressed by a majority.”

 “There should be a law to the People besides its own will.”

 “Democracy generally monopolizes and concentrates power.”

“Americans dreaded democracy and contrived their constitution against it.”

“For it is a most striking thing that the views of pure democracy...were almost entirely unrepresented in [the American] convention.”

 “The true natural check on absolute democracy is the federal system, which limits the central government by the powers reserved, and the state governments by the powers they have ceded.”

 “Limitation is essential to authority. A government is legitimate only if it is effectively limited.”

“Authority that does not exist for Liberty is not authority but force.”

“The will of the people cannot make just that which is unjust.”

 “A convinced man differs from a prejudiced man as an honest man from a liar.”

“By liberty I mean the assurance that every man shall be protected in doing what he believes is his duty against the influence of authority and majorities, custom and opinion.”

“It is easier to find people fit to govern themselves than people fit to govern others.”

 “The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern. Every class is unfit to govern.”