One of the distinguishing characteristics of a democratic period is the taste that all men have for easy success and present enjoyment. This occurs in the pursuits of the intellect as well as in others.

Nature secretly avenges herself for the constraint imposed upon her by the laws of man.

I do not know if the people of the United States would vote for superior men if they ran for office, but there can be no doubt that such men do not run.

One of the happiest consequences of the absence of government...is the development of individual strength that inevitably follows.

The position of the Americans is quite exceptional, and it may be believed that no democratic people will ever be placed in a similar one.

How could a society escape destruction if, when political ties are relaxed, moral ties are not tightened, and what can be done with a people master of itself if it not subject to God?

I studied the Quran a great deal. I came away from that study with the conviction that by and large there have been few religions in the world as deadly to men as that of Muhammad. As far as I can see, it is the principal cause of the decadence so visible today in the Muslim world and, though less absurd than the polytheism of old, its social and political tendencies are in my opinion more to be feared, and I therefore regard it as a form of decadence rather than a form of progress in relation to paganism itself.