Politics deserves much praise. Politics is a preoccupation of free men, and its existence is a test of freedom. The praise of free men is worth having, for it is the only praise which is free from either servility or condescension.

The plain truth is that what holds a free state together is neither general will nor a common interest, but simply politics itself.

Politics are, as it were, the market place and the price mechanism of all social demands - though there is no guarantee that a just price will be struck; and there is nothing spontaneous about politics- it depends on deliberate and continuous activity.

The political process is not tied to any particular doctrine. Genuine political doctrines, rather, are the attempt to find particular and workable solutions to this perpetual and shifty problem of conciliation.

One of the symptoms of a declining social order is that its members have to give most of their time to politics, rather than to the real tasks of economic production, in an attempt to patch up the cracks already appearing from the 'inner contradictions' of such a system.

Democracy is perhaps the most promiscuous word in the world of public affairs.

Politics is a way of ruling in divided societies without undue violence...politics is not just a necessary evil; it is a realistic good.