Civilization is a progress from an indefinite, incoherent homogeneity toward a definite, coherent heterogeneity.

The more numerous public instrumentalities become, the more is there generated in citizens the notion that everything is to be done for them, and nothing by them. Every generation is made less familiar with the attainment of desired ends by individual actions or private agencies; until, eventually, governmental agencies come to be thought of as the only available agencies.

If every man has freedom to do all that he wills, provided he infringes not the equal freedom of any other man, then he is free to drop connection with the state-to relinquish its protection, and to refuse paying toward its support.

The question of questions for the politicians should ever be-What type of social structure am I tending to produce? But this is a question he never entertains.

The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly, is to fill the world with fools.

The wise man must remember that while he is a descendant of the past, he is a parent of the future.

When men hire themselves out to shoot other men to order, asking nothing about the justice of their cause, I don't care if they are shot themselves.