The science of politics is the one science that is deposited by the streams of history, like the grains of gold in the sand of a river; and the knowledge of the past, the record of truths revealed by experience, is eminently practical, as an instrument of action and a power that goes to making the future.

There is not a soul who does not have to beg alms of another, either a smile, a handshake, or a fond eye.

I cannot accept your canon that we are to judge Pope and King unlike other men, with a favorable presumption that they do no wrong. If there is any presumption, it is the other way against holders of power...power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end.

Many things are better for silence than for speech: others are better for speech than for stationery.

Far from being the product of a democratic revolution and of an opposition to English institutions, the constitution of the United States was the result of a powerful reaction against democracy, and in favor of the traditions of the mother country.

Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority...