The best servants of the people, like the best valets, must whisper unpleasant truths in the master's ear. It is the court fool, not the foolish courtier, whom the king can least afford to lose.

The mass of the reading public is not interested in learning and assimilating the results of accurate investigation.

A man who has humility will have acquired in the last reaches of his beliefs the saving doubt of his own certainty.

Genius sees the dynamic purpose first, find reasons afterward.

In government offices which are sensitive to the vehemence and passion of mass sentiment public men have no sure tenure. They are in effect perpetual office seekers, always on trial for their political lives, always required to court their restless constituents.

The private citizen, beset by partisan appeals for the loan of his Public Opinion, will soon see, perhaps, that these appeals are not a compliment to his intelligence, but an imposition on his good nature and an insult to his sense of evidence.

The first principle of a civilized state is that power is legitimate only when it is under contract.