The first principle of a civilized state is that power is legitimate only when it is under contract.
Walter LippmannThe ordinary politician has a very low estimate of human nature. In his daily life he comes into contact chiefly with persons who want to get something or to avoid something. Beyond this circle of seekers after privileges, individuals and organized minorities, he is aware of a large unorganized, indifferent mass of citizens who ask nothing in particular and rarely complain. The politician comes after a while to think that the art of politics is to satisfy the seekers after favors and to mollify the inchoate mass with noble sentiments and patriotic phrases.
Walter LippmannBetween ourselves and our real natures we interpose that wax figure of idealizations and selections which we call our character.
Walter LippmannThe whole speculation about morality is an effort to find a way of living which men who live it will instinctively feel is good.
Walter LippmannPoliticians tend to live "in character" and many a public figure has come to imitate the journalism that describes him.
Walter LippmannCulture is the name for what people are interested in, their thoughts, their models, the books they read and the speeches they hear, their table-talk, gossip, controversies, historical sense and scientific training, the values they appreciate, the quality of life they admire. All communities have a culture. It is the climate of their civilization.
Walter Lippmann