Category: Thought

People speak of ‘the public interest.’ But what is the public interest? Strictly speaking, there is no such thing. There is only the interest of each individual human being. There are interests that many or all people share, but these are still the interests of individuals. When politicians say that something is ‘in the public interest,’ they usually mean it serves the interests of some people but goes against the interests of others — and usually the interests of the people with the most political pull win out.

Liberality consists less in giving profusely, than in giving judiciously.

Political correctness is the enemy of freedom because it rejects honesty and authenticity. We have to tackle it as the distortion of the truth.

Mario Vargas Llosa, Interview, El País, 27/02/2018.

The right to enjoy liberty is inalienable. To invade it is to usurp the prerogative of Jehovah. Every man has a right to his own body — to the products of his own labor — to the protection of law — and to the common advantages of society.

William Lloyd Garrison, “Declaration of Sentiments of the American Anti-Slavery Convention,” speech in Philadelphia (Dec. 6 1833).

A scoundrel will be a scoundrel, even with two university degrees.

I have not come here with reference to any flag but that of freedom. If your Union does not symbolize universal emancipation, it brings no Union for me. If your Constitution does not guarantee freedom for all, it is not a Constitution I can ascribe to. If your flag is stained by the blood of a brother held in bondage, I repudiate it in the name of God. I came here to witness the unfurling of a flag under which every human being is to be recognized as entitled to his freedom. Therefore, with a clear conscience, without any compromise of principles, I accepted the invitation of the Government of the United States to be present and witness the ceremonies that have taken place today. And now let me give the sentiment which has been, and ever will be, the governing passion of my soul: ‘Liberty for each, for all, and forever!’

William Lloyd Garrison, Speech in Charleston, South Carolina (April 14, 1865)

A man’s rights rest in three boxes. The ballot box, jury box and the cartridge box. Let no man be kept from the ballot box because of his color. Let no woman be kept from the ballot box because of her sex.

Frederick Douglass, Speech (November 15, 1867).

I should like to be able to love my country and still love justice.

Liberty, then, is the sovereignty of the individual, and never shall man know liberty until each and every individual is acknowledged to be the only legitimate sovereign of his or her person, time, and property, each living and acting at his own cost.

Equitable Commerce, 1848.

Judge not according to the orthodox standard of a system religious, philosophical, political, but according as things promote, or fail to promote the delicacy, integrity, and authority of Conscience. Put conscience above both system and success. History provides neither compensation for suffering nor penalties for wrong.

Postscript of letter to Mandell Creighton (April 5, 1887), published in Historical Essays and Studies, by John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton (1907), edited by John Neville Figgis and Reginald Vere Laurence, Appendix, p. 505.