Category: Thought

If one awakens in men the idea of freedom then the free men will incessantly go on to free themselves; if, on the contrary, one only educates them, then they will at all times accommodate themselves to circumstances in the most highly educated and elegant manner and degenerate into subservient cringing souls. What are our gifted and educated subjects for the most part? Scornful, smiling slave-owners and themselves slaves.

Max Stirner, “The False Principles of Our Education,” Rheinische Zeitung (1842)

A government of laws and not of men, is a definition of liberty; a government of men and not of laws, of despotism.

John Taylor of Caroline, as quoted in Walter E. Volkomer, ed., The Liberal Tradition in American Thought (G. P. Putnam Sons, 1969)

Today, every president is the target of criticism and mockery. It is inconceivable that even the most caustic critic would be imprisoned for his or her words.

Anthony Lewis, Freedom for the Thought That We Hate; A Biography of the First Amendment (New York: Basic Books, 2007)

Yes, the U.N. does some good things. But the assumption that, if the United Nations didn’t exist, those good things wouldn’t get done is ridiculous. It’s like saying that if government didn’t pick up your garbage, garbage would never get collected. Meanwhile, the U.N. does all manner of terrible things, that wouldn’t be done if it didn’t exist.

Jonah Goldberg, “The Goldberg File: The U. N. vs. Israel,” December 30, 2016 (National Review newsletter)

War is what happens when language fails.

Margaret Atwood, The Robber Bride (1993), Ch. 6

Purpose is what separates success from failure. Those with a guiding purpose, however small, can make a difference in the lives of others.

That is why I always suggest think locally and act locally. You can change the world, even if it is just your own. At the end of the day — or year — that is really all that matters.

Brion McClanahan, email newsletter for The Brion McClanahan Show, December 30, 2016

The old are not really smarter than the young, in terms of sheer brainpower. It is just that we have already made the kinds of mistakes that the young are about to make, and we have already suffered the consequences that the young are going to suffer if they disregard the record of the past.

Thomas Sowell, “Random Thoughts, Looking Back,” his final syndicated column upon retirement, National Review (December 27, 2016).

The humanoids protect people so well they won’t let them drive a car lest they have an accident or let a woman hold a needle lest she stab herself, . . . With the Patriot Act, people are trying to overprotect us by taking our freedoms away. I’d repeal it if I could.

Jack Williamson, author of The Humanoids (1948) and The Humanoid Touch (1980), science fiction novels in which humanity is overrun with “well-intentioned” robots.

The trouble is that we have a bad habit, encouraged by pedants and sophisticates, of considering happiness as something rather stupid. Only pain is intellectual, only evil interesting. This is the treason of the artist: a refusal to admit the banality of evil and the terrible boredom of pain. If you can’t lick ’em, join ’em. If it hurts, repeat it. But to praise despair is to condemn delight, to embrace violence is to lose hold of everything else.

Ursula K. Le Guin, “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas,” New Dimensions 3 (Robert Silverberg, ed.), p. 254

When I was growing up, we were taught the stories of people whose inventions and scientific discoveries had expanded the lives of millions of other people. Today, students are being taught to admire those who complain, denounce, and demand.

Thomas Sowell, “Random Thoughts, Looking Back,” his final syndicated column upon retirement, National Review (December 27, 2016).