quotations about government
Good Government is like a fruitful Season in a temperate Soil.
PATRICK CUMING
sermon preached in the Old Church of Edinburgh, December 18, 1745
Let the people think they govern, and they will be govern'd.
WILLIAM PENN
Some Fruits of Solitude
Most traditional governments divide people, setting them against each other to weaken the society and make it governable.
BRIAN HERBERT & KEVIN J. ANDERSON
The Butlerian Jihad
The Government of Man should be the Monarchy of Reason; it is too often a Democracy of Passions, or an Anarchy of Humours.
BENJAMIN WHICHCOTE
Moral and Religious Aphorisms
When a country is well governed, poverty and a mean condition are something to be ashamed of. When a country is ill governed, riches and honors are something to be ashamed of.
CONFUCIUS
The Wisdom of Confucius
A ruler must learn to persuade and not to compel.
FRANK HERBERT
Dune
In all governments, there must of necessity be both the law and the sword; laws without arms would give us not liberty, but licentiousness; and arms without laws would produce not subjection, but slavery. The law, therefore, should be unto the sword, what the handle is to the hatchet; it should direct the stroke and temper the force.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON
Lacon
We assert the province of government to be to secure the people in the enjoyment of their unalienable rights. We throw to the winds the old dogma that governments can give rights.
SUSAN B. ANTHONY
during her trial for voting in the presidential election of Nov. 1872
All free governments are managed by the combined wisdom and folly of the people.
JAMES A. GARFIELD
letter to B. A. Hinsdale, April 21, 1880
Liars and panderers in government would have a much harder time of it if so many people didn't insist on their right to remain ignorant.
BILL MAHER
When You Ride Alone You Ride With Bin Laden
A great sacrifice of liberty must necessarily be made in every government; yet even the authority, which confines liberty, can never, and perhaps ought never, in any constitution, to become quite entire and uncontrollable.
DAVID HUME
"Of the Origin of Government", Essays, Moral, Political, and Literary
A nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves.
EDWARD R. MURROW
attributed, People Before Profit
A thousand years scarce serve to form a state;
An hour may lay it in the dust.
LORD BYRON
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
Man, born in a family, is compelled to maintain society from necessity, from natural inclination, and from habit. The same creature, in his further progress, is engaged to establish political society, in order to administer justice, without which there can be no peace among them, nor safety, nor mutual intercourse. We are, therefore, to look upon all the vast apparatus of our government, as having ultimately no other object or purpose but the distribution of justice.
DAVID HUME
"Of the Origin of Government", Essays, Moral, Political, and Literary
The great fish swallow up the small; and he who is most strenuous for the rights of the people, when vested with power, is as eager after the prerogatives of government.
ABIGAIL ADAMS
letter to John Adams, Nov. 27, 1775
A general government shall do all those things which pertain to it, and all the local governments shall do precisely as they please in respect to those matters which exclusively concern them.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
speech at Columbus, September 16, 1859
When government disappears, it's not as if paradise will take its place. When governments are gone, other interests will take their place.
LAWRENCE LESSIG
keynote address at the "One Planet, One Net" symposium, October 10, 1998
In all governments, there is a perpetual intestine struggle, open or secret, between Authority and Liberty, and neither of them can ever absolutely prevail in the contest.
DAVID HUME
"Of the Origin of Government", Essays, Moral, Political, and Literary
To form a new government requires infinite care and unbounded attention; for if the foundation is badly laid, the superstructure must be bad.
GEORGE WASHINGTON
letter to John Augustine Washington, May 31, 1776
Free government is self-government. A government of the people by the people. The best government of this sort is that which the people think best.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution