Actual aristocracy cannot be abolished by any law: all the law can do is decree how it is to be imparted and who is to acquire it.

Every great movement must experience three stages: ridicule, discussion, adoption.

I use emotion for the many and reserve reason for the few

In politics, nothing happens by accident. If it happens, you can bet it was planned that way.

Wise men say nothing in dangerous times.

When I am abroad, I always make it a rule never to criticize or attack the government of my own country. I make up for lost time when I come home.

I'm not interested in preserving the status quo; I want to overthrow it.

Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose.

The way to crush the bourgeoisie is to grind them between the millstones of taxation and inflation.

Law describes the way things would work if men were angels.

Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.

Either you repeat the same conventional doctrines everybody is saying, or else you say something true, and it will sound like it's from Neptune.

The things that will destroy America are prosperity at any price, peace at any price, safety first instead of duty first and love of soft living and the get-rich-quick theory of life.

A handful of soldiers is always better than a mouthful of arguments.

Appear weak when you are strong, and strong when you are weak.

When everything has to be right, something isn't.

Those who are too smart to engage in politics are punished by being governed by those who are dumber.

If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.

It is a mistake to look too far ahead. Only one link in the chain of destiny can be handled at a time.

Do not do to others what angers you if done to you by others.

We often give our enemies the means for our own destruction.