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    Except in the sacred texts of democracy and in the incantations of orators, we hardly take the trouble to pretend that the rule of the majority is not at bottom a rule of force. What other virtue can there be in fifty-one percent except the brute fact that fifty-one is more than forty-nine? The rule of fifty-one per cent is a convenience, it is for certain matters a satisfactory political device, it is for others the lesser of two evils, and for others it is acceptable because we do not know any less troublesome method of obtaining a political decision. But it may easily become an absurd tyranny if we regard it worshipfully, as though it were more than a political device. We have lost all sense of its true meaning when we imagine that the opinion of fifty-one per cent is in some high fashion the true opinion of the whole hundred per cent, or indulge in the sophistry that the rule of a majority is based upon the ultimate equality of man.

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  15  /  19  

The fact is that up to now a free society has not been good for the intellectual. It has neither read more

The fact is that up to now a free society has not been good for the intellectual. It has neither accorded him a superior status to sustain his confidence nor made it easy for him to acquire an unquestioned sense of social usefulness. For he derives his sense of usefulness mainly from directing, instructing, and planning- from minding other people's business- and is bound to feel superfluous and neglected where people believe themselves competent to manage individual and communal affairs, and are impatient of supervision and regulation. A free society is as much a threat to the intellectual's sense of worth as an automated economy is to the workingman's sense of worth. Any social order that can function with a minimum of leadership will be anathema to the intellectual.

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  8  /  19  

The war for liberty never ends. One day liberty has to be defended against the power of wealth, on another read more

The war for liberty never ends. One day liberty has to be defended against the power of wealth, on another day against the intrigues of politicians, on another against the dead hand of bureaucrats, on another against the patrioter and the militarist, on another against the profiteer, and then against the hysteria and the passions of the mobs, against obscurantism and stupidity, against the criminal and against the overrighteous. In this campaign every civilized man is enlisted till he dies, and he only has known the full joy of living who somewhere and at some time has struck a decisive blow for the freedom of the human spirit.

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Where does virgin wool come from? The sheep that runs the fastest.

Where does virgin wool come from? The sheep that runs the fastest.

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I gave 'em a sword. And they stuck it in, and they twisted it with relish. And I guess if read more

I gave 'em a sword. And they stuck it in, and they twisted it with relish. And I guess if I had been in their position, I'd have done the same thing.

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  26  /  47  

Neither "property" nor the value of property is a physical thing. Property is a set of defined options...It is that read more

Neither "property" nor the value of property is a physical thing. Property is a set of defined options...It is that set of options which has economic value...It is the options, and not the physical things, which are the "property" - economically as well as legally...But because the public tends to think of property as tangible, physical things, this opens the way politically for government confiscation of property by forcibly taking away options while leaving the physical objects untouched.

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  15  /  17  

What you cannot enforce, do not command.

What you cannot enforce, do not command.

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Show me the country that has no strikes and I'll show you the country in which there is no liberty.

Show me the country that has no strikes and I'll show you the country in which there is no liberty.

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I have no trouble with my enemies. I can take care of my enemies all right. But my damn friends. read more

I have no trouble with my enemies. I can take care of my enemies all right. But my damn friends. They're the ones that keep me walking the floor nights!

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A liberal is a man or a woman or a child who looks forward to a better day, a more read more

A liberal is a man or a woman or a child who looks forward to a better day, a more tranquil night, and a bright, infinite future.

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