Quotes About Society

The class of citizens who provide at once their own food and their own raiment, may be viewed as the most truly independent and happy. They are more: they are the best basis of public liberty, and the strongest bulwark of public safety. It follows, that the greater the proportion of this class to the whole society, the more free, the more independent, and the more happy must be the society itself.

The danger of disturbing the public tranquillity by interesting too strongly the public passions, is a still more serious objection against a frequent reference of constitutional questions to the decision of the whole society.

Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise.... During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less, in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and servility in laity; in both, superstition, bigotry, and persecution.

It is *essential* to such a government, that it be derived from the great body of the society, not from an inconsiderable proportion, or a favored class of it; otherwise a handful of tyrannical nobles, exercising their oppressions by a delegation of their powers, might aspire to the rank of republicans, and claim for their government the honorable title of republic.

Justice is the end of government. It is the end of civil society. It ever has been and ever will be pursued until it be obtained, or until liberty be lost in the pursuit.

But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflection on human nature?

Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other.

What is government itself but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.

The aim of every political constitution is, or ought to be, first to obtain for rulers men who possess most wisdom to discern, and most virtue to pursue, the common good of the society; and in the next place, to take the most effectual precautions for keeping them virtuous whilst they continue to hold their public trust.

But what is government itself but the greatest of all reflections on human nature.

Without the Jesuits you wouldn't be enjoying your gin and tonic.

today we no longer value silence at all. Electronic gadgets—cell phones, laptops, and so on—have created a world of constant stimulation.

Evil comes in various forms, the one it comes most is the crowd of people.

The best form of government is that which is most likely to prevent the greatest sum of evil.

For a bounded, metaphysically veiled, and destined society, enemies are necessary, conflict inevitable, and war likely.

Just as infinite play cannot be contained within finite play, culture cannot be authentic if held within the boundaries of a society. Of course, it is often the strategy of a society to initiate and embrace a culture as exclusively its own. Culture so bounded may even be so lavishly subsidized and encouraged by society that it has the appearance of open-ended activity, but in fact it is designed to serve societal interests in every case-like the socialist realism of Soviet art.

Society and culture are therefore not true opponents of each other. Rather society is a species of culture that persists in contradicting itself, a freely organized attempt to conceal the freedom of the organizers and the organized, an attempt to forget that we have willfully forgotten our decision to enter this or that contest and to continue in it.

If we think of society as all that a people does under the veil of necessity, we must also think of it as a single finite game that includes any number of smaller games within its boundaries.

Some titles are inherited, though only when the bloodline or some other tangible connection with the original winner has been established, suggesting that the winners have continued to exist in their descendants. The heirs to titles are therefore obliged to display the appropriate emblems: a coat of arms or identifiable styles of speech, clothing, or behavior. It is a principal function of society to validate titles and to assure their perpetual recognition.

The power of citizens in a society is determined by their ranking in games that have been played. A society preserves its memory of past winners. Its record-keeping functions are crucial to societal order. Large bureaucracies grow out of the need to verify the numerous entitlements of the citizens of that society.

There is no effective pattern of entitlement in a society short of the free agreement of all opponents that the titles to property are in the hands of the actual winners.

Those who challenge the existing pattern of entitlements in a society do not consider the designated officers of enforcement powerful; they consider them opponents in a struggle that will determine by its outcome who is powerful. One does not win by power; one wins to be powerful.

Propertied persons typically have large estates and freedom of movement through the society. At the same time, the property of the rich has the effect of crowding and confining the less propertied. The very poor are typically restricted to narrow geographical limits and are regarded as aliens outside them.

If society is all that a people feels it must do, culture "is the realm of the variably free, not necessarily universal, of all that cannot lay claim to compulsive authority (Buckhardt).