Quotes About Power

Then, I said, no science or art considers or enjoins the interest of the stronger or superior, but only the interest of the subject and weaker?

Where there is great power to do wrong, to live and to die justly is a hard thing.

The wisest have the most authority

That the makers of laws are the majority who are weak; and they make laws and distribute praises and censures with a view to themselves and to their own interests.

Yet is not the power which injustice exercises of such a nature that wherever she takes up her abode, whether in a city, in an army, in a family, or in any other body, that body is, to begin with, rendered incapable of united action by reason of sedition and distraction; and does it not become its own enemy and at variance with all that opposes it, and with the just? Is not this the case? Yes

Virtue is the desire of things honorable and the power of attaining them.

The ruler who is good for anything ought not to beg his subjects to be ruled by him, although the present governors of mankind are of a different stamp.

The excess of liberty, whether in States or individuals, seems only to pass into excess of slavery.

Too much freedom seems to change into nothing but too much slavery, both for private man and city.

For men born and educated like our citizens, the only way, in my opinion, of arriving at a right conclusion about the possession and use of women and children is to follow the path on which we originally started, when we said that the men were to be the guardians and watchdogs of the herd. True.

For we cannot suppose that States are made of 'oak and rock,' and not out of the human natures which are in them, and which in a figure turn the scale and draw other things after them? Yes

And this is proved by the fact that when he obtains the power, he immediately becomes unjust as far as he can be.

What do you mean? he asked. Beginning with the State, I replied, would you say that a city which is governed by a tyrant is free or enslaved? No city, he said, can be more completely enslaved. And

the rulers make laws for their own interests. But

Es razonable, entonces, que la tiranía no se establezca a partir de otro régimen político que la democracia, y que sea a partir de la libertad extrema que surja la mayor y más salvaje esclavitud

I believe that oligarchy follows next in order. And what manner of government do you term oligarchy? A government resting on a valuation of property, in which the rich have power and the poor man is deprived of it. I

That in any city, and particularly in the city of Athens, it is easier to do men harm than to do them good;

They are always either the masters or servants and never the friends of anybody; the tyrant never tastes of true freedom or friendship.

a los dioses y nobles monarcas persuaden los dones

I believe that Periander or Perdiccas or Xerxes or Ismenias the Theban, or some other rich and mighty man, who had a great opinion of his own power, was the first to say that justice is 'doing good to your friends and harm to your enemies.

Cronos, then lord of the world, knew that no mortal nature could endure the temptations of power, and therefore he appointed demons or demi-gods, who are of a superior race, to have dominion over man, as man has dominion over the animals

Mas la verdad es, creo yo, lo siguiente: la ciu­dad en que estén menos ansiosos por ser gobernantes quienes hayan de serlo, ésa ha de ser forzosamente la que viva mejor y con menos disensiones que ninguna; y la que tenga otra clase de gobernantes, de modo distinto.

Do not expect justice where might is right.

might is still right, but the might is the weakness of the many combined against the strength of the few.