Quotes About Theft

I was tired of losing things. No, not losing, having things taken from me. I couldn't handle any more of the universe's thievery. — Lyric

That which falls off a lorry belongs to he who follows the lorry.

The only book Knight didn't steal was the one he most often saw. 'I had no need for a Bible,' he said.

NEVER file an insurance claim for a stolen air conditioner, stolen tools, stolen supplies, stolen carpet, stolen pipes, stolen furnaces, vandalism, or stolen anything. Pay for this out of your pocket. You do not want to jeopardize your insurance record from these puny claims.

I've enjoyed an endless supply of free paper, paperclips, envelopes, and office supplies since joining The Office, because I steal props on a regular basis.

This peasant said; He who should rule by law commands theft, Who then will punish crime? The straightener of another's crookedness Supports another's crime.

Lo, [scribes] are slain, Their writings stolen, Woe is me for the grief of this time!

He who steals hooks is a thief. He who robs a nation is a nobleman.

The State obtains its revenue by coercion, by threatening dire penalties should the income not be forthcoming. That coercion is known as "taxation," although in less regularized epochs it was often known as "tribute." Taxation is theft, purely and simply even though it is theft on a grand and colossal scale which no acknowledged criminals could hope to match. It is a compulsory seizure of the property of the State's inhabitants, or subjects.

Albert Jay Nock wrote vividly that the State claims and exercises the monopoly of crime. . . . It forbids private murder, but itself organizes murder on a colossal scale. It punishes private theft, but itself lays unscrupulous hands on anything it wants, whether the property of citizen or of alien. Nock

While everyone else must pay their debts or go bankrupt, the banks are permitted to refuse redemption of their receipts, at the same time forcing their own debtors to pay when their loans fall due. The usual name for this is a "suspension of specie payments." A more accurate name would be "license for theft;" for what else can we call a governmental permission to continue in business without fulfilling one's contract?

Albert Jay Nock wrote vividly that the State claims and exercises the monopoly of crime. . . . It forbids private murder, but itself organizes murder on a colossal scale. It punishes private theft, but itself lays unscrupulous hands on anything it wants, whether the property of citizen or of alien.

Taxation is theft, purely and simply even though it is theft on a grand and colossal scale which no acknowledged criminals could hope to match. It is a compulsory seizure of the property of the State's inhabitants, or subjects.

A robber who justified his theft by saying that he really helped his victims, by his spending giving a boost to retail trade, would find few converts; but when this theory is clothed in Keynesian equations and impressive references to the "multiplier effect," it unfortunately carries more conviction.

And, indeed, what is the State anyway but organized banditry? What is taxation but theft on a gigantic, unchecked, scale? What is war but mass murder on a scale impossible by private police forces? What is conscription but mass enslavement? Can anyone envision a private police force getting away with a tiny fraction of what States get away with, and do habitually, year after year, century after century?

It would be an instructive exercise for the skeptical reader to try to frame a definition of taxation which does not also include theft. Like the robber, the State demands money at the equivalent of gunpoint; if the taxpayer refuses to pay, his assets are seized by force, and if he should resist such depredation, he will be arrested or shot if he should continue to resist.

Religiously speaking, interest is an act of theft.

suddenly shivered. "I should put the bracelet somewhere safe. Yesterday at the pier, a pickpocket tried to take my carryall." She walked

Punishments were severe, their harshness underscored by the fact that they were written in blood. At the very least, petty thieves were beaten with whips. Those convicted of stealing property...routinely lost an army or a leg. the most serious offenders were tied to a post, where, as it was stipulated, 'his body shall be taken as a target,' with arrows.

A robber who steals a knife and cuts himself cannot cry out against the woman who kept it sharp.

There is one kind of robber whom the law does not strike at, and who steals what is most precious to men: time.

Surely the President can agree with us, that theft from government is not good. I know it's bold. It's out on the edge. I know from a Chicago-Springfield background it's hard to fully grasp that honesty could be part of government.

As soon as politicians have learnt to buy political support from the 'public purse', and conditioned electorates to embrace looting and bribery, the democratic process reduces itself to the formation of (Mancur Olson's) 'distributional coalitions' – electoral majorities mortared together by common interest in a collectively advantageous pattern of theft.

La gloire ne peut apporter de joie à qui l'a volée: elle ne fait palpiter que les cœurs dignes d'elle.