Posted on 11/14/2007 6:46:12 AM PST by Loud Mime
“It had been observed that a pure democracy if it were practicable would be the most perfect government. Experience had proved that no position is more false than this. The ancient democracies in which the people themselves deliberated never possessed one good feature of government. Their very character was tyranny; their figure deformity.”
Alexander Hamilton June 21, 1788
“The world is weary of statesmen whom democracy has degraded into politicians.”
British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli -1850
“The adoption of Democracy as a form of Government by all European nations is fatal to good Government, to liberty, to law and order, to respect for authority, and to religion, and must eventually produce a state of chaos from which a new world tyranny will arise.”
Duke of Northumberland 1931
“I have long been convinced that institutions purely democratic must, sooner or later, destroy liberty or civilization, or both.”
Thomas Babington Macaulay
“Democracy forever teases us with the contrast between its ideals and its realities, between its heroic possibilities and its sorry achievements.
Agnes Repplier
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”
C.S. Lewis
A good politician under democracy is quite as unthinkable as an honest burglar.
H.L. Mencken
Nothing...is unchangeable but the inherent and unalienable rights of man.
Thomas Jefferson (letter to John Cartwright, 1824)
Be in general virtuous, and you will be happy.
Benjamin Franklin (letter to John Alleyne, 9 August 1768)
And this one I cannot verify:
A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine.
A writer claimed it was Thomas Jefferson, but it's not in his style.
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”
Cry me a river if it ain’t so!!!
No, I hadn't; thanks for sharing.
Some people's hatred of President Bush has clouded their ability to think clearly. The most recent public example was Hillary answering a cogent question about illegal immigrants in her state having a driver's license. Her attempt to include blame on the President in her answer tripped her up and she hasn’t recovered to this day.
Actually, we have a “Representative Republic,” based on the “Constitution!”
I key on hatred. When I visited Dachau I sat in bewilderment; how could hatred allow such things? Now I see the liberals blaming everything on conservatives while saying Tim Russert should be shot. They’re on the same path...they just haven’t gone as far yet.
The politician who surfs the hatred while posing themselves as the person who can deliver the country from the “oppressors” is a dangerous character. Hillary isn’t out yet....there’s a long way to go.
One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. He said, "My son, the battle is between two "wolves" inside us all.
One is Evil. It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.
The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith."
The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather: "Which wolf wins?"
The old Cherokee simply replied, "The one you feed."
Bumped for posterity.
Wow, talk about a blast from the past!
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