“This whole theory [of John Law and Jean Terrasson], as dear to French financial schemers in the eighteenth century as to American "Greenbackers" in the nineteenth, had resulted, under the Orleans Regency and Louis XV, in ruin to France financially and morally, had culminated in the utter destruction of all prosperity, the rooting out of great numbers of the most important industries, and the grinding down of the working people even to starvation.” PeopleImportantWholeLawNumbersCenturyTheoryIndustryDestructionFinancialDearProsperityRuinsFranceStarvation Author:Andrew Dickson White
“History affords us many instances of the ruin of states, by the prosecution of measures ill suited to the temper and genius of their people. The ordaining of laws in favor of one part of the nation, to the prejudice and oppression of another, is certainly the most erroneous and mistaken policy. ... These measures never fail to create great and violent jealousies and animosities between the people favored and the people oppressed; whence a total separation of affections, interests, political obligations, and all manner of connections, by which the whole state is weakened.” PeopleStatesWholeLawPoliticalNationsInterestFailingPolicyGeniusConnectionsPrejudiceIllAffectionFavorsSeparationViolentObligationOppressionInstanceRuinsTemperOppressedMistakenAnimosityProsecution Author:Benjamin Franklin
“Examining love is like examining a stocking: if you hold it up to the light and stretch it to search for snags, any snags there are may well run and ruin the stocking. In fact, if I may fashion Coudert's law from Heisenberg's principle of indeterminacy, it is this: Love is not only changed by observation; it is changed for the worse.” IfsWellsMayFactsLightRunningLawLove IsPrinciplesFashionChangedObservationRuinsExaminingLove Is LikeStockings Book:Advice from a Failure Source: Advice from a Failure
“In all well-attempered governments there is nothing which should be more jealously maintained than the spirit of obedience to law, more especially in small matters; for transgression creeps in unperceived and at last ruins the state, just as the constant recurrence of small expenses in time eats up a fortune.” ShouldWellsMatterStatesGovernmentLastsLawSpiritConstantFortuneRuinsObedienceExpensesCreepsTransgressionRecurrenceJealously Book:The Essential Aristotle Source: The Essential Aristotle