“Moral decay first hampers and then strangles honest government, regular commerce, and even the ability to take genuine pleasure in the goods of this world. Compulsion is applied from above as self-discipline relaxes below, and the last liberties expire under the weight of a unitary state.... Since religion has lost its empire over the souls of men, the most prominent boundary that divided good from evil is overthrown; kings and nations are guided by chance and none can say where are the natural limits of despotism and the bound of license.” MenWorldFirstsSoulSelfStatesGovernmentLastsEvilLostNationsNaturalChanceAbilityPleasureLibertyMoralHonestThis WorldKingsDisciplineLimitsWeightBoundsCorruptionBoundariesGenuineRelaxEmpiresGoodsDividedDecayCommerceSelf DisciplineLicenseCompulsionDespotismProminentHamperMoral DecayHonest Government Author:Russell Kirk
“Is it just or reasonable, that most voices against the main end of government should enslave the less number that would be free? more just it is, doubtless, if it come to force, that a less number compel a greater to retain, which can be no wrong to them, their liberty, than that a greater number, for the pleasure of their baseness, compel a less most injuriously to be their fellow-slaves. They who seek nothing but their own just liberty, have always right to win it and to keep it, whenever they have power, be the voices never so numerous that oppose it.” IfsShouldEndsGovernmentWould BeWinningForceVoicePleasureNumbersLibertyGreaterFellowsSlaveReasonableBaseness Author:John Milton
“There are countries in which public establishments are considered by the government as its own personal affair, so that it admits persons to them only according to its pleasure, just as a proprietor refuses at his pleasure admission into his house; they are a sort of administrative sanctuaries, into which no profane person can penetrate. These establishments, on the contrary, in the United States, are considered as belonging to all. The prisons are open to everyone who chooses to inspect them ad every visiter may inform himself of the order which regulates the interior.” MayPersonsCountryStatesGovernmentOrderHousePleasureUnitedUnited StatesPrisonAffairRefuseContraryBelongingAdsEstablishmentInteriorsPenetrateSanctuaryAdmissionProfaneAdministrative Author:Gustave de Beaumont
“I have received your letter of the 6th, with the eloquent discourse delivered at the consecration of the Jewish Synagogue. Having ever regarded the freedom of religious opinions and worship as equally belonging to every sect, and the secure enjoyment of it as the best human provision for bringing all either into the same way of thinking, or into that mutual charity which is the only substitute, I observe with pleasure the view you give of the spirit in which your sect partake of the blessings offered by our Government and laws.” ThinkingWayGivingHumansGovernmentLawSpiritReligiousPleasureViewsOpinionAtheismBlessingWorshipLettersCharityPositive AtheismSecureEnjoymentMutualBelongingSubstitutesDiscourseWay Of ThinkingProvisionEloquentSectsSynagogueConsecration Book:1816-1828 Source: 1816-1828
“Luxury, or a refinement on the pleasures and conveniences of life, had long been supposed the source of every corruption in government, and the immediate cause of faction, sedition, civil wars, and the total loss of liberty. It was, therefore, universally regarded as a vice, and was an object of declamation to all satyrists, and severe moralists.” LongWarGovernmentCausesLossPleasureLibertyObjectsSourceVicesCorruptionLuxuryCivil WarSevereConvenienceRefinementFactionsMoralistDeclamation Book:An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals Source: An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals
“A foreign minister, I will maintain it, can never be a good man of business if he is not an agreeable man of pleasure too. Half his business is done by the help of his pleasures: his views are carried on, and perhaps best, and most unsuspectedly, at balls, suppers, assemblies, and parties of pleasure; by intrigues with women, and connections insensibly formed with men, at those unguarded hours of amusement.” IfsMenDoneHelpingGovernmentHoursPleasureViewsPartyHalfConnectionsBallsMinistersGood ManIntrigueAmusementAssemblySupper Author:Lord Chesterfield
“[D]emocracy will soon degenerate into an anarchy, such an anarchy that every man will do what is right in his own eyes and no man's life or property or reputation or liberty will be secure, and every one of these will soon mould itself into a system of subordination of all the moral virtues and intellectual abilities, all the powers of wealth, beauty, wit and science, to the wanton pleasures, the capricious will, and the execrable cruelty of one or a very few.” MenGovernmentEyeWealthAbilityPleasureLibertyMoralVirtueDemocracyIntellectualPropertyWitEvery ManCrueltyReputationSecureAnarchyProperty RightsDegeneratesMouldWantonCapriciousSubordinationMoral Virtues Author:John Adams