Quotes · Skopia

34 quotes

On Liberty · 1859

★ 7.9

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

A man who has nothing which he is willing to fight for...is a miserable creature, who has no chance of being free.

John Stuart Mill

1862

★ 7.0

Essay · Philosophical literature

Human existence is girt round with mystery: the narrow region of our experience is a small island in the midst of a boundless sea.

John Stuart Mill

The Utility of Religion · 1873

★ 6.2

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

We can never be sure that the opinion we are endeavoring to stifle is a false opinion; and if we were sure, stifling it would be an evil still.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 5.5

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

The fatal tendency of mankind to leave off thinking about a thing when it is no longer doubtful, is the cause of half their errors.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 5.5

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

An opinion that corn-dealers are starvers of the poor, or that private property is robbery, ought to be unmolested when simply circulated through the press, but may justly incur punishment when delivered orally to an excited mob assembled before the house of a corn-dealer.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 5.5

Essay · Philosophical writing

I will call no being good, who is not what I mean when I apply that epithet to my fellow-creatures; and if such a being can sentence me to hell for not so calling him, to hell I will go.

John Stuart Mill

Examination of Sir William Hamilton's Philosophy · 1865

★ 5.3

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

Whatever crushes individuality is despotism, by whatever name it may be called.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 4.7

Essay · Political literature

So true is it that unnatural generally means only uncustomary, and that everything which is usual appears natural. The subjection of women to men being a universal custom, any departure from it quite naturally appears unnatural.

John Stuart Mill

The Subjection of Women · 1869

★ 4.5

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

Liberty consists in doing what one desires.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 4.0

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

There is no such thing as absolute certainty, but there is assurance sufficient for the purposes of human life.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 3.9

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

The liberty of the individual must be thus far limited; he must not make himself a nuisance to other people.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 3.9

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

A party of order or stability, and a party of progress or reform, are both necessary elements of a healthy state of political life.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 3.9

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

Every one who receives the protection of society owes a return for the benefit.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 3.9

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

The individual is not accountable to society for his actions, in so far as these concern the interests of no person but himself.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 3.9

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 3.8

Essay · Political literature

The Conservatives…being by the law of their existence the stupidest party.

John Stuart Mill

Considerations on Representative Government · 1861

★ 3.7

The social state is at once so natural, so necessary, and so habitual to man, that...he never conceives himself otherwise than as a member of a body.

John Stuart Mill

Utiliarianism · 1861

★ 3.7

Speech

Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing.

John Stuart Mill

1867

★ 3.7

Essay · Political literature

Marriage is the only actual bondage known to our law. There remain no legal slaves, except the mistress of every house.

John Stuart Mill

The Subjection of Women · 1869

★ 3.7

Essay · Political literature

No slave is a slave to the same lengths, and in so full a sense of the word, as a wife is.

John Stuart Mill

The Subjection of Women · 1869

★ 3.7

Essay · Political literature

The true virtue of human beings is fitness to live together as equals; claiming nothing for themselves but what they as freely concede to everyone else; regarding command of any kind as an exceptional necessity, and in all cases a temporary one.

John Stuart Mill

The Subjection of Women · 1869

★ 3.6

Essay · Political literature

The principle which regulates the existing social relations between the two sexes—the legal subordination of one sex to the other—is wrong in itself, and now one of the chief hindrances to human improvement.

John Stuart Mill

The Subjection of Women · 1869

★ 3.6

Essay · Political literature

The moral regeneration of mankind will only really commence, when the most fundamental of the social relations is placed under the rule of equal justice, and when human beings learn to cultivate their strongest sympathy with an equal in rights and in cultivation.

John Stuart Mill

The Subjection of Women · 1869

★ 3.6

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 2.3

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

The only freedom which deserves the name, is that of pursuing our own good in our own way.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 2.2

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 2.1

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 2.1

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

It is a piece of idle sentimentality that truth, merely as truth, has any inherent power denied to error, of prevailing against the dungeon and the stake.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 2.1

Philosophical literature

It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.

John Stuart Mill

1861

★ 2.1

Essay · Political literature

The generality of the male sex cannot yet tolerate the idea of living with an equal.

John Stuart Mill

The Subjection of Women · 1869

★ 2.0

Economic literature · Political literature

No man made the land. It is the original inheritance of the whole species. Its appropriation is wholly a question of general expediency. When private property in land is not expedient, it is unjust.

John Stuart Mill

1848

★ 1.9

Essay · Political literature

What is now called the nature of women is an eminently artificial thing—the result of forced repression in some directions, unnatural stimulation in others.

John Stuart Mill

The Subjection of Women · 1869

★ 1.9

Essay · Philosophical literature · Political literature

A general State education is a mere contrivance for moulding people to be exactly like one another.

John Stuart Mill

On Liberty · 1859

★ 1.3

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