“He would rather burst a city gate than find it open to admit him.”
Non tam portas intrare patentis
quam fregisse juvat.
Marcus Annaeus Lucanus book Pharsalia
Book II, line 443 (tr. J. D. Duff).
Pharsalia
"The God and His Man", Asimov's Science Fiction, 1980, Reprinted in Gene Wolfe, Endangered Species (1989), Reprinted in Gene Wolfe, The Best of Gene Wolfe (2009)
Fiction
“He would rather burst a city gate than find it open to admit him.”
Non tam portas intrare patentis
quam fregisse juvat.
Marcus Annaeus Lucanus book Pharsalia
Book II, line 443 (tr. J. D. Duff).
Pharsalia
Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)
1960s, A Time for Choosing (1964)
Herbert Spencer book Social Statics
Pt. III, Ch. 19 : The Right to Ignore the State, § 1 http://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/273#lf0331_label_200 <br class="br">Social Statics (1851) <br class="br">Context: As a corollary to the proposition that all institutions must be subordinated to the law of equal freedom, we cannot choose but admit the right of the citizen to adopt a condition of voluntary outlawry. If every man has freedom to do all that he wills, provided he infringes not the equal freedom of any other man, then he is free to drop connection with the state — to relinquish its protection, and to refuse paying towards its support. It is self-evident that in so behaving he in no way trenches upon the liberty of others; for his position is a passive one; and whilst passive he cannot become an aggressor. It is equally selfevident that he cannot be compelled to continue one of a political corporation, without a breach of the moral law, seeing that citizenship involves payment of taxes; and the taking away of a man’s property against his will, is an infringement of his rights. Government being simply an agent employed in common by a number of individuals to secure to them certain advantages, the very nature of the connection implies that it is for each to say whether he will employ such an agent or not. If any one of them determines to ignore this mutual-safety confederation, nothing can be said except that he loses all claim to its good offices, and exposes himself to the danger of maltreatment — a thing he is quite at liberty to do if he likes. He cannot be coerced into political combination without a breach of the law of equal freedom; he can withdraw from it without committing any such breach; and he has therefore a right so to withdraw.
“A city is a place that can offer maximum freedom. Otherwise it’s incomplete.”
Ai Weiwei (1957) Chinese concept artist
2010-, The City: Beijing, 2011
Jack Donovan (1974) American activist, editor and writer
"Mother May I" Masculinity
A Sky Without Eagles (2014)