
“Struggle of power is natural in human because with power their individuality prevails over others.”
"Humanity", Ch.IV, "Rule: Power and Order" Part I
No. 79
The Federalist Papers (1787–1788)
“Struggle of power is natural in human because with power their individuality prevails over others.”
"Humanity", Ch.IV, "Rule: Power and Order" Part I
Source: An Essay on The Principle of Population (First Edition 1798, unrevised), Chapter VII, paragraph 20, lines 2-4
No. 73
The Federalist Papers (1787–1788)
Context: There are men who could neither be distressed nor won into a sacrifice of their duty; but this stern virtue is the growth of few soils; and in the main it will be found that a power over a man's support is a power over his will. If it were necessary to confirm so plain a truth by facts, examples would not be wanting, even in this country, of the intimidation or seduction of the Executive by the terrors or allurements of the pecuniary arrangements of the legislative body.
Adolphe Quételet. 1981. Letters addressed to H.R.H. the Grand Duke of Saxe Coburg and Gotha, on the theory of probability. Arno Press, p. 132
Materialism and Empirio-Criticism (1908)
“An honest man can feel no pleasure in the exercise of power over his fellow citizens.”
“Mankind is so fallen that no man can be trusted with unchecked power over his fellows.”
Equality (1943)
Context: I don't deserve a share in governing a hen-roost, much less a nation. Nor do most people — all the people who believe advertisements, and think in catchwords and spread rumors. The real reason for democracy is just the reverse. Mankind is so fallen that no man can be trusted with unchecked power over his fellows. Aristotle said that some people were only fit to be slaves. I do not contradict him. But I reject slavery because I see no men fit to be masters.