“I wish my countrymen to consider, that whatever the human law may be, neither an individual nor a nation can ever commit the least act of injustice against the obscurest individual, without having to pay the penalty for it. A government which deliberately enacts injustice, and persists in it, will at length ever become the laughing-stock of the world.”
― Civil Disobedience and Other Essays
― Civil Disobedience and Other Essays
“Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resigns his conscience to the legislator? Why has every man a conscience then? I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward.”
― Civil Disobedience and Other Essays
― Civil Disobedience and Other Essays
“I am too high born to be propertied, To be a second at control, Or useful serving-man and instrument To any sovereign state throughout the world.”
― Civil Disobedience and Other Essays
― Civil Disobedience and Other Essays
“Unjust laws exist; shall we be content to obey them, or shall we endeavor to amend them, and obey them until we have succeeded, or shall we transgress them at once? Men generally, under such a government as this, think that they ought to wait until they have persuaded the majority to alter them. They think that, if they should resist, the remedy would be worse than the evil. But it is the fault of the government itself that the remedy is worse than the evil. It makes it worse. Why is it not more apt to anticipate and provide for reform? Why does it not cherish its wise minority? Why does it cry and resist before it is hurt? Why does it not encourage its citizens to be on the alert to point out its faults, and do better than it would have them?”
― Civil Disobedience and Other Essays
― Civil Disobedience and Other Essays
“The mass of men serve the state thus, not as men mainly, but as machines, with their bodies”
― Civil Disobedience and Other Essays
― Civil Disobedience and Other Essays
Halle’s 2023 Year in Books
Take a look at Halle’s Year in Books. The good, the bad, the long, the short—it’s all here.
More friends…
Polls voted on by Halle
Lists liked by Halle