A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right.
Thomas PaineRead
Let a crown be placed thereon, by which the world may know, that so far as we approve of monarcy, that in America the law is King. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be King; and there ought to be no other.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote emphasizes the importance of law over individual rulers in a free society.
Thomas Paine argues that in a free country like America, the law should be the supreme authority, just as a king is in absolute monarchies. He suggests that the legitimacy of power comes from the law rather than any single individual, advocating for a system where the law is revered and upheld above all else.
Themes
LawKingMonarchyFreedomGovernment
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about democracy versus monarchy.
More from Thomas Paine
All quotes →That God cannot lie, is no advantage to your argument, because it is no proof that priests can not, or that the Bible does not.
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I consider the war of America against Britain as the country's war, the public's war, or the war of the people in their own behalf, for the security of their natural rights, and the protection of their own property.
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Had the news of salvation by Jesus Christ been inscribed on the face of the sun and the moon, in characters that all nations would have understood, the whole earth had known it in twenty-four hours, and all nations would have believed it; whereas, though it is now almost two thousand years since, as they tell us, Christ came upon earth, not a twentieth part of the people of the earth know anything of it, and among those who do, the wiser part do not believe it.
Thomas PaineRead
The end of all political associations is the preservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man; and these rights are liberty, property, security, and resistance of oppression.
Thomas PaineRead
To reason with goverments, as they have existed for ages, is to argue with brutes. It is only from the nations themselves that reforms can be expected
Thomas PaineRead
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