Governments, whatever their pretensions otherwise, try to preserve themselves by holding the individual down ... Government itself, indeed, may be reasonably defined as a conspiracy against him. Its one permanent aim, whatever its form, is to hobble him sufficiently to maintain itself.
Interpretation
This quote critiques government's tendency to limit individual freedom to sustain its own power.
H. L. Mencken argues that governments inherently act to suppress individual liberties to protect their own existence. He suggests that all forms of government, regardless of their claims to promote freedom, ultimately conspire against the individual by imposing restrictions that ensure their continued authority and control.
In practice
In a political debate about individual rights and government control, this quote can be used to illustrate concerns over government overreach.
I know a good many men of great learning-that is, men born with an extraordinary eagerness and capacity to acquire knowledge. One and all, they tell me that they can't recall learning anything of any value in school. All that schoolmasters managed to accomplish with them was to test and determine the amount of knowledge that they had already acquired independently-and not infrequently the determination was made clumsily and inaccurately.
It takes a long while for a naturally trustful person to reconcile himself to the idea that after all God will not help him
It is the theory of all modern civilized governments that they protect and foster the liberty of the citizen; it is the practice of all of them to limit its exercise, and sometimes very narrowly.
The central belief of every moron is that he is the victim of a mysterious conspiracy against his common rights and true deserts.
The cure for the evils of democracy is more democracy.
It is my conviction that no normal man ever fell in love, within the ordinary meaning of the term, after the age of thirty.
OBLIVION, n. Cold storage for high hopes. A place where ambitious authors meet their works without pride and their betters without envy. A dormitory without an alarm clock.
The press is impotent when it abandons itself to falsehood.
To be with God is really to be involved in some enormous, overwhelming desire, and joy, and power which you cannot control, which controls you.
Imagination is not something apart and hermetic, not a way of leaving reality behind; it is a way of engaging reality.
The game is just one long conversation, and I'm anticipating that, and I will say things like 'Did you know that?' or 'You're probably wondering why.' I'm really just conversing rather than just doing play-by-play. I never thought of myself as having a style. I don't use key words. And the best thing I do? I shut up.
We are beginning to see that money, after all, is not the main thing. The real values cannot be bought and sold.
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