"The great difficulty in the way of the progress of any reform is always not the 'difficulty of the thing itself,' but the difficulty of getting people to believe in the difficulty of the thing itself."

"The tendency of all changes of a progressive kind, is to give increased ascendancy to the comparatively uninstructed many."

"Even despotism does not produce its worst effects, so long as individuality exists under it; and whatever crushes individuality is despotism, by whatever name it may be called, and whether it professe…"

"In the case of any person whose conduct affects prejudicially the interests of others, there is no room for the argument that he should be allowed to do as he likes, because it is his own affair."

"War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things: the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war, is much worse."