Quote

It is with government as with medicine, its only business is the choice of evils. Every law is an evil, for every law is an infraction of liberty.

Jeremy Bentham

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Jeremy Bentham
Died: 1832
Died: June 6
Human Rights Activist
Jurist
Lawyer
Merchant
Philosopher
Political Scientist
Suffragist
Gamaliel Smith
Philip Beauchamp
Choice
Liberty
Choices
Law
Evil
Business
Infraction
Government
Evils
Every
Medicine

More quotes by Jeremy Bentham

Image
All punishment is mischief all punishment in itself is evil.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
As to the evil which results from censorship, it is impossible to measure it, because it is impossible to tell where it ends.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
Right... is the child of law.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
The age we live in is a busy age in which knowledge is rapidly advancing towards perfection.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
An absolute and unlimited right over any object of property would be the right to commit nearly every crime.If Ihad sucha right over thestick Iamaboutto cut, I might employ it as a mace to knock down the passengers, or I might convert it into a sceptre as an emblem of royalty, or into an idol to offend the national religion.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
The word independence is united to the accessory ideas of dignity and virtue. The word dependence is united to the ideas of inferiority and corruption.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
Among the several cloudy appellatives which have been commonly employed as cloaks for misgovernment, there is none more conspicuous in this atmosphere of illusion than the word Order.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
Create all the happiness you are able to create remove all the misery you are able to remove. Every day will allow you, --will invite you to add something to the pleasure of others, --or to diminish something of their pains.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
Reputation is the road to power
Jeremy Bentham
Image
Without publicity, no good is permanent under the auspices of publicity, no evil can continue.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
Stretching his hand up to reach the stars, too often man forgets the flowers at his feet.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
Lawsuits generally originate with the obstinate and the ignorant, but they do not end with them and that lawyer was right who left all his money to the support of an asylum for fools and lunatics, saying that from such he got it, and to such he would bequeath it.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
Lawyers sometimes tell the truth. They'll do anything to win a case.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
There is no pestilence in a state like a zeal for religion, independent of morality.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
Unkind language is sure to produce the fruits of unkindness--that is, suffering in the bosom of others.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
The said truth is that it is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
[I]n principle and in practice, in a right track and in a wrong one, the rarest of all human qualities is consistency.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
Pleasure is in itself a good nay, even setting aside immunity from pain, the only good.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
Every law is an infraction of liberty.
Jeremy Bentham
Image
The spirit of dogmatic theology poisons anything it touches.
Jeremy Bentham