"Those who took the road to democracy to be the road to freedom mistook temporary means for an ultimate end."

Frederic William Maitland History See all quotes by Frederic William Maitland →

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“It was a court of politicians enforcing a policy, not a court of judges administering the law.”

“All Europe over, lawyers were being at once attracted and puzzled by the Roman doctrine of possession. ... Roman law compels us to hold that there are some occupiers who are not possessors. In an evil hour the English judges, who were controlling a new possessory action, which had been suggested by foreign models, adopted this theory at the expense of the termor. ... English law for six centuries and more will rue this youthful flirtation with Romanism.”

Resonant Thoughts

"Since the advent of modernism, artists have been seeking to loosen the entanglement of work and subject, because they saw themselves pushed into a role that they did not necessarily want to occupy: on…"

— Johannes Grenzfurthner

Entertainment1975

#freedom

"Since in this view dictatorships generate development while development leads to democracy, the best way to democracy was said to be a circuitous one. Yet common sense would indicate that in order to …"

— Adam Przeworski

Economics1940

#leadership

"The Constitution was made chiefly because of the demands of Commerce. Thus it was at the outset a merchant's machine, which the other interests of the country, the land and labor interests, even then …"

— Voltairine de Cleyre

essay1866–1912

#freedom

"Writing freezes speech and in so doing gives birth to the grammarian, the logician, the rhetorician, the historian, the scientist -- all those who must hold language before them so that they can see w…"

— Neil Postman

Literature1931–2003

#writing