A person should be free to do as he likes in his own concerns; but he ought not to be free to do as he likes in acting for another, under the pretext that the affairs of the other are his own affairs.

That a thing is unnatural ... is no argument for its being blamable; since the most criminal actions are, to a being like man, not more unnatural than most of the virtues.

Genius can only breathe freely in an atmosphere of freedom.

Human nature is not a machine to be built after a model, and set to do exactly the work prescribed for it, but a tree, which requires to grow and develop itself on all sides, according to the tendency of the inward forces which make it a living thing.

Eccentricity has always abounded when and where strength of character has abounded; and the amount of eccentricity in a society has generally been proportional to the amount of genius, mental vigor, and moral courage which it contained.

He who does anything because it is the custom, makes no choice.

Customs are made for customary circumstances, and customary characters.

The concessions of the privileged to the unprivileged are seldom brought about by any better motive than the power of the unprivileged to extort them.

It is questionable if all the mechanical inventions yet made have lightened the day’s toil of any human being.

Unquestionably, it is possible to do without happiness; it is done involuntarily by nineteen-twentieths of mankind.