John Stuart Mill quotes

On action

“A person may cause evil to others not only by his actions but by his inaction.”

“It is not because men's desires are strong that they act ill; it is because their consciences are weak.”

“France has done more for even English history than England has.”

“The utilitarian doctrine is, that happiness is desirable, and the only thing desirable, as an end; all other things being only desirable as means to that end.”

“Since the state must necessarily provide subsistence for the criminal poor while undergoing punishment, not to do the same for the poor who have not offended is to give a premium on crime.”

On freedom

“Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign.”

“A bureaucracy always tends to become a pedantocracy.”

“Landlords... grow richer, as it were in their sleep, without working, risking, or economizing.”

On mind

“How can great minds be produced in a country where the test of a great mind is agreeing in the opinions of small minds?”

“The reasons for legal intervention in favour of children, apply not less strongly to the case of those unfortunate slaves and victims of the most brutal part of mankind, the lower animals.”

On presence

“It might be plausibly maintained, that in almost every one of the leading controversies, past or present, in social philosophy, both sides were in the right in what they affirmed, though wrong in what they denied.”

“Among a people without fellow-feeling, especially if they read and speak different languages, the united public opinion, necessary to the working of the representative government, cannot exist.”

On truth

“Truth gains more even by the errors of one who, with due study and preparation, thinks for himself, than by the true opinions of those who only hold them because they do not suffer themselves to think.”

“For my own part, not believing in universal selfishness, I have no difficulty in admitting that Communism would even now be practicable among the elite of mankind, and may become so among the rest.”

On contentment

“I have learned to seek my happiness by limiting my desires, rather than in attempting to satisfy them.”

On doubt

“I regard utility as the ultimate appeal on all ethical questions; but it must be utility in the largest sense, grounded on the permanent interests of man as a progressive being.”

On wholeness

“The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant.”

On faith

“Whatever crushes individuality is despotism, by whatever name it may be called, and whether it professes to be enforcing the will of God or the injunctions of men.”

On fear

“The best state for human nature is that in which, while no one is poor, no one desires to be richer, nor has any reason to fear being thrust back by the efforts of others to push themselves forward.”