Tyranny

“ How, when misrule became organic, and seated tyranny unreasoning and obstinate, they have demonstrated to all the world, how trilling a thing is the tenure of tyrants, how resistless and invincible is the free spirit of a nation! ”

“ We are eloquent about oppression on a large scale,—we deprecate the tyranny of government, which, after all, extends but to few; and yet how little pity is bestowed upon those who suffer from that worst of tyranny in daily practice in daily life. ”

“ What form does the contest between tyranny and freedom take to-day? What is the special form of tyranny we now fight? How does it endanger the rights of the people, and what do we mean to do in order to make our contest against it effectual? ”

“ Between freemen and tyrants had spread thro' the world—
That then—oh! disgrace upon manhood—even then,
You should falter, should cling to your pitiful breath;
Cower down into beasts, when you might have stood men,
And prefer the slave's life of prostration to death.
It is strange, it is dreadful:—shout, Tyranny, shout
Thro' your dungeons and palaces, "Freedom is o'er;"—
If there lingers one spark of her light, tread it out,
And return to your empire of darkness once more. ”

“ SIR, I go on with my considerations upon liberty, to shew that all civil virtue and happiness, every moral excellency, all politeness, all good arts and sciences, are produced by liberty; and that all wickedness, baseness, and misery, are immediately and necessarily produced by tyranny; which being founded upon the destruction of every thing that is valuable, desirable, and noble, must subsist upon means suitable to its nature, and remain in everlasting enmity to all goodness and every human blessing. ”

“ But a tyrant shall, out of a wanton personal passion, carry fire and sword through a whole continent, and deliver up a hundred thousand of his fellow creatures to the slaughter in one day, without any remorse or further notice, than that they died for his glory. I say nothing of the moral effect of tyranny; though 'tis certain that ignorance, vice, poverty, and vileness, always attend it. ”

“ The consequence has been the birth of this bloody and scorching despotism,—this giant, armed from his mother’s womb with sweeping scimitar and consuming fire. Can such a government be fit for such a people? Can a tyranny, operating by direct violence and characteristic of the earliest periods in the most barbarous condition of mankind, have any quality adapted to the wants or feelings of a nation, grown old in arts, luxuries, and letters? ”

“ He that his right demands can ne'er rebel;
Which right, if 'tis by governors denied,
May be procured by force or foreign aid;
For tyranny's a nation's term of grief,
As folks cry fire to hasten in relief;
And when the hated word is heard about,
All men should come to help the people out. ”

“ The tyranny which calls itself authority, the personal revenge which hides under the name of punishment, and both used, cowardly, by the stronger against the weaker, were, to her keen sense of justice, so obnoxious, so detestable that they always roused in her a something, which is at the root of all the righteous rebellions in the world—a something which God, who ordained righteous authority, implants in every honest human heart as a safeguard against authority unrighteous and therefore authority no longer. ”

“ Do you wish to serve tyranny, privilege—in a word, the oppressors? Remember that you are sons of the people; that force alone dragged you from the bosom of your desolated families; that, slaves of a stern discipline, you are forced to shoot down the oppressed, to protect the oppressors ”

“ Kings spurn at limitations, laws, and rules, And rob mankind—because mankind are fools; Wheedled to act against their common sense, To jumble tyranny with providence; To hope from God what God expects from them, For what they ought to do, look up to Him; Leave unperform'd the duties which they know, And lift up hands they should employ below! Christians must no more miracles expect, The men that will be slaves, He'll not protect; God never will our base petitions hear, Till our endeavours supersede our prayer; Not always then; but nation's may be sure, The willing bondage ever shall endure. ”

“ It may be doubted, if any scene of the kind ever possessed more of the moral sublime, than that which our young countryman presented,—daring thus, amidst armed and frowning enemies, to denounce them and their masters, and to speak forth the startling truths of justice and freedom, with the naked sword of tyranny suspended over his head. ”

“ The tyranny of kings and nobles, the tyranny of the mass and the inquisition, the tyranny of battle and murder and crime—how was a man to live in those ages?
How is a man to live in this age? The tyranny of kings and of priests is gone, and from the tyranny of industrialism the individual can escape. ”

“ These principles will displease those, who have made it a rule with themselves, to transmit to their inferiors the tyranny they suffer from their superiors. I should have every thing to fear, if tyrants were to read my book; but tyrants never read. ”

“ The strain of tyranny sustained by force and craft for generations, the abuse of power and pleasure, the isolation and the dread in which the despots lived habitually, bred a kind of hereditary madness. ”

“ Several new tyrannies have sprung up, like so many new plagues, within the memory of man, and like them have laid waste, but with a more regular and continued ruin, countries once strong in liberty and people: And as tyranny, like every other full-grown mischief, becomes more and more insupportable every day, the condition of mankind under it must necessarily, and does actually, grow every day worse and worse, and they themselves fewer. ”

“ By our political theory, the people are supposed to be the patrons of the government, and not the government the patron of the people. A theoretical reversal of this principle, is a theoretical advance towards tyranny; and a practical reversal of it, either by an assumption of power by a government, to prescribe constitutional regulations to the people, or to use their property in donations to individuals or combinations, is in my view, both theoretical and actual tyranny. ”

“ To the eyes and ears of the temperate part of the public, and to the breasts of suffering thousands in the provinces, be the melancholy appeal, whether the present unnatural rebellion has not been made a foundation for the completest system of tyranny that ever God, in his displeasure, suffered for a time to be exercised over a froward and stubborn generation. ”

“ As it is natural to shake off a yoke that is rough, hard, and heavy, may it not happen that this people will make an effort to wrest themselves from our tyranny? Their murmurs and complaints must, sooner or later, lead to this. ”

“ Because a man does not approve of your mode of proceeding, are you right in destroying his property, and injuring him in every way you can? You speak of the tyranny of your rulers—is not this greater tyranny? ”

“ The accumulation of all powers, legislative and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny. ”

“ No more, America, in mournful strain Of wrongs, and grievance unredress’d complain, No longer shalt thou dread the iron chain, Which wanton Tyranny with lawless hand Had made, and with it meant t’ enslave the land. ”

“ But in a state habituated to a despotism, all is still and torpid. A dark and savage tyranny stifles every effort of genius; and the mind loses all its spirit and dignity.
Before I proceed to what I have farther in view, I will observe, that the account now given of the principles of public Liberty, and the nature of an equal and free government, shews what judgment we should form of that OMNIPOTENCE, which, it has been said, must belong to every government as such. ”

“ But if your spirit should revolt at this; if you have sense enough to discover, and spirit enough to oppose, tyranny under whatever garb it may assume; whether it be the plain coat of republicanism, or the splendid robe of royalty; if you have yet learned to discriminate between a people and a cause, between men and principles,—awake; attend to your situation, and redress yourselves. If the present moment be lost, every future effort is in vain ”

“ A tyrant or a cabal may oppress a nation for long years. Their word may be thought absolute, their power irresistible. Tyranny seems to paralyse the courage of resistance, like the fabled head of Medusa. Remove its fascination [Pg 123] of corruption, and men become men, and not machines, once more. ”

“ The tyranny growing out of this principle, initiated by violence and perpetuated by custom, became rooted in the peoples' mind, till at length they came to own an infant mewling in the cradle for their King, and to kiss the boot of the Pope. What consequences have not come out of these aberrations! Peoples have throttled each other. ”

“ But seriously, I have long apprehended the effects of that universal corruption, which has been improved with so much care, and has so fitted us for the tyranny designed, that we are grown I fear insensible of slavery, and almost unworthy of liberty. ”

“ Not the least in conspicuous display was an allegorical representation on a ear of the devil inciting Tyranny, crowned and dressed as a monarch, to acts of cruelty towards a group of cowering wretches in chains, whilst the angel of Liberty was be degrees releasing them from slavery, and the tyrant eventually becomes the prey of the Arch-Fiend. ”

“ Now, that a violent policy that I cannot altogether undertake to defend hath shorn the strength of tyranny, and that fair deceiver the late King—whom none could safely trust or utterly despise—is by that blow taken out of our path, we are free to set matters straight around us. ”

“ It is unimportant who first stood against the world of tyranny and demanded his right of independence, or who first felt indignation for the wrongs inflicted upon his race and pity for the victims of cruelty, and pleaded for more humanity towards man. ”

“ We have lived, and we yet live to be trampled upon, by the vilest, the most ignominious of all Tyranny, the Tyranny of Ministers, the Tyranny of Fellow Subjects, raised from the Dirt of Faction, supported by Senates, chosen and directed by Corruption. ”

“ In action, in desire, we must submit perpetually to the tyranny of outside forces; but in thought, in aspiration, we are free, free from our fellow-men, free from the petty planet on which our bodies impotently crawl, free even, while we live, from the tyranny of death. ”

“ Where-ever law ends, tyranny begins, if the law be transgressed to another’s harm; ”

“ Though the persecution of individuals, and actions of glaring oppression and injustice, soon excited discord in peaceable times, and under the government of a legitimate King, they were so congenial to the nature of tyranny, that people were more apt to rejoice in their own escape than to animadvert on the sufferings of their neighbours. ”

“ May those who govern her wide extended empire, so study the records of our former woes, and shape their political course with such single-hearted observance of the unerring laws of God, as to become, under his Providence, our preservers from danger; and may the governed, remembering the tyranny which originated from insubordination; the daring ambition of popular demagogues ”

“ There’s a sharp difference between such “common” law and the exceptional law that strikes at the personal liberty of a man, laws concerning morals, temperance, or that conscript unwilling men for war. In all law there is tyranny, in these laws tyranny shows its hand. ”

“ And more plainly I assert, that if the peers of the land whose duty it is principally to restrain and repress tyranny, either connive at it, or concur with it, and so abandon or betray their trust, then the common people may do it; at least are obliged to renounce, reject, and disown allegiance to the tyrant, without the peers. ”

“ By any of these forces may the tyranny be broken through. We have seen, in the conduct of our Countrymen, to what degree it tempts to weak actions,—and furnishes excuse for them, admitted by those who sit as judges. ”

“ And because the name of tyranny, signifieth nothing more, nor less, than the name of sovereignty, be it in one, or many men, saving that they that use the former word, are understood to be angry with them they call tyrants ”

“ Unlimited power is apt to corrupt the minds of those who possess it; and this I know, my Lords, that where law ends, tyranny begins! ”

“ The several species of government vie with each other in the absurdity of their constitutions, and the oppression which they make their subjects endure. Take them under what form you please, they are in effect but a despotism, and they fall, both in effect and appearance too, after a very short period, into that cruel and detestable species of tyranny: which I rather call it, because we have been educated under another form, than that this is of worse consequences to mankind. ”

“ For tyranny is a kind of monarchy which has in view the interest of the monarch only; oligarchy has in view the interest of the wealthy; democracy, of the needy: none of them the common good of all. ”

“ That, in those times and countries where they have been treated as worse than slaves, despised, insulted, and robbed on every occasion, they should have become, what they are often described as being, is not only not surprising, but is according to the laws which govern mankind. Tyranny and wrong, invariably make the people, who submit to them, grow mean, treacherous, and false. ”

“ Scripture says, that man was made lord of this sublunary world. But intoxicated with pride, the common effect of sovereignty, he erected himself, like little partial monarchs, into a tyrant. And as tyranny consists in supposing all made for the use of one, he took those freedoms with all, which are the consequence of such a principle. ”