Quotes Library

April 25, 2025

Government…is simply not the channel through which men’s noblest impulses are to be realized. Its task, on the contrary, is largely to see to it that the ignoble ones are kept under restraint and not permitted to go too far.

George Kennan (1904–2005), American diplomat, historian. Around the Cragged Hill (1993), Jay p.203

Did you come to elective office to do good, or to do well? Have you sacrificed the former in the interest of the latter? Do you think Kennan read The Federalist as a student?

If you want to pursue a noble human impulse, join the NGO of your choice. *non-government organization.


More Quotes

April 10, 2025
Ill can he rule the great that cannot reach the small.
January 16, 2025
[On Friedrich Hayek’s Road to Serfdom] A plan to resist all planning may be better than its opposite, but it belongs to the same style of politics.
November 12, 2025
Humming, Hawing and Hesitation are the three Graces of contemporary Parliamentary oratory.
Page 96 of 122