JAMES HARRINGTON

…to make a commonwealth is to divide it into parties, which setteth them at perpetual variance, the one party endeavouring to preserve their eminence and inequality, and the other to attain their equality.

The wisdom of the few may be the light of mankind, but the interest of the few is not the profit of mankind, nor of a commonwealth.

He that is for a government of laws is for the government of God. And he that is for a government of man is for government of a beast.

the main question seems to be how a commonwealth comes to be an empire of laws and not of men

Treason doth never prosper: what's the reason? Why, if it prosper, none dare call it treason.

…to hold that government may be founded upon community is to hold that there may be a black swan or a castle in the air.

… an empire of laws and not of men.

No man can be a politician, except he be first a historian or a traveller; for except he can see what must be, or what may be, he is no politician.

Dominion must naturally follow Property.

A whole army, though they can neither write nor read, are not afraid of a platform, which they know is but earth or stone; nor of a cannon, which, without a hand to give fire to it, is but cold iron; therefore a whole army is afraid of one man.

Vice: Whatever was passion in the contemplation of man, being brought forth by his will into action.

No man can be a politician, except he be first a historian or a traveller; for except he can see what must be, or what may be, he is no politician.

A whole army, though they can neither write nor read, are not afraid of a platform, which they know is but earth or stone; nor of a cannon, which, without a hand to give fire to it, is but cold iron; therefore a whole army is afraid of one man.

the main question seems to be how a commonwealth comes to be an empire of laws and not of men

A Popular Assembly without a Senate cannot be wise. A Senate without a Popular Assembly will not be honest.

The wisdom of the few may be the light of mankind, but the interest of the few is not the profit of mankind, nor of a commonwealth.

… an empire of laws and not of men.

No man can be a politician except he be first a historian.

Treason doth never prosper: what's the reason? Why, if it prosper, none dare call it treason.

The People cannot see, but they can feel. The People having felt the difference between a Government of Laws and a Government of Arms, will always desire the Government of Laws, and abhor that of arms.

…empire follows the balance of property, whether lodged in one, a few, or many hands.

Dominion must naturally follow Property.

…to hold that government may be founded upon community is to hold that there may be a black swan or a castle in the air.

…to make a commonwealth is to divide it into parties, which setteth them at perpetual variance, the one party endeavouring to preserve their eminence and inequality, and the other to attain their equality.

…he who goes about to introduce monarchy where the condition of the people is equal shall never bring it to pass, unless he cull out such of them as are the most turbulent and ambitious, and make them gentlemen or noblemen, not in name but in effect, that is by enriching them with lands, castles, and treasures, that may gain them power amongst the rest and bring in the rest unto dependence upon themselves, to the end that, they maintaining their ambition by the prince, the prince may maintain his power by them.

The balance of a commonwealth that is equal is of such nature that whatever falleth into her empire must fall equally.

He that is for a government of laws is for the government of God. And he that is for a government of man is for government of a beast.

… if one person owns the preponderance of land in a given territory, the result is monarchy; if a few own it, we have aristocracy; if the whole people be landlords, it is a commonwealth.

… all other [than Christianity] religions, with the public exercise of the same, be both tolerated and protected by the council of religion: and that all professors of any such religion be equally capability of all elections, magistracies, preferments and offices in the commonwealth.

The power that can invade the liberty of conscience can usurp civil liberty; and where there is a power that can usurp civil liberty, there is no commonwealth.

Every man, either to his terror or consolation, has some sense of religion.

And government (to define it de facto, or according to modern prudence) is an art whereby some man, or some few men, subject a city or a nation, and rule it according to his or their private interest; which, because the laws in such cases are made according to the interest of a man, or of some few families, may be said to be the empire of men, and not of laws.

A whole army, though they can neither write nor read, are not afraid of a platform... therefore a whole army is afraid of one man.