"The
greater part of what my neighbors call good I believe in my soul to be bad, and
if I repent of anything, it is very likely to be my good behavior. What demon
possessed me that I behaved so well?"
Civil
Disobedience (excerpt)
by Henry David Thoreau - 1849
"...The
authority of government, even such as I am willing to submit to - for I will
cheerfully obey those who know and can do better than I, and in many things
even those who neither know nor can do so well - is still an impure one: to be
strictly just, it must have the sanction and consent of the governed. It can
have no pure right over my person and property but what I concede to it. The
progress from an absolute to a limited monarchy, from a limited monarchy to a
democracy, is a progress toward a true respect for the individual...There will
never be a really free and enlightened State until the State comes to recognize
the individual as a higher and independent power, from which all its own power
and authority are derived, and treats him accordingly..."