Generalization Is Necessary To The Advancement Of

History, Is Made Up Of The Bad Actions Of Extraordinary Men And Woman. All The Most Noted Destroyers And Deceivers Of Our Species, All The Founders Of Arbitrary Governments And False Religions Have Been Extraordinary People; And Nine Tenths Of The Calamities That Have Befallen The Human Race Had No Other Origin Than The Union Of High Intelligence With Low Desires.

In Order That He Might Rob A Neighbour Whom He Had Promised To Defend, Black Men Fought On The Coast Of Coromandel And Red Men Scalped Each Other By The Great Lakes Of North America.

It Has Often Been Found That Profuse Expenditures, Heavy Taxation, Absurd Commercial Restrictions, Corrupt Tribunals, Disastrous Wars, Seditions, Persecutions, Conflagrations, Inundation, Have Not Been Able To Destroy Capital So Fast As The Exertions Of Private Citizens Have Been Able To Create It.

A Government Cannot Be Wrong In Punishing Fraud Or Force, But It Is Almost Certain To Be Wrong If, Abandoning Its Legitimate Function, It Tells Private Individuals That It Knows Their Business Better Than They Know It Themselves.

In Truth It May Be Laid Down As An Almost Universal Rule That Good Poets Are Bad Critics.