The essence of Government is power and power lodged as it must be in human hands will ever be liable to abuse.

We need a government alas because of the nature of humans.

All government indeed every human benefit and enjoyment every virtue and every prudent act is founded on compromise and barter.

The worst government is often the most moral. One composed of cynics is often very tolerant and humane. But when fanatics are on top there is no limit to oppression.

We are fast approaching the stage of the ultimate inversion: the stage where the government is free to do anything it pleases while the citizens may act only by permission which is the stage of the darkest periods of human history the stage of rule by brute force.

Government is an unnecessary evil. Human beings when accustomed to taking responsibility for their own behavior can cooperate on a basis of mutual trust and helpfulness.

If human beings are fundamentally good no government is necessary if they are fundamentally bad any government being composed of human beings would be bad also.

War is war. The only good human being is a dead one.

May joy and good fellowship reign and in this manner may the Olympic Torch pursue its way through ages increasing friendly understanding among nations for the good of a humanity always more enthusiastic more courageous and more pure.

Everyone who wants to do good to the human race always ends in universal bullying.

And I hope that five years and 10 years from now I'll be a better man a more mature man a wiser man a more humble man and a more spirited man to serve the good of my people and the good of humanity.

All human beings are commingled out of good and evil.

By cultivating the beautiful we scatter the seeds of heavenly flowers as by doing good we cultivate those that belong to humanity.

To prefer evil to good is not in human nature and when a man is compelled to choose one of two evils no one will choose the greater when he might have the less.

There is in general good reason to suppose that in several respects the gods could all benefit from instruction by us human beings. We humans are - more humane.

Human felicity is produced not as much by great pieces of good fortune that seldom happen as by little advantages that occur every day.

I believe that every human mind feels pleasure in doing good to another.

The care of human life and happiness and not their destruction is the first and only object of good government.

Just as treasures are uncovered from the earth so virtue appears from good deeds and wisdom appears from a pure and peaceful mind. To walk safely through the maze of human life one needs the light of wisdom and the guidance of virtue.

On the whole human beings want to be good but not too good and not quite all the time.

Charity. To love human beings in so far as they are nothing. That is to love them as God does.

In my country of South Africa we struggled for years against the evil system of apartheid that divided human beings children of the same God by racial classification and then denied many of them fundamental human rights.

All of us are guinea pigs in the laboratory of God. Humanity is just a work in progress.

It is the creative potential itself in human beings that is the image of God.