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The State always moves slowly and grudgingly towards any purpose that accrues to society's advantage, but moves rapidly and with alacrity towards one that accrues to its own advantage; nor does it ever move towards social purposes on its own initiative, but only under heavy pressure, while its motion towards anti-social purposes is self-sprung.

— Albert Jay Nock Our Enemy, the State (1935)

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More quotes by Albert Jay Nock

You do not know, and will never know, who the Remnant are, nor what they are doing or will do.

Isaiah's Job (1936)

As against Jesus, the historic choice of the mass-man goes regularly to some Barabbas.

Memoirs of a Superfluous Man (1943)

In any given society the Remnant are always so largely an unknown quantity.

Isaiah's Job (1936)

The mentality of an army on the march is merely so much delayed adolescence; it remains persistently, incorrigibly and notoriously infantile.

Our Enemy, the State (1935)

The positive testimony of history is that the State invariably had its origin in conquest and confiscation. No primitive State known to history originated in any other manner.

Our Enemy, the State (1935)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Albert Jay Nock (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.