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If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.

— John Stuart Mill On Liberty (1859)

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Mind

More quotes by John Stuart Mill

One person with a belief is a social power equal to ninety-nine who have only interests.

On Representative Government (1861)

How can great minds be produced in a country where the test of a great mind is agreeing in the opinions of small minds?

Egoists: A Book of Supermen (1909)

I deny that anyone knows, or can know, the nature of the two sexes, as long as they have only been seen in their present relation to one another.

The Subjection of Women (1869)

Whatever is known to us by consciousness, is known beyond possibility of question. What one sees or feels, whether bodily or mentally, one cannot but be sure that one sees or feels.

A System of Logic (1843)

Since the state must necessarily provide subsistence for the criminal poor while undergoing punishment, not to do the same for the poor who have not offended is to give a premium on crime.

Principles of Political Economy (1848)

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The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents.

H. P. Lovecraft The Call of Cthulhu (1926)

Anyone who believes exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a madman or an economist.

Kenneth Boulding to Kenneth Boulding in: United States. Congress. House (1973)

The greater part of humanity is too much harassed and fatigued by the struggle with want, to rally itself for a new and sterner struggle with error.

Friedrich Schiller On the Aesthetic Education of Man (1794)

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

George Bernard Shaw Maxims for Revolutionists (1903)

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