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Terror consists mostly of useless cruelties perpetrated by frightened people in order to reassure themselves.

— Friedrich Engels

La Terreur, das sind großenteils nutzlose Grausamkeiten, begangen von Leuten, die selbst Angst haben, zu ihrer Selbstberuhigung.

Original text (German)

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More quotes by Friedrich Engels

The capitalists soon had everything in their hands and nothing remained to the workers.

Principles of Communism (1847)

Hegel was the first to state correctly the relation between freedom and necessity. To him, freedom is the insight into necessity.

Big industry, competition and generally the individualistic organization of production have become a fetter which it must and will shatter.

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Abolish competition and replace it with association.

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Freedom does not consist in any dreamt-of independence from natural laws, but in the knowledge of these laws, and in the possibility this gives of systematically making them work towards definite ends.

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