Spencer, Ortega y Gasset i Mencken o państwie
Be it or be it not true that Man is shapen in iniquity and conceived in sin, it is unquestionably true that Government is begotten of aggression, and by aggression.
— Herbert Spencer, 1850This is the gravest danger that today threatens civilization: State intervention, the absorption of all spontaneous social effort by the State; that is to say, of spontaneous historical action, which in the long-run sustains, nourishes and impels human destinies.
— José Ortega y Gasset, 1922It [the State] has taken on a vast mass of new duties and responsibilities; it has spread out its powers until they penetrate to every act of the citizen, however secret; it has begun to throw around its operations the high dignity and impeccability of a State religion; its agents become a separate and superior caste, with authority to bind and loose, and their thumbs in every pot. But it still remains, as it was in, the beginning, the common enemy of all well-disposed, industrious and decent men.
— Henry L. Mencken, 1926
Źródło: Albert Jay Nock, Our Enemy – The State