All history is only one long story to this effect: men have struggled for power over their fellowmen in order that they might win the joys of earth at the expense of others, and might shift the burden of life from their own shoulders upon those of ot

William Graham Sumner

Men Order Power

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The men who start out with the notion that the world owes them a living generally find that the world pays its debt in the penitentiary or the poor house

— William Graham Sumner

If you want a war, nourish a doctrine. Doctrines are the most frightful tyrants to which men are ever subject, because doctrines get inside a man's reason and betray him against himself. Civilized men have done their fiercest fighting for doctrines.

— William Graham Sumner

Men never cling to their dreams with such tenacity as at the moment when they are losing faith in them, and know it, but do not dare yet to confess it to themselves.

— William Graham Sumner

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The men who start out with the notion that the world owes them a living generally find that the world pays its debt in the penitentiary or the poor house.

— William Graham Sumner

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Furthermore, the unearned increment from land appears in the United States as a gain to the first comers, who have here laid the foundations of a new State.

— William Graham Sumner

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