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Quotation by Henry David Thoreau
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Henry David Thoreau (3060)Additional Sources
"After the Death of John Brown" (1860) Houghton Mifflin (1906)"A Plea for Captain John Brown" (1859) Houghton Mifflin (1906)"Appendix" (1864) in The Maine Woods (1864) Houghton Mifflin (1906)"Autumnal Tints" (1862) Houghton Mifflin (1906)"A Walk to Wachusett" (1843) Houghton Mifflin (1906)
I heartily accept the motto, "That government is best which governs least"; and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which also I believe,—"That government is best which governs not at all"; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have.
Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862), U.S. philosopher, author, naturalist. "Civil Disobedience," originally published as "Resistance to Civil Government" (1849), in The Writings of Henry David Thoreau, vol. 4, p. 356, Houghton Mifflin (1906).
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Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. Except as otherwise permitted by written agreement, the following are prohibited: copying substantial portions or the entirety of the work in machine readable form, making multiple printouts thereof, and other uses of the work inconsistent with U.S. and applicable foreign copyright and related laws.
