Now, labour being in itself a pain, and man being naturally inclined to avoid pain, it follows, and history proves it, that wherever plunder is less … - Frédéric Bastiat

Now since man is naturally inclined to avoid pain — and since labor is pain in itself — it follows that men will resort to plunder whenever plunder is easier than work.

men will resort to plunder whenever plunder is easier than work.

When, then, does plunder stop? It stops when it becomes more painful and more dangerous than labor.

What is freedom? It is the sum total of freedoms. To be free, under one’s own responsibility, to think and act, to speak and write, to work and trade, to teach and learn, that alone is to be free.

We cannot wonder enough at the facility with which men resign themselves to continue ignorant of what it is most important that they should know; and we may be certain that such ignorance is incorrigible in those who venture to proclaim this axiom: There are no absolute principles.

Legal plunder has two roots: one of them, as we have already seen, is in human egotism; the other is in false philanthropy. Before