The worth of the state, in the long run, is the worth of the individuals composing it.
John Stuart Mill Quotes
That so few now dare to be eccentric marks the chief danger of the time.
It is only the cultivation of individuality which produces, or can produce, well-developed human beings.
Whatever crushes individuality is despotism, by whatever name it may be called.
There is a limit to the legitimate interference of collective opinion with individual independence: and to find that limit, and maintain it against encroachment, is as indispensable to a good condition of human affairs, as protection against political despotism.
If it were felt that the free development of individuality is one of the leading essentials of well-being; that it is not a coordinate element with all that is designated by the terms civilization, instruction, education, culture, but is itself a necessary part and condition of all those things; there would be no danger that […]
Eccentricity has always abounded when and where strength of character has abounded; and the amount of eccentricity in a society has generally been proportional to the amount of genius, mental vigor, and moral courage it contained. That so few dare to be eccentric marks the chief danger of the time.
In this age, the man who dares to think for himself and to act independently does a service to his race.
All ideas need to be heard, because each idea contains one aspect of the truth. By examining that aspect, we add to our own idea of the truth. Even ideas that have no truth in them whatsoever are useful because by disproving them, we add support to our own ideas.
But society has now fairly got the better of individuality; and the danger which threatens human nature is not the excess, but the deficiency, of personal impulses and preferences.
