85 Quotes by Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

Liberty is not the daughter but the mother of order.

We want property, but property restored to its proper limits, that is to say, free distribution of the products of labour, property minus usury!

The proprietor, producing neither by his own labor nor by his implement, and receiving products in exchange for nothing, is either a parasite or a thief.

Justice is a faculty that may be developed. This development is what constitutes the education of the human race.

In any given society the authority of man over man runs in inverse proportion to the intellectual development of that society.

I stand ready to negotiate, but I want no part of laws: I acknowledge none; I protest against every order with which some authority may feel pleased on the basis of some alleged necessity to over-rule my free will. Laws: We know what they are, and what they are worth! They are spider webs for the rich and mighty, steel chains for the poor and weak, fishing nets in the hands of government.

To be governed is, under pretext of public utility and in the name of the general interest, to be laid under contribution, drilled, fleeced, exploited, monopolized, extorted from, exhausted, hoaxed and robbed; then, upon the slightest resistance, at the first word of complaint, to be repressed, fined, vilified, annoyed, hunted down, pulled about, beaten, disarmed, bound, imprisoned, shot, judged, condemned, banished, sacrificed, sold, betrayed, and, to crown all, ridiculed, derided, outraged, dishonored.

the government can do nothing for you. But you can do everything for yourselves

Anarchy is order, government is civil war.