"This must be said: There are too many 'great' men in the world--legislators, organizers, do-gooders, leaders of the people, fathers of nations, and so on, and so on. Too many persons place themselves above mankind; they make a career of organizing it, patronizing it, and ruling it."
--Frederic Bastiat, The Law, 1850

Agreed. Bastiat was so great.

Bastiat has 'great' in quotation marks, but I wonder whether his comment doesn't also apply to classical magnanimity.

Why would it?

Actually, he probably does mean people who fancy themselves to be magnanimous.

But people who are magnanimous are rarely those who like to pat themselves on the back for it.

Ralph-- does the magnanimous man "make a career of organizing, patronizing, and ruling" mankind?

I think you can't stand the idea of someone else saying something rather insightful -- otherwise, why do try, often graspingly as in this case, to put yourself above each quote?

Skeptic,

You're too kind. If I understand Bastiat (and who knows with all the grasping I do), I don't find his remark insightful. The point I was hinting at is that libertarian types hate the notion that some men are better than most, and that the former should rule the latter.

"You're too kind. If I understand Bastiat (and who knows with all the grasping I do), I don't find his remark insightful. The point I was hinting at is that libertarian types hate the notion that some men are better than most, and that the former should rule the latter." -Ralph

Libertarians know that the men who are better than most and the men who want to rule the rest are two different types.

'Libertarians know that the men who are better than most and the men who want to rule the rest are two different types.'

Not necessarily.

Almost universally so, yes. Sorry if that spoils your power-worship.

Almost universally? What possible evidence could you offer in support of this claim?

The job description more or less requires a person of low morals: Aggressing against others, taking credit for everything good that happens to them, avoiding blame for any possible mistakes, and begging them for more money so that you can continue to decide how they would best run their lives.

Oh yes, and of course the key feature of the state: It allows no competition for the services it provides, outlawing and persecuting any who would attempt to do so. Of course, because it knows that it does not provide satisfactory services, and can survive only by enforced monopolies.

Leaders, who needs 'em?

The weak.

P.S: Actually, leaders serve a great societal function. But you were talking about rulers, specifically. Changing your tune?

Here I am using 'leader' and 'ruler' as synonyms. Your claim that only the weak need rulers is absurd. It implies that all forms of political community, except for actual democracy, are solely for the weak.

Actually it would imply that actual democracy was also undesirable.

Ralph -- You get sarcastic with Ben T when he says the obvious: "...the men who are better than most and the men who want to rule the rest are two different types." If you don't see this truth yourself and you want it on better authority than Ben T, look to Aristotle and Plato. Otherwise you might listen to Hesiod: he who neither knows himself, nor can learn from one who does is a useless person.

More seriously, Bastiat, I suspect, puts 'great' in scare quotes not because he thinks that no one is better than others at given skills or virtues (this is a stretch on your part), but because people who style themselves as 'great' by setting themselves up to rule other people are usually not actually so.