[This is Albert Jay Nock’s (1870–1945) introduction to Spencer’s forgotten 1884 classic, The Man versus the State .] In 1851 Herbert Spencer published a treatise called Social Statics; or, The Conditions Essential to Human Happiness Specified. Among other specifications, this work established and made clear the fundamental principle that society
[This essay first appeared in the American Mercury in March 1939.] As well as I can judge, the general attitude of Americans who are at all interested in foreign affairs is one of astonishment, coupled with distaste, displeasure, or horror, according to the individual observer’s capacity for emotional excitement. Perhaps I ought to shade this
Introduction Unhappiness and Enervation The State’s Business Service and Servitude The New Absolutism Our Enemy, The State [This article originally appeared in Scribner’s in March 1935; it is now the introduction to Our Enemy, The State .] For almost a full century before the Revolution of 1776, the classic enumeration of human rights was “life,
[A review of George Bernard Shaw, Everybody’s Political What’s What? (New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1944), Economic Council Review of Books , Volume II, no. 6, February 1945, published in New York by the National Economic Council] There is nowadays a tendency to regard Mr. George Bernard Shaw as somewhat a back number; that is, as a person who has
The Majesty of the Law When I was seven years old, playing in front of our house on the outskirts of Brooklyn one morning, a policeman stopped and chatted with me for a few moments. He was a kindly man, of a Scandinavian blonde type with pleasant blue eyes, and I took to him at once. He sealed our acquaintance permanently by telling me a story
Introduction: Education vs Training Dissatisfaction with American “Education” Tinkering with the Mechanics of Education The Educational Theory of Equality and Democracy The Literate Citizen Classical Education Training, Diluted Science, and Big Numbers Drugstore Education The Great Tradition Sound Theory and a Reasonable Precision in Nomenclature
This essay first appeared in The Atlantic Monthly in 1936. An MP3 version of this article, read by Dr. Floy Lilley, is available for free download . I One evening last autumn, I sat long hours with a European acquaintance while he expounded a political-economic doctrine which seemed sound as a nut and in which I could find no defect. At the end,
[This essay was originally published in The Freeman as “In the Vein of Intimacy,” 1920 and appears for the first time since then on Mises.org .] The editors of this paper and its publisher appreciate more than they can say, the unlooked-for cordiality shown by the press to its first two issues. Influential daily newspapers throughout the country
If we look beneath the surface of our public affairs, we can discern one fundamental fact, namely, a great redistribution of power between society and the State. This is the fact that interests the student of civilization. He has only a secondary or derived interest in matters like price fixing, wage fixing, inflation, political banking,
[From Snoring as a Fine Art ] The most charming city on the Rhine — one of the most charming in all Germany or in the whole wide world for that matter — is the city of Bonn. Tourists usually manage to miss it, and thereby miss a good deal, though their loss is Bonn’s eternal gain, probably; so in the general balance of things one can afford to
What is the Mises Institute?
The Mises Institute is a non-profit organization that exists to promote teaching and research in the Austrian School of economics, individual freedom, honest history, and international peace, in the tradition of Ludwig von Mises and Murray N. Rothbard.
Non-political, non-partisan, and non-PC, we advocate a radical shift in the intellectual climate, away from statism and toward a private property order. We believe that our foundational ideas are of permanent value, and oppose all efforts at compromise, sellout, and amalgamation of these ideas with fashionable political, cultural, and social doctrines inimical to their spirit.
