Benjamin Rush Quotes

There are no great lords who possess everything and a herd of people who have nothing

An imbalance between the rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics.

Class structures are a luxury that we cannot afford.

Our democracy may have an aristocracy of talent, as Jefferson said – which is fine – but we don’t want everyone else to be left out. Something like that seems to be happening, though.

Is the great working class oppressed? Yes, undoubtedly it is. God has intended the great to be great and the little to be little.

The prime culprit in causing contemporary social inequality seems to be merit.

If Eleanor Roosevelt has her way, how are we going to tell the rich from the poor?

The gap between aspiration and reality could hardly be wider. Today, the United States has less equality of opportunity than almost any other advanced industrial country. Study after study has exposed the myth that America is a land of opportunity. This is especially tragic: While Americans may differ on the desirability of equality of outcomes, there is near-universal consensus that inequality of opportunity is indefensible.

A Plowman on his knees is higher than a Gentleman on his legs.

Subordination tends greatly to human happiness. Were we all upon an equality, we should have no other enjoyment than mere animal pleasure.

I reject absolutely the idea that people should know their place, and know their class.

They cannot divide us by saying that you're middle class or you're lower class.

I don't believe in social equality, and they know it.

In every commercial state, notwithstanding any pretension to equal rights, the exaltation of a few must depress the many.

Every society naturally divides itself into classes. The author of nature has bestowed on some greater capacities than on others--birth, education, talents and wealth, create distinctions among men as visible and of as much influence as titles, stars and garters. In every society, men of this class will command a superior degree of respect--and if the government is so constituted as to admit but few to exercise the powers of it, it will, according to the natural course of things, be in their hands.

Aristocracy is naturally abhorrent to me, and adored equality is my idol.

There is also an artificial aristocracy founded on wealth and birth, without either virtue or talents;... The artificial aristocracy is a mischievous ingredient in government, and provision should be made to prevent its ascendancy.

In America everybody is of the opinion that he has no social superiors, since all men are equal, but he does not admit that he has no social inferiors.

The middle class is always a firm champion of equality when it concerns a class above it; but it is its inveterate foe when it concerns elevating a class below it.

I am no leveller; I look upon an artificial equality as equally pernicious with a factitious aristocracy; both depressing the energies and checking the enterprise of a nation.

Income inequality is not a bad thing. Income inequality is a good thing.

Distinction in society will always exist under every just government. Equality of talents, of education, or of wealth can not be produced by human institutions.

There is a natural aristocracy among men. The grounds of this are virtue and talent.

The higher classes constitute the mind of the single large whole of humanity; the lower classes constitute its limbs;

All men would then be necessarily equal, if they were without needs. It is the poverty connected with our species which subordinates one man to another. It is not inequality which is the real misfortune, it is dependence.