Civic Decay Quotes

The mobs of great cities add just so much to the support of pure government as sores do to the strength of the human body.

Pundits, media companies and politicians have discovered that it is emotion, not reason, that wins votes and pulls in eyeballs. It’s fun and lucrative while it lasts, but the Greeks and Romans can tell you precisely what it does to a civilization in the long run.

The word democracy has no meaning. Duty has gone. Only rights remain.

Cities are ruined when they were unable to distinguish worthless citizens from virtuous ones.

The mobs of the great cities add just so much to the support of pure government as sores do to the strength of the human body. It is the manners and spirit of a people which preserve a republic in vigor. A degeneracy in these is a canker which soon eats to the heart of its laws and constitution.

I have never been able to look upon America as young and vital but rather as prematurely old, as a fruit which rotted before it had a chance to ripen.

When public virtue is gone, when the national spirit is fled the republic is lost in essence, though it may still exist in form

If the Constitution framers would come back today, they would have contempt for most of us.