James Russell Lowell

"Democracy is nothing more than an experiment in government, more likely to succeed in a new soil, but likely to be tried in all soils, which must stand or fall on its own merits as others have done before it. For there is no trick of perpetual motion in politics any more than in mechanics."

3 likes

Source: William Makepeace Thackeray, John Henry Newman, Matthew Arnold, John Ruskin, Walter Bagehot (1910). “Essays, English and American: With Introductions and Notes”

About the author

James Russell Lowell

James Russell Lowell

Poet, Essayist

James Russell Lowell was an American poet and essayist known for his advocacy of social reform and his influential work, 'The Biglow Papers.'

All quotes by James Russell Lowell →

Same author

More quotes by James Russell Lowell

See all →
James Russell Lowell Poet, Essayist

"What visionary tints the year puts on, When falling leaves falter through motionless air Or numbly cling and shiver to be gone! How shimmer the low flats and pastures bare, As with her nectar Hebe Autumn fills The bowl between me and those distant hills, And smiles and shakes abroad her misty, tremulous hair!"

Read quote