“By such words, Hydarnes, you give us no good counsel,” replied the Lacedaemonians, “because you have experienced merely the advantage of which you speak; you do not know the privilege we enjoy. You have the honor of the king’s favor; but you know nothing about liberty, what relish it has and how sweet it is. For if you had any knowledge of it, you yourself would advise us to defend it, not with lance and shield, but with our very teeth and nails.”
–Étienne de la Boétie, The Politics of Obedience: The Discourse of Voluntary Servitude
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On page 53 Étienne de la Boétie said “…the Israelites who, without any compulsion or need appointed a tyrant.” Well I am no Biblical scholar but it seems to me that Samuel and his sons had the monopoly on judging and Samuel’s sons were corrupt so the Israelites asked for a king to judge them.
[...] In recognition of the Fourth, I wanted to repost a quote from Etienne de la Boetie’s The Politics of Obedience: The Discourse of Voluntary Servitude that appeared on the Mises Institute’s Circle Bastiat blog earlier this week: [...]