John Stuart Mill Quotes About Opinions

Quotes about: Opinions

• If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.

  John Stuart Mill

  Freedom, Philosophy, Differences

  On Liberty ch. 2 (1859)

• He who knows only his own side of the case (argument) knows little of that. His reasons may be good, and no one may have been able to refute them. But if he is equally unable to refute the reasons on the opposite side, if he does not so much as know what they are, he has no ground for preferring either opinion

  John Stuart Mill

  Opposites, Doe, May

  John Stuart Mill (1989). “J. S. Mill: 'On Liberty' and Other Writings”, p.38, Cambridge University Press

• The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.

  John Stuart Mill

  Opportunity, Errors, Race

  John Stuart Mill, Jeremy Bentham, John Troyer (2003). “The Classical Utilitarians: Bentham and Mill”, p.163, Hackett Publishing

• Let not any one pacify his conscience by the delusion that he can do no harm if he takes no part, and forms no opinion. Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing.

  John Stuart Mill

  Men, Good Man, Needs

  "On Education" (1867)

• Protection, therefore, against the tyranny of the magistrate is not enough; there needs protection against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling, against the tendency of society to impose, by other means than civil penalties, its own ideas and practices as rules of conduct on those who dissent from them.

  John Stuart Mill

  Mean, Practice, Ideas

  John Stuart Mill (1864). “On Liberty”, p.13

• To refuse a hearing to an opinion, because they are sure that it is false, is to assume that their certainty is the same thing as absolute certainty. All silencing of discussion is an assumption of infallibility.

  John Stuart Mill

  Hearing, Opinion, Assuming

  John Stuart Mill, Jeremy Bentham, John Troyer (2003). “The Classical Utilitarians: Bentham and Mill”, p.163, Hackett Publishing

• How can great minds be produced in a country where the test of great minds is agreeing in the opinion of small minds?

  John Stuart Mill

  Country, Greatness, Mind

• We can never be sure that the opinion we are endeavoring to stifle is a false opinion; and if we were sure, stifling it would be an evil still.

  John Stuart Mill

  Evil, Liberty, Would Be

  On Liberty ch. 2 (1859)

• In this age, the mere example of non-conformity, the mere refusal to bend the knee to custom, is itself a service. Precisely because the tyranny of opinion is such as to make eccentricity a reproach, it is desirable, in order to break through that tyranny, that people should be eccentric.

  John Stuart Mill

  Order, Break Through, People

  John Stuart Mill (1989). “J. S. Mill: 'On Liberty' and Other Writings”, p.67, Cambridge University Press

• Truth gains more even by the errors of one who, with due study and preparation, thinks for himself, than by the true opinions of those who only hold them because they do not suffer themselves to think.

  John Stuart Mill

  Philosophy, Thinking, Errors

  John Stuart Mill (1859). “On Liberty”, p.62

• the only way in which a human being can make some approach to knowing the whole of a subject, is by hearing what can be said about it by persons of every variety of opinion, and studying all modes in which it can be looked at by every character of mind. No wise man ever acquired his wisdom in any mode but this; nor is it in the nature of human intellect to become wise in any other manner.

  John Stuart Mill

  Wise, Character, Men

  John Stuart Mill (1865). “On Liberty”, p.12

• All political revolutions, not affected by foreign conquest, originate in moral revolutions. The subversion of established institutions is merely one consequence of the previous subversion of established opinions.

  John Stuart Mill

  Political Revolution, Moral, Opinion

  John Stuart Mill (2009). “Dissertations and Discussions”, p.56, Cosimo, Inc.

• In this age, the mere example of non-conformity, the mere refusal to bend the knee to custom, is itself a service. Precisely because the tyranny of opinion is such as to make eccentricity a reproach, it is desirable, in order to break through that tyranny, that people should be eccentric. Eccentricity has always abounded when and where strength of character has abounded; and the amount of eccentricity in a society has generally been proportional to the amount of genius, mental vigor, and moral courage which it contained. That so few now dare to be eccentric, marks the chief danger of the time.

  John Stuart Mill

  Character, Order, Break Through

  John Stuart Mill (2003). “Mill's On Liberty”, p.81, Agora Publications, Inc.

• On religion in particular, the time appears to me to have come, when it is a duty of all who, being qualified in point of knowledge, have, on mature consideration, satisfied themselves that the current opinions are not only false, but hurtful, to make their dissent known.

  John Stuart Mill

  Hurtful, Opinion, Mature

  John Stuart Mill (2015). “Autobiography John Stuart Mill: Top Biography”, p.20, 谷月社

• It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the pig, are of a different opinion, it is because they only know their own side of the question.

  John Stuart Mill

  Pigs, Different, Fool

  John Stuart Mill, Jeremy Bentham, John Troyer (2003). “The Classical Utilitarians: Bentham and Mill”, p.102, Hackett Publishing

• Stupidity is much the same all the world over. A stupid person's notions and feelings may confidently be inferred from those which prevail in the circle by which the person is surrounded. Not so with those whose opinions and feelings are an emanation from their own nature and faculties.

  John Stuart Mill

  Stupid, Circles, Feelings

  John Stuart Mill, Harriet Taylor Mill (2015). “Essays on Sex Equality”, p.151, University of Chicago Press

• However unwillingly a person who has a strong opinion may admit the possibility that his opinion may be false, he ought to be moved by the consideration that, however true it may be, if it is not fully, frequently, and fearlessly discussed, it will be held as a dead dogma, not a living truth.

  John Stuart Mill

  Strong, May, Opinion

  John Stuart Mill (1864). “On Liberty”, p.64

• There is a limit to the legitimate interference of collective opinion with individual independence: and to find that limit, and maintain it against encroachment, is as indispensable to a good condition of human affairs, as protection against political despotism.

  John Stuart Mill

  Political, Independence, Limits

  John Stuart Mill (1864). “On Liberty”, p.14

• So long as an opinion is strongly rooted in the feelings, it gains rather than loses in stability by having a preponderating weight of argument against it.

  John Stuart Mill

  Long, Feelings, Weight

  John Stuart Mill, Harriet Taylor Mill (2015). “Essays on Sex Equality”, p.126, University of Chicago Press

• The real advantage which truth has, consists in this, that when an opinion is true, it may be extinguished once, twice, or many times, but in the course of ages there will generally be found persons to rediscover it

  John Stuart Mill

  Spiritual, Real, Understanding

  John Stuart Mill (1913). “On Liberty: The philosophical work that changed society for ever”, p.42, Harriman House Limited

• Every man who says frankly and fully what he thinks is so far doing a public service. We should be grateful to him for attacking most unsparingly our most cherished opinions.

  John Stuart Mill

  Freedom, Grateful, Men

• Popular opinions, on subjects not palpable to sense, are often true, but seldom or never the whole truth.

  John Stuart Mill

  Truth, Halloween, Opinion

  John Stuart Mill (2015). “On Liberty, Utilitarianism and Other Essays”, p.45, OUP Oxford

• There is never any fair and thorough discussion of heretical opinions... The greatest harm done is to those who are not heretics, and whose whole mental development is cramped and their reason cowed, by the fear of heresy.

  John Stuart Mill

  Speech, Done, Development

  John Stuart Mill (1864). “On Liberty”, p.61

• It is useful that while mankind are imperfect there should be different opinions, so is it that there should be different experiments of living; that free scope should be given to varieties of character, short of injury to others.

  John Stuart Mill

  Character, Different Opinions, Imperfect

  "On Liberty: Mill's Works".

• The principles which men profess on any controverted subject are usually a very incomplete exponent of the opinions they really hold.

  John Stuart Mill

  Men, Principles, Opinion

  John Stuart Mill (2015). “On Liberty, Utilitarianism and Other Essays”, p.260, OUP Oxford

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