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“In Germany to-day one hears a good deal concerning Socialism, but it is a Socialism that would only be despotism under another name. Individualism makes no appeal to the German voter. He is willing, nay, anxious to be controlled and regulated in all things.

'You get yourself born,' says the German Government to the German citizen, 'we do the rest. Indoors and out of doors, in sickness and in health, in pleasure and in work, we will tell you what to do, and we will see to it that you do it. Don't you worry yourself anything.'

And the German doesn't.

[published in 1900]”
― Jerome K. Jerome, Three Men on the Bummel

“Perhaps the grumbler will object on the ground that he considers p a vital commodity, much more important than q, and that therefore the production of p should be expanded and that of q restricted. If this is really the meaning of his criticism, he is at variance with the valuations of the consumers. He throws off his mask and shows his dictatorial aspirations. Production should not be directed by the wishes of the public but by his own despotic discretion.”
― Ludwig von Mises, Profit and Loss

“Let us be prepared to set aside the habits of our own day and to honour the past as a treasure of neglected and forgotten, but still living, possibilities. There is no other way to escape the indignity of the despotism inflicted by our provinciality in time, no other way to regain the freedom only history can afford. We had let ourselves be convinced that history is useless. Much too late it began to dawn on us how narrowly this confines our horizons, how our growth is stunted when we seek nothing in history but contradiction or reinforcement, instead of frolicking carelessly and selflessly in its meadows, led only by curiosity.”
― Emil Staiger