I laugh at those peoples, sunk in abasement, who, egged on by demagogues, dare to speak of freedom without having the least notion of it, and who, with hearts full of all the vices of slaves, imagine that to become free…

I laugh at those peoples, sunk in abasement, who, egged on by demagogues, dare to speak of freedom without having the least notion of it, and who, with hearts full of all the vices of slaves, imagine that to become free it is enough to be rebels. Proud and holy freedom! If these poor people could know you, if they knew at what price you are to be won and kept, if they felt how much stricter your laws are than the heaviest yoke of tyrants, their feeble souls, slaves to passions that ought to be suppressed, would fear you a thousand times more than bondage; they would flee from you in horror, as from a burden about to crush them.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau