| Ludwig von Mises | It is an enormous simplification to speak of the American mind. Every American has his own mind. | Theory and History | pp. 191-92 | America |
| Ludwig von Mises | Those politicians, professors and union bosses who curse big business are fighting for a lower standard of living. | Theory and History | p. 147 | AntiTrust Laws |
| Ludwig von Mises | The enjoyment of art and literature presupposes a certain disposition and susceptibility on the part of the public. Taste is inborn to only a few. Others must cultivate their aptitude for enjoyment. | Theory and History | p. 63 | Arts |
| Ludwig von Mises | Only stilted pedants can conceive the idea that there are absolute norms to tell what is beautiful and what is not. They try to derive from the works of the past a code of rules with which, as they fancy, the writers and artists of the future should comply. But the genius does not cooperate with the pundit. | Theory and History | p. 63 | Arts |
| Ludwig von Mises | It is a hopeless task to interpret a symphony, a painting, or a novel. The interpreter at best tries to tell us something about his reaction to the work…. There are no words to describe the ineffable. | Theory and History | p. 276 | Arts |
| Ludwig von Mises | Behaviorism fails to explain why different people adjust themselves to the same conditions in different ways. | Theory and History | p. 245 | Behaviorism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Behaviorism proposes to study human behavior according to the methods developed by animal and infant psychology. It seeks to investigate reflexes and instincts, automatisms and unconscious reactions. But it has told us nothing about the reflexes that have built cathedrals, railroads, and fortresses, the instincts that have produced philosophies, poems, and legal systems, the automatisms that have resulted in the growth and decline of empires, the unconscious reactions that are splitting atoms. | Theory and History | pp. 245-46 | Behaviorism |
| Ludwig von Mises | The big business enterprises are almost without exception corporations, precisely because they are too big for single individuals to own them entirely. The growth of business units has far outstripped the growth of individual fortunes. | Theory and History | p. 118 | Big Business |
| Ludwig von Mises | Grumblers may blame Western civilization for its materialism and may assert that it gratified nobody but a small class of rugged exploiters. But their laments cannot wipe out the facts. Millions of mothers have been made happier by the drop in infant mortality. Famines have disappeared and epidemics have been curbed. | Theory and History | p. 334 | Capitalism |
| Ludwig von Mises | Choosing ultimate ends is a personal, subjective, individual affair. Choosing means is a matter of reason, choosing ultimate ends a matter of the soul and the will. | Theory and History | p. 15 | Choice |
| Ludwig von Mises | It was not the Syllabus of Pope Pius IX that paved the way for the return of intolerance and the persecution of dissenters. It was the writings of the socialists. | Theory and History | p. 68 | Christianity |
| Ludwig von Mises | What distinguishes civilized man from a barbarian must be acquired by every individual anew. | Theory and History | p. 293 | Civilization |
| Ludwig von Mises | In the unhampered market economy there are no privileges, no protection of vested interests, no barriers preventing anybody from striving after any prize. | Theory and History | p. 114 | Class Mobility |
| Ludwig von Mises | Collectivism is a doctrine of war, intolerance, and persecution. If any of the collectivist creeds should succeed in its endeavors, all people but the great dictator would be deprived of their essential human quality. They would become mere soulless pawns in the hands of a monster. | Theory and History | p. 61 | Collectivism |
| Ludwig von Mises | When the collectivist extols the state, what he means is not every state but only that regime of which he approves, no matter whether this legitimate state exists already or has to be created. | Theory and History | p. 254 | Collectivism |
| Ludwig von Mises | There are no irreconcilable conflicts between selfishness and altruism, between economics and ethics, between the concerns of the individual and those of society. | Theory and History | pp. 54-55 | Conflict |
| Ludwig von Mises | Great Britain would not have gone socialist if the Conservatives, not to speak of the Liberals, had not virtually endorsed socialist ideas. | Theory and History | p. 319n | Conservatism |
| Ludwig von Mises | The essence of an individuals freedom is the opportunity to deviate from traditional ways of thinking and of doing things. | Theory and History | p. 378 | Conservatism |
| Ludwig von Mises | The essence of an individuals freedom is the opportunity to deviate from traditional ways of thinking and of doing things. | Theory and History | p. 378 | Creativity |
| Ludwig von Mises | Every quantity that we can observe is a historical event, a fact which cannot be fully described without specifying the time and geographical point. The econometrician is unable to disprove this fact, which cuts the ground from under his reasoning. He cannot help admitting that there are no behavior constants. | Theory and History | p. 10 | Econometrics |
| Ludwig von Mises | A technological invention is not something material. It is the product of a mental process, of reasoning and conceiving new ideas. The tools and machines may be called material, but the operation of the mind which created them is certainly spiritual. | Theory and History | p. 109 | Entrepreneurs |
| Ludwig von Mises | Talk about the magnificence of untouched nature is idle if it does not take into account what man has got by desecrating nature. | Theory and History | pp. 218-19 | Environment |
| Ludwig von Mises | The egalitarian doctrine is manifestly contrary to all the facts established by biology and by history. Only fanatical partisans of this theory can contend that what distinguishes the genius from the dullard is entirely the effect of postnatal influences. | Theory and History | p. 331 | Equality |
| Ludwig von Mises | The idea of equal distribution of land is a pernicious illusion. Its execution would plunge mankind into misery and starvation, and would in fact wipe out civilization itself. | Theory and History | p. 354 | Equality |
| Ludwig von Mises | It is only the passionate pro-socialist zeal of mathematical pseudo-economists that transforms a purely analytical tool of logical economics into an utopian image of the good and most desirable state of affairs. | Theory and History | p. 367 | Equilibrium |
| Ludwig von Mises | The distinction between an economic sphere of human life and activity and a noneconomic sphere is the worst of their fallacies. | Theory and History | pp. 37677 | Freedom |
| Ludwig von Mises | The characteristic feature of a free society is that it can function in spite of the fact that its members disagree in many judgments of value. | Theory and History | p. 61 | Freedom |
| Ludwig von Mises | It is an illusion to expect that despotism will always side with the good causes. | Theory and History | p. 372 | Government |
| Ludwig von Mises | Man is not the member of one group only and does not appear on the scene of human affairs solely in the role of a member of one definitive group. | Theory and History | p. 257 | Groups |
| Ludwig von Mises | Each individual is the only and final arbiter in matters concerning his own satisfaction and happiness. | Theory and History | p. 13 | Happiness |