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Herbert Spencer

Works Published inThe Journal of Libertarian StudiesMises Daily ArticleLeft and Right

Herbert Spencer was one of the leading 19th-century English radical individualists. He began working as a journalist for the laissez-faire magazine The Economist in the 1850s. Much of the rest of his life was spent working on an all-encompassing theory of human development based upon the ideas of individualism, utilitarian moral theory, social and biological evolution, limited government, and laissez-faire economics.

The image comes from "The Warren J. Samuels Portrait Collection at Duke University."

All Works

Patriotism

War and Foreign Policy

Blog04/26/2021

“When men hire themselves out to shoot other men to order, asking nothing about the justice of their cause, I don’t care if they are shot themselves.”

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The Right to Ignore the State

Free MarketsPhilosophy and MethodologyPrivate Property

04/15/2021Mises Daily Articles
The rule of the many by the few we call tyranny; the rule of the few by the many is tyranny also ... "You shall do as we will, and not as you will," is in either case the declaration.
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The Man versus The State Audiobook

Political Theory

12/31/2014Mises Media
Freedom must also mean freedom from the state . Download the complete audio book here.
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On Moral Education

EducationPhilosophy and Methodology

08/06/2014Journals
Education is a perennially important and controversial subject, especially in a country as child-centered as the United States. Within libertarian ranks, an unlimited diversity of viewpoint prevails, ranging from rigorous traditionalists to ultra-progressives. Among the numerous Libertarians in the...
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On Moral Education

EducationPhilosophy and Methodology

08/06/2013Mises Daily Articles
Bear constantly in mind the truth that the aim of your discipline should be to produce a self-governing being; not to produce a being to be governed by others.
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