Thread by @DrGJackBrown

1/ THREAD:
"The mass of men serve the state thus,
not as men mainly,
but as machines, with their bodies.
They are the standing army,
and the militia, jailers, constables, posse comitatus, etc.
In most cases, there is no free exercise whatever
of the judgment or the moral sense;

2/
but they put themselves on a level with wood and earth and stones;
wooden men can perhaps be manufactured that will serve the purpose as well.
Such command no more respect than men of straw or a lump of dirt.
They have the same sort of worth only as dogs and horses.

3/
Yet such as these even are commonly esteemed good citizens.
Others — as most legislators,
politicians,
lawyers,
ministers,
and officeholders —
serve the state chiefly with their heads;
and, as they rarely make any moral distinctions,

4/
they are as likely to serve the devil,
without intending it,
as God.

5/
A very few,
as heroes,
patriots,
martyrs,
reformers in the greater sense,
and men,
serve the state with their consciences also,
and so necessarily resist it for the most part;
and they are commonly treated as enemies by it."

Henry David Thoreau
from "Civil Disobedience"