"The legislator should keep two things constantly before his eyes:—1. The pure theory developed to its minutest details; 2. The particular condition of actual things which he designs to reform."
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Ch. 16 (tr. Joseph Coulthard)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Limits_of_State_Action
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The Limits of State Action
The Limits of State Action (German: Ideen zu einem Versuch die Grenzen der Wirksamkeit des Staats zu bestimmen) is a philosophical treatise by Wilhelm von Humboldt, which is a major work of the German Enlightenment. Though written in the early 1790s, it was not published in its entirety until 1852, long after von Humboldt's death in 1835. It was a significant source for the ideas that John Stuart Mill popularized in his 1859 book On Liberty.
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