An Enemy of the People

You see, the point is that the strongest man in the world is he who stands most alone.

The majority is never right. Never, I tell you! That's one of these lies in society that no free and intelligent man can help rebelling against. Who are the people that make up the biggest proportion of the population -- the intelligent ones or the fools?

You should never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for freedom and truth.

The most dangerous enemy of the truth and freedom amongst us is the compact majority

The strongest man in the world is he who stands most alone.

A party is like a sausage machine, it grinds up all sorts of heads together into the same baloney ...

Oh, yes--you can shout me down, I know! But you cannot answer me. The majority has might on its side--unfortunately; but right it has not.

I am in revolt against the age-old lie that the majority is always right.

There is so much falsehood both at home and at school. At home one must not speak, and at school we have to stand and tell lies to the children.

What sort of truths are they that the majority usually supports? They are truths that are of such advanced age that they are beginning to break up. And if a truth is as old as that, it is also in a fair way to become a lie, gentlemen.

Oh yes, right—right. What is the use of having right on your side if you have not got might?

But a scientific man must live in a little bit of style.

You should never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for freedom and truth, Author

The idol of Authority must be shattered in this town.

Dr. Stockmann. I have already told you that what I want to speak about is the great discovery I have made lately--the discovery that all the sources of our moral life are poisoned and that the hole fabric of our civic community is founded on the pestiferous soil of falsehood.

The right? Ah, what does it help to be in the right if you don't have any power?

A normally constituted truth lives, let us say, as a rule seventeen or eighteen, or at most twenty years—seldom longer.

A community is like a ship; everyone ought to be prepared to take the helm.

Dr. Stockmann: Yes, I can afford it now. Katherine tells me I earn almost as much as we spend. Peter Stockmann: Almost—yes!

...det kan da vel, for fanden, aldri i evighet være rett at de dumme skal herske over de kloke.

A maioria nunca tem razão! Esta é a maior mentira social que já se disse! Todo o cidadão livre deve protestar contra ela. Quem se constitui na maioria dos habitantes de um país? As pessoas inteligentes ou os imbecis? Estamos todos de acordo, penso eu, em afirmar que, em se considerando o globo terrestre como um todo, os imbecis formam uma maioria esmagadora.