Albert Jay Nock Quote on State and Church

"Instead of recognizing the State as ‘the common enemy of all well-disposed, industrious and decent men,’ the run of mankind, with rare exceptions, regards it not only as a final and indispensable entity, but also as, in the main, beneficent. The mass-man, ignorant of its history, regards its character and intentions as social rather than anti-social; and in that faith he is willing to put at its disposal an indefinite credit of knavery, mendacity and chicane, upon which its administrators may draw at will." Albert Jay Nock

"On a metaphysical level, the State, whether real or imagined, is a faith based deity existing in the minds of its believers, generally based on a combination of the adoration of a Great Man along with an illogical fear of a Bogeyman in conjunction with an unblinking faith in the political process. That faith in turn relies on a dramatic opera-like performance on the part of politicians as they attempt to appear relevant, while the shadow government of bureaucrats and corporate/banking puppet masters attempts to remain unseen. All the while the State struggles to provide services it claims the monopolistic right to provide, while miserably failing at providing those services. On the occasion that the State's true nature is revealed and its failures exposed, it always responds by sending in waves of lies by actors on all levels, while systematically discrediting, beating down, or murdering anyone who shines the light on those failures. The State relies on an incredibly delicate balancing act between the disinterest of its victims, the imagery of a functioning political process, and faith in government-lead progress toward some mythical idea of a better tomorrow, in contrast with the reality of a non-functional puppet political process and an ever growing ever consuming Beast, driving humanity toward world-wide slavery at best, and species wide destruction as a very real possibility." Ben Stone