Online Library of Liberty
A collection of scholarly works about individual liberty and free markets. A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.
Herbert Spencer
1820 - 1903
Nationality:
English
Historical Period:
The 19th Century
Groups
Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) 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.”]
See the Timeline of the Life and Work of Herbert Spencer:
Key: events in the author’s life (blue); historical events (green); books & organisations (red)
Titles:
- Author: BOLL 22 The Right to Ignore the State
- Author: BOLL 55: Herbert Spencer, “Political Retrospect and Prospect” (1882)
- Author: An Autobiography, 2 vols. (1904)
- Author: An Autobiography, vol. 1
- Author: An Autobiography, vol. 2
- Author: The Data of Ethics (1879)
- Author: Essays on Education and Kindred Subjects (1861, 1911)
- Author: Essays: Scientific, Political and Speculative, 3 vols. (1891)
- Author: Essays: Scientific, Political and Speculative, Vol. 1
- Author: Essays: Scientific, Political and Speculative, Vol. 2
- Author: Essays: Scientific, Political, and Speculative, vol. 3
- Author: First Principles (1867)
- Author: Justice: Being Part IV of the Principles of Ethics (1891)
- Author: The Man versus the State (1885 ed.)
- Author: The Man versus the State, with Six Essays on Government, Society and Freedom (LF ed.)
- Introduction: A Plea for Liberty: An Argument against Socialism and Socialistic Legislation (LF ed.)
- Introduction: A Plea for Liberty: An Argument against Socialism and Socialistic Legislation (1891 ed.)
- Author: Political Institutions, being Part V of the Principles of Sociology
- Author: The Principles of Ethics, 2 vols. (1879) (LF ed.)
- Author: The Principles of Ethics, vol. 1 (LF ed.)
- Author: The Principles of Ethics, vol. 2 (LF ed.)
- Author: The Principles of Psychology (1855)
- Author: The Principles of Sociology, 3 vols. (1898)
- Author: The Principles of Sociology, vol. 1 (1898)
- Author: The Principles of Sociology, vol. 2 (1898)
- Author: The Principles of Sociology, vol. 3 (1898)
- Author: Social Statics (1851)
- Author: The Study of Sociology (1873)
Quotations:
- As if in answer to Erasmus' prayer, Spencer does become a Philosopher of the Kitchen arguing that "if there is a wrong in respect of the taking of food (and drink) there must also be a right" (1897)
- Herbert Spencer makes a distinction between the "militant type of society" based upon violence and the "industrial type of society" based upon peaceful economic activity (1882)
- Herbert Spencer argued that in a militant type of society the state would become more centralised and administrative, as compulsory education clearly showed (1882)
- Herbert Spencer takes "philosophical politicians" to task for claiming that government promotes the "public good" when in fact they are seeking "party aggrandisement" (1843)
- Herbert Spencer concludes from his principle of equal freedom that individuals have the Right to Ignore the State (1851)
- Herbert Spencer on the pitfalls of arguing with friends at the dinner table (1897)
- Herbert Spencer worries that the violence and brutalities of football will make it that much harder to create a society in which individual rights will be mutually respected (1879)
- Spencer on voting in elections as a screen behind which the wirepullers turn the sovereign people into a puppet (1882)
- Spencer on voting as a poor instrument for protecting our rights to life, liberty, and property (1879)
- Spencer on spontaneous order produced by "the beneficent working of social forces" (1879)
- Herbert Spencer on the prospects for liberty (1882)
- Herbert Spencer on human nature and the right to property (1851)
- Herbert Spencer on the State's cultivation of "the religion of enmity" to justify its actions (1884)
- Herbert Spencer on customs which are the result of human action but not of deliberate design (1876)
- Herbert Spencer on the idea that society is a spontaneous growth and not artificially put together (1860)
- Herbert Spencer on the superiority of private enterprise over State activity (1853)
- Herbert Spencer notes that traditionally the growth in government revenue has come about because of war (1882)
- Herbert Spencer observes that class structures emerge in societies as a result of war and violence (1882)
- Herbert Spencer on "the seen" and "the unseen" consequences of the actions of politicians (1884)
- Herbert Spencer on the right of political and economic “dissenters” to have their different beliefs and practices respected by the state (1842)