David A. Wells Quote
Perhaps, but you fail to see the folly of the Reishi, Bragador said. The concentration of power that allowed them to ensure peace for so long was the very thing that made them such a potent threat to peace when their power corrupted them, as power inevitably does. So what’s the solution? Alexander asked, a bit more defiantly than he would have liked. Simple … humans must learn to live without government, Bragador said. Government, organized force, is the repository of evil. It is the source of corruption, the enemy of civilization and the problem with the world. As long as there is a place where concentrated power resides, it will attract evil people like dung attracts flies. The only solution is to remove the pile of dung. What about crime? What about other countries with powerful governments bent on war? How can there be peace without authority? Alexander asked. Therein lies the human dilemma, Bragador said. There will always be those who call for greater and greater control, out of fear or ignorance or greed. Until humanity learns restraint in governance, learns how to limit the power it grants to its leaders, learns that those who crave power over others are always deceivers, your kind will know only war and despair. If we haven’t learned that lesson by now, I doubt we ever will, Alexander said. Some will, most won’t, Bragador said. Selfish interest is a powerful motivator. Governments can always be bought or manipulated or blackmailed to set rules that favor some at the expense of others. Evil people see government as a weapon to be used for their own purposes while spreading the lie that it exists to protect the innocent or ensure fairness or defend against some distant threat. The truth is, government has always existed for one single reason … the profit and power of those in government. Of course, there are always those working within government who are good and decent people. But those who vie for power, they can never be trusted.
Perhaps, but you fail to see the folly of the Reishi, Bragador said. The concentration of power that allowed them to ensure peace for so long was the very thing that made them such a potent threat to peace when their power corrupted them, as power inevitably does. So what’s the solution? Alexander asked, a bit more defiantly than he would have liked. Simple … humans must learn to live without government, Bragador said. Government, organized force, is the repository of evil. It is the source of corruption, the enemy of civilization and the problem with the world. As long as there is a place where concentrated power resides, it will attract evil people like dung attracts flies. The only solution is to remove the pile of dung. What about crime? What about other countries with powerful governments bent on war? How can there be peace without authority? Alexander asked. Therein lies the human dilemma, Bragador said. There will always be those who call for greater and greater control, out of fear or ignorance or greed. Until humanity learns restraint in governance, learns how to limit the power it grants to its leaders, learns that those who crave power over others are always deceivers, your kind will know only war and despair. If we haven’t learned that lesson by now, I doubt we ever will, Alexander said. Some will, most won’t, Bragador said. Selfish interest is a powerful motivator. Governments can always be bought or manipulated or blackmailed to set rules that favor some at the expense of others. Evil people see government as a weapon to be used for their own purposes while spreading the lie that it exists to protect the innocent or ensure fairness or defend against some distant threat. The truth is, government has always existed for one single reason … the profit and power of those in government. Of course, there are always those working within government who are good and decent people. But those who vie for power, they can never be trusted.
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About David A. Wells
Born in Springfield, Massachusetts, he graduated from Williams College in 1847. In 1848 he joined the staff of the Springfield Republican newspaper, where he invented a device to fold papers. He graduated from the Lawrence Scientific School at Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1851, where he worked with Louis Agassiz. Also in 1851, he was appointed assistant professor at the Lawrence Scientific School, and was lecturer on chemistry and physics at Groton Academy. He edited The Annual of Scientific Discovery from 1850 to 1866. He invented devices for textile mills, and wrote The Science of Common Things (1857) and Wells's Principles and Applications of Chemistry (1858); Wells's First Principles of Geology (1861) and Wells's Natural Philosophy (1863), which went through fifteen editions as a college textbook.
He was a strong supporter of Abraham Lincoln during the American Civil War, writing pamphlets that reassured investors of the soundness of Lincoln's financial policies. He first attained reputation as a political economist by an address on “Our Burden and Our Strength,” read before a literary society of Troy in 1864. It discussed the resources of the United States in regard to the nation's debt-paying ability, and attracted the attention of President Lincoln, who appointed him in 1865 chairman of a three-member National Revenue Commission. In this capacity Wells was the first to collect economic and financial statistics for government use. The commission's recommendations became law in 1866.
President Andrew Johnson made him a special commissioner of the revenue. The Reports of the Special Commissioner of the Revenue, 1866-69 recommended the use of stamps in the collection of revenue on liquor and tobacco. Wells was instrumental in abolishing the many petty taxes which had been imposed during the Civil War, and originated most of the important forms and methods of internal revenue taxation adopted from 1866 to 1870.
In 1867, Wells studies the costs of production in Europe. He started as a high-tariff supporter, but finding that high wages in America made for efficiency as compared with the backward methods of competing countries, he was converted to free trade, and became a leading advocate of abolition of the tariff. He was an advisor to his close friend, Congressman James Garfield, on tariff matters, and later to Grover Cleveland.
As chairman of the New York state tax commission, his Local Taxation (1871) was a highly influential analysis. The problem was New York was losing business to neighboring states with lower taxes. He was an active consultant to the railroad industry.
He served as delegate to the Democratic National Conventions, and ran unsuccessfully for Congress from Connecticut in 1876 and 1890, and he made many speeches in each of Cleveland's campaigns.
Wells died at Norwich, Connecticut, which had been his residence since 1870. He was married, May 9, 1860, to Mary Sanford Dwight, by whom he had one son; a second wife and a son survived him.