Ludwig von Mises, “Human Action: A Treatise on Economics (Part Two)”, The Mises Institute, 2020.

“The terms society and state as they are used by the contemporary advocates of socialism, planning, and social control of all the activities of individuals signify a deity. The priests of this new creed ascribe to their idol all those attributes which the theologians ascribe to God – omnipotence, omniscience, infinite goodness, and so on.” (p. 151)

“In our time the most powerful theocratic parties are opposed to Christianity and to all other religions which evolved from Jewish monotheism. What characterizes them as theocratic is their craving to organize the earthly affairs of mankind according to the contents of a complex of ideas whose validity cannot be demonstrated by reasoning. They pretend that their leaders are blessed by a knowledge inaccessible to the rest of mankind and contrary to the ideas maintained by those to whom the charisma is denied. The charismatic leaders have been entrusted by a mystical higher power with the office of managing the affairs of erring mankind. They alone are enlightened; all other people are either blind and deaf or malefactors.” (pp. 155-156)

“Experience teaches that this condition – higher productivity achieved under the division of labor – is present because its cause – the inborn inequality of men and the inequality in the geographical distribution of the natural factors of production – is real.” (p. 160)