The expectation that people will be able to confine government as we know it -- that is, government without explicit, voluntary, individual consent -- to a limited sphere and to prevent it from acting arbitrarily is nothing but wishful thinking. It’s as if one acquired a baby Burmese python to keep at home. At first, all might be well; the snake might even be useful in consuming mice and other pests. Yet, it would naturally continue to grow, and one’s pets would begin to disappear. One day, it would be found coiled around one of the children. And not long afterward, the householder himself might find it had caught hold of him and was crushing the life out of him. The snake cannot be blamed; it does only what is in its nature to do. Governments as we know them, whether we blame them or not, also do what is in their nature to do: they increase their size, scope, and power until they become tyrannical and, ultimately, destroy the economy and other means of their own support; whereupon new governments are founded and begin their own relentless growth.