The action of social revolution and the reaction of guarding against such revolution or combating it once it has begun are the causes of a great deal of the human misery with which history is permeated.

Isaac Asimov The Naked Sun (1957), chapter 10, “A Culture is Traced”, p. 312 Verified source · How we source quotes
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Where this quote comes from

This is the closing sentence of a longer passage in Isaac Asimov's 1957 novel The Naked Sun, from chapter 10, "A Culture is Traced". The passage pictures every civilization as a pyramid: leisure and the chance to pursue happiness grow toward the top, where fewer and fewer people live. Those lower down, however well off in absolute terms, always look dispossessed next to the apex. That gap keeps societies in constant friction, and the passage ends by naming revolution, and the effort to prevent or fight it, as a major source of misery in history.

Source: The Naked Sun (1957), chapter 10, “A Culture is Traced”, p. 312

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