Those who know the least obey the best.

The line expresses a paradox about authority and knowledge: people with the least understanding are often the most compliant, while those who know more are likelier to question, resist, or demand reasons. Read as social satire (very much in keeping with Restoration/early eighteenth-century comedy), it can also imply that obedience is not necessarily a virtue but a symptom of ignorance—an indictment of systems that prefer uncritical followers. Alternatively, it can be taken more conservatively as a comment on discipline: those without expertise should defer to better judgment. The sting of the aphorism lies in its ambiguity—whether it praises obedience or exposes how easily the uninformed are governed.