When the last of the Reformers died, religion, instead of emancipating the nations, had become an excuse for the criminal art of despots. Calvin preached, and Bellarmine lectured; but Machiavelli reigned.
LORD ACTONThe science of politics is the one science that is deposited by the streams of history, like the grains of gold in the sand of a river; and the knowledge of the past, the record of truths revealed by experience, is eminently practical, as an instrument of action and a power that goes to making the future.
More Lord Acton Quotes
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The minority can seldom resist. But from the absolute will of an entire people there is no appeal, no redemption, no refuge but treason.
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It is bad to be oppressed by a minority, but it is worse to be oppressed by a majority.
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History provides neither compensation for suffering nor penalties for wrong.
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Great men are almost always bad men.
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Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority: still more when you superadd the tendency or the certainty of corruption by authority.
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The issue which has swept down the centuries and which will have to be fought sooner or later is the people versus the banks.
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The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the majority.
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A public man has no right to let his actions be determined by particular interests. He does the same thing as a judge who accepts a bribe. Like a judge he must consider what is right, not what is advantageous to a party or class.
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The will of the people cannot make just that which is unjust.
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Ink was not invented to express our real feelings.
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The true natural check on absolute democracy is the federal system, which limits the central government by the powers reserved, and the state governments by the powers they have ceded.
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Feudalism made land the measure and the master of all things.
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Liberty is the prevention of control by others. This requires self-control and, therefore, religious and spiritual influences; education, knowledge, well-being.
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The strong man with the dagger is followed by the weak man with the sponge.
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Those who have more power are liable to sin more; no theorem in geometry is more certain than this.
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There are many things the government cant do, many good purposes it must renounce. It must leave them to the enterprise of others. It cannot feed the people. It cannot enrich the people. It cannot teach the people. It cannot convert the people.
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A wise person does at once, what a fool does at last. Both do the same thing; only at different times.
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Liberty, next to religion has been the motive of good deeds and the common pretext of crime, from the sowing of the seed at Athens, 2,460 years ago, until the ripened harvest was gathered by men of our race
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Character is tested by true sentiments more than by conduct. A man is seldom better than his word.
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Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise and fall, but the moral law is written on the tablets of eternity.
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Official truth is not actual truth.
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Democracy generally monopolizes and concentrates power.
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The mills of God grind slowly.
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The true guide of our conduct is no outward authority, but the voice of God, who comes down to dwell in our souls, who knows all our thoughts, to whom are owing all the truth we know, and all the good we do; for vice is voluntary, and virtue comes from the grace of the heavenly spirit within.
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Far from being the product of a democratic revolution and of an opposition to English institutions, the constitution of the United States was the result of a powerful reaction against democracy, and in favor of the traditions of the mother country.
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When you perceive a truth, look for the balancing truth.
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