The passion for power over others can never cease to threaten mankind, and is always sure of finding new and unforseen allies in continuing its martyrology.
LORD ACTONThough oppression may give rise to violent and repeated outbreaks, like the convulsions of a man in pain, it cannot mature a settled purpose and plan of regeneration, unless a new notion of happiness is joined to the sense of present evil.
More Lord Acton Quotes
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Government rules the present. Literature rules the future.
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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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Democracy generally monopolizes and concentrates power.
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False principles, which correspond with the bad as well as with the just aspirations of mankind, are a normal and necessary element in the social life of nations.
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Socialism easily accepts despotism. It requires the strongest execution of power — power sufficient to interfere with property.
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Fanaticism in religion is the alliance of the passions she condemns with the dogmas she professes.
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There should be a law to the People besides its own will.
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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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To develop and perfect and arm conscience is the great achievement of history.
LORD ACTON -
Ink was not invented to express our real feelings.
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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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When the revolutionary theory of government began to prevail, and Church and State found that they were educating for opposite ends and in a contradictory spirit, it became necessary to remove children entirely from the influence of religion.
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From the absolute will of an entire people there is no appeal, no redemption, no refuge but treason.
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History is not a burden on the memory but an illumination of the soul.
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Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end.
LORD ACTON