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History, to be above evasion or dispute, must stand on documents, not on opinions.

Lord Acton

Limitation is essential to authority. A government is legitimate only if it is effectively limited.
LORD ACTON

Authority Essential Limitation
Opinions alter, manners change, creeds rise and fall, but the moral law is written on the tablets of eternity.
LORD ACTON

Change Creed Eternity Fail Fall Law Manner Moral Opinion Table Tablet
Liberty and good government do not exclude each other; and there are excellent reasons why they should go together.
LORD ACTON

Emna Excellent Good Government Higher Mean Political Reason Together
And remember, where you have a concentration of power in a few hands, all too frequently men with the mentality of gangsters get control. History has proven that.
LORD ACTON

Concentration Control Frequently Hand Men Mentality Peace Power Remember
I cannot accept your canon that we are to judge Pope and King unlike other men, with a favorable presumption that they do no wrong.
LORD ACTON

Accept Do Favorable Judge King Men Pope Power Presumption Unlike Wrong
The possession of unlimited power corrodes the conscience, hardens the heart, and confounds the understanding.
LORD ACTON

Atheism Confound Heart Possession Ultimate Understanding
Monarchy hardens into despotism. Aristocracy contracts into oligarchy. Democracy expands into the supremacy of numbers.
LORD ACTON

Aristocracy Contract Democracy Fanaticism Number Religious
History provides neither compensation for suffering nor penalties for wrong.
LORD ACTON

Compensation History Penalties Provide Suffering
Be generous before you are just. Do not temper mercy with justice.
LORD ACTON

Before Generous Justice Mercy Temper
The will of the people cannot make just that which is unjust.
LORD ACTON

Make People Power Unjust Will
Character is tested by true sentiments more than by conduct. A man is seldom better than his word.
LORD ACTON

Character Conduct Men Personality Sentiment
A generous spirit prefers that his country should be poor, and weak, and of no account, but free, rather than powerful, prosperous, and enslaved.
LORD ACTON

Account Country Ensalve Generous Powerful Spirit
Though 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.
LORD ACTON

Convulsion Evil Give Man Men Oppression Outbreak Pain Purpose Repeat Settle Violent
The 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.
LORD ACTON

Gold Grainm Stream Knowledge Past Politics River Rivers Sand Science
The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern: every class is unfit to govern.
LORD ACTON

Clas Class Danger Every Govern Particular Unfit
It is bad to be oppressed by a minority, but it is worse to be oppressed by a majority.
LORD ACTON

Bad Majority Minority Oppress

History, to be above evasion or dispute, must stand on documents, not on opinions.

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History, to be above evasion or dispute, must stand on documents, not on opinions.

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Popular Authors

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